I think I get it now.

[tameigh]

You guys have been so generous with your time. I feel like I am ready to leave "newbie" mode.

I did the above brightness and exposure only on ACR, then used Alien Skin Exposure 3 emulating Fuji Velvia 100 F from CS5.

Then a little clone work using layer masks, thank you mythlady.

I shot the picture using EC+, and aperture dependent. Thank you guys for helping me with that. I know it isn't perfect, but I think it is pretty, and I finally understand not just what settings to use, but why and know that getting the shot perfectly is about persistence now.

For the first couple of months I wondered why anybody would swap out a film camera for digital, but of course, all my shots were in snow, and without EC, all of the subjects were underexposed and noisy.

Anyway, I have come a long way from my first thread and I just wanted to thank everybody who helped me.

[Geoff F]

A white subject on snow is always tricky so that has worked well.

And taking your 'training course' one step further; are you familiar with selective sharpening? Using layers and masks or selections to just apply sharpening to the main subject (bird) without sharpening the background.

It can work well if you have a bird against a problem background or sky which is a bit noisy or complicated foliage etc.