Autumn in Colorado

[kkart]

This past Friday I headed up to Golden Gate Canyon outside of Golden, Colorado to take some shots of the Autumn colors. This is one of those shots.
I would REALLY like some honest feedback on this capture. I just woke up and was checkin my email just a minute ago and got one that said this shot had a comment on it somewhere else. So I went and read it and was greeted with "About your picture-- there once was a day when I went out with some Velvia, or Agfa Ultra, or some such "hyper-saturated" film. I underexposed it a tad, for the richest colors. I added an enhancing filter, like that gold-blue polarizer I have. All were good, sound techniques, but they added up to make a gaudy mess of primary crayola colors. And I seldom used those options in combination again. You can do the same, easier and cheaper, these days by moving too many sliders all the way to the right. Not that there's anything wrong with that, but IMHO, these colors belong in a place like Lakeside Amusement Park, not in nature.."....wow, chalk it up to being the worst comment I have ever had on my photography.
Does it honestly look THAT bad?!?!??

Minolta 5D/ Minolta 18-200 DT lens/ Singh-ray CPL

 

[JoaoC]

Well, you can tell that it's not natural colors, but I like the composition very much! I like the way it looks

 

[John E.]

I like the picture, the log pile makes it interesting.

One cannot please everyone, some photographers try their best to make everthing look real, which is impossible, and kudo's to them. IMO there are only different levels of enhancement and each to their own. I do think the picture would still be good toned down a bit, but that's up to you.

 

[JTHphoto]

it looks a little overdone to me too, but nothing warranting a comment like that.

I wouldn't participate in a community if they were more concerned with how many different ways they could creatively attack a member rather than offering up some constructive criticism from their vast amounts of knowledge.

I agree with J & J above on the comp. well done. i have a stack of shots that are overdone just like this, it's tough with the golds/blues of fall. What's nice about a c. polarizer is that you can adjust the effect by turning it... try different levels of polarization and see how you feel about your results.