Tell me if you think they are overworked. I shot the photos and did all post work. This is the first time I shot as well as retouched the photos. I'm afraid, I'm pushing it too far. Yet, i'm trying to define my own style.

A little info on what was done. For the two images that don't show the house, the original photos were created using HDR. This gave me a really saturated image with nice details in the shadows. For the car that is on the driveway, I worked the image to increase contrast and to make the background dark. But I kept the details in the wheels and on the grills. The scoop on the side of the car though seems to be a casualty. But I still like the contrast here. Gives the image a real grit. I laso reworked the windows.

The vertical image is not HDR. But I desaturated the top half of the image. I actually added some orange in the sky to complement the car, but I waffled back and forth on whether I liked it or not. In the end, I reduced it down to almost gray. Now I'm thinking I should have left it in.

With the car with the doors open, I did very little retouching at all. Just adjusted the contrast a little and blurred and darkened around the edges. I think I'll go back and fix the windows. I think if I had a polarizing filter it would have been nicer.

Love the orange against the green. Personally, I'll change the green a :) little, but the work you've done is good, not at all over the top.

GOOD JOB

In the first two pictures the bushes in the background are in focus above the car whilst out of focus at either side, this does not look "natural" as they are all at approximately the same distance from the camera.

It draws your eye from the car, which is meant to be the focus of the pictures.

I agree with Gary. There are two focal points. The car and that one tree in the background behind it.

I agree with all the comments so far. Also, it seems if you're using the principles of HDR, there is a lot more tonal range you can squeeze out of the car. attached is a quick example though with the compression of the JPG it begins to loose clear detail pretty quick. You would have much better results if you did this with the original image.

That's real nice. Tell me what you did. I think, though that it's just a little too much contrast. The detail in the tire starts to dissappear and the windshiled's glare is a bit too harsh for my taste. And the reflections on the car are distracting. I used to do a lot of work for Porsche and they never wanted any reflections on their cars.

But still, it's a perfectly acceptable image to me. It just goes to show, you can work an image as much as you want to acheive what you're looking for.

You're right, it really all goes to taste. I just thought the image you submitted looked a little flat so a bumped up the contrast selectively. The reflections may be a little harsh though a lot has to do with the compression of the file I started working with and the recompression to put it up here. The problem with no reflections is you don't get a sense of the material. After a while the car starts to look like it's made out of orange marshmellow. If you find the reflections distracting you can try touching them up so they are more stylized and less actual reflections of the objects around the car. Still, I think it needs a little reflection.

Enough babble, on to the process:
The process is actually just hand drawn HDR principles. What I did was make separate layers that target the contrast of the different parts of the image. I then masked everything but those parts of the image. This gives incredible control over just how much or how little detail you want/need. The car was obviously touched up to my taste but you can easily do it your way with as much or as little contrast as you would like. I do recommend a little more variation in the car to make it more dimensional.

Thanks. I really appreciate your input.