It’s time for June’s One Photo Focus Photo Challenge. One Photo Focus is a photography challenge hosted by Stacy Fischer at Visual Venturing. The participants in this challenge edit the same image and share it on the One Photo Focus Forum. You can get more information and join the One Photo Focus monthly challenge at Stacy Fisher’s Visual Venturing. Thanks to David Crocker for letting us practice on his photo. (Scroll to the bottom of the page to see the original photo.)

My process

First, I used Macphun’s Snapheal to remove the electric towers and electric lines.  My hubby says that electric lines are part what we really see; so I should leave them.  I think they are often  distracting when left in a photo.  What do you think – leave them or remove them?

I also cropped just a little off of each side of the photo —  which I think puts more emphasis on the boats.  Next, I uploaded the photo into Macphun’s Aurora HDR.  I used the Architect Bright filter and added one layer of the Soft & Airy filter.

I don’t always like using more than one filter because it often pushes the photo past realistic (in my opinion).  However, in this case I like how the two filters made the colors pop more and added detail to the photo.

Below is the photo after the Architect Bright filter; but before I added the Soft & Airy filter.

Original by David Crocker.

Which version do you like the best?

Thanks to Stacy Fischer for hosting this photography challenge every month and to David Crocker for letting us practice on his photo.