A very hard walk!

[Ridg]

Here are the others I've done too.

1st one is nice, but the HDR treatment ruins the photos to a point; does it need to be HDR I can't see there being that great a range to require it?

2nd one again, the levels are wrong IMO the grass looks to be glowing and you're losing contrast / definition to the point the bench almost blends into the grass.

[TheRaven]

The second one the bench is the same colour as the grass and the background is the same colour as that, as you can see from an earlier pic further up, it is the same bench, the inscription on the bench is what I was trying to pic out. B&W was the only thing that stopped them all bleeding into each other and created some definition!

This is someone elses Pic off Flickr to explain what I meant about the colours. This is with a flash I reckon...

Where are the other 49? by suziesue_00, on Flickr

[Ridg]

that's quite though then, without external lighting it's going to be hard to separate the two.  I'd probably select the bench, create an adjustment mask, and lower the exposure on the background to produce some separation.

[Winso]

Nice set, compositions of 3, 4 and 5 I really like. I do think they're all a bit over processed though, just sort of a bit 'over cooked'.

What technique/program are you using to process them? I'd say you're not far off getting it nailed. Just a few tweaks here and there and you'll have it bang on.

[TheRaven]

Using Photomatix Pro, I am getting there, going to re do them when I get the chance, a little bit less.

[Winso]

I used to use that when I was dabbling with HDR a bit. It was always was a fine balance between subtle and overdone looking. Personally the more and more I used it the less and less extreme I got with the processing until I realised that it wasn't really worth using it anymore and just reverted back to Photoshop.

[Ridg]

I use photomatrix for all my HDR blending save as a tiff and then finish in photoshop.

photomatix is great for blending the images, but any adjustments need to be done in the same way you would a normal photo.

[TheRaven]

Yeah that's what I do, think I'll start editing them more in Photoshop though.

[dTEA]

Same here on the compositions...the unnaturalness does detract though.  If it was anything other than landscape of hillside/water it may work to be that processed. 

If you want to use Photomatix to do the layering use LR and export and then import back to do some more subtle tweaks...I like photoshop but LR is soooo much quicker for batch processing...unless you have something extra special you want to do. 

I now have a couple of my own presets that I try on most shots and then minor tweaks in LR...rarely use photoshop but there again mine is playing up and keeps ignoring the live preview changes until i select and reselect a layer...PITA