This is the original image. It was a rainy overcast day in Washington, but as you can see the cherry blossoms were in full bloom. I like the photo, but it never popped because it is just so dull looking.

This is the same image. I fixed the levels and adjusted the saturation a tiny bit.
I like this photo much better. The sky looks brighter and the photo looks much more inviting. I would like to have the cherry trees brighter and the sky a little darker. So I kept playing...


Alright, so this one I kind went a little smudge crazy! I pumped up the contrast and saturation. I used the select tool and color picker to pick certain colors from the sky and then I played with their color levels...doing each section until I ended up with a very digitized sky. From there I smudged them together to get this look...It's ok, but still not happy with the look I kept playing....

This one drove me CRAZY...it took forever to figure out how to blend the two layers (yeah for e-directions manuals!)....But my hard work payed off. I love this new look and I think with a lot more practice I will only get better...well anyway, no more fun for me today, I'm off to write a paper for my psychology of gender class uggggggg...thank goodness for art classes or I really might go crazy (well a little anyway :)