Beach Bed for C&C please

[crimbfighter]

Taken 15 min after sunrise on a beach of a resort in the Dominican Republic. C&C appreciated. In retrospect I wish I would have gone to at least f/5.6 or f/7, but I was running at f/2.8 all morning long due to the low light morning light and forgot to stop it down once the light was sufficient...

Tokina 11-16mm @ 12mm, f/2.8, 1/1000sec, ISO 320, handheld, CPL used

 

[crimbfighter]

Or this one, taken in portrait orientation. Not sure if I like the wooden frame in this one, though.

Tokina 11-16mm @ 11mm, f/2.8, 1/1000sec, ISO 320, handheld, CPL used

 

[Rick50]

The composition is nice but I don't really like the blow out sky. But, I can see there wasn't much you could do at the time.

 

[The_Traveler]

you are not doing yourself justice.
these pictures were uploaded with a color profile of RGB and most browsers see sRGB thus your picture looks flatter and without pop.

if this was shot in raw, those clouds may be recoverable.
if this was a jpeg, surely you have other clouds you could slip in there to recover the blown out spot.

nice picture.

also not sharpened enough

 

[crimbfighter]

Thanks for the suggestions. I was able to adjust the blown out sky a tad with the addition of a GND filter in LR.

The_Traveler, thanks for the feedback. I like your edit. I do shoot in RAW, so I was able to adjust what you were referring to. I recovered the clouds as much as I could with a bump in clarity, both overall and with an adjustment brush. I also sharpened it a bit more, about as far as I could without getting noticeably over sharpened. I also exported it in sRGB. I always get confused as to which color space to use, and forget which one browsers tend to run on.

How is this re-edit?

 

[Rick50]

I like the edit....

 

[The_Traveler]

I think it is much nicer.

 

[paigew]

I like the colors of the new edit but I am not sure I like the wooden frame around the bed. Do you have any with just the bed? It seems busy and cluttered when it should be peaceful/simple.

 

[crimbfighter]

Thanks for the comments on the re-edit. I'm definitely much happier with it the more I look at it.

paigew, unfortunately I don't have any without the frame.. When I first took the shot, I thought it was fun having the wooden frame, kind of showing some of the "features" of this particular beach. But, the more that I think about it, I do see your point, and I wish I had found a similar bed without the frame.. Eh, well. It'll be quite a while before I get to go back there again to try again!