The image itself was not underexposed or the images in the windows would have been dark and that it not the case. Nevertheless selective brightening was indeed a worthwhile approach and taking out the light standard although not easy was also appropriate too.
I like the Re do on this Much Better!! Nice Clone Job on the light, but removing the background bldg. really put it into perspective... a bit more cloning than I would want to take on , and sure after involved , you must have felt the same way..
This would probably be next to impossible to get any straighter I suppose.. but it still has that tilt feel to the left... Think it was because the Orig, shot was not taken dead on , at same level or plane of height as subject.. more or less meaning , you were shooting up some..and really not dead on straight..
The window glass in your orig. seems to be better controlled as far as glare or flare... must be the extra enlarging in second shot changed the previous work ??
but overall , I like what you have here, very interesting shot !! great Patterns !
Thanks for the comments, New England and Paolo. The problem with the allignment was that the building was not square but rather in a slight arc with the edges closer to the camera than the centre. Shooting with a 28 mm from a lower angle compounded the problem. I tried some straightening and lens distortion correction but still have not gotten the results that I want as yet.
By the way, this looks nothing like the original below: