The tones of the muted places

This has been edited at PSE 5, Nikon Capture NX and finally at ACDSee

Pro 3. So, definitely not one out of the camera, but this time it was my

intention . Thank you for your time and opinion.

I'm struck by the control of the tones you have achieved here. You say you did quite a bit of processing of the image, so I wonder how far off the original exposure must have been.

 

I particularly like the gap between the lighter and darker forground trees, leading your eyes into the more distant brilliantly lit stand of trees.

 

Nicely done.

Thank you for the kind comment! Actually, the tones are quite unaltered, just a tad opened from the shadowed snow. My main editing was the correcting of the twisted trees. Those two "main" trees were tilted towards each other, because I shot the image with a 12mm lens and had to tilt the camera to catch the fabulous light and tones of the frosted afternoon. I used the Capture NX to convert the RAW image to BW Jpeg, the PSE5 to correct the tilting and finally ACDSee to add the drop shadowed borders.

This is up there with Ansel adams almost. A SPECTACULAR and quite beautiful vista. The commanding presence of the spruce or fir to the right contrasting with the light touch of the deciduous on the left does a good compo. But the light on the tree's snow in the background is what create a stunning picture. i love it. One little criticism...The cemetary stones do not help the picture (imho) because they show the wide angle flaws at the bottom left corner. I would just crop or touch up the stick. actually, I am going to try it, see what it does. catch you later.

It's a detail difference really

I see what you mean and totally agree with you, concerning the tombstones! Thank you for suggesting the improvement and for the provided image. I will try to work something out of this and let you know what kind of version turns out. I must also say that you left me speechless with such a kind comment. Ansel Adams really is the master of BW-photography and I don`t deserve such a fine comparison to be mentioned at the presence of his name! :-) But thank you again for both the comments and the suggested improvement!

I assumed this picture was from a professional and what I said about Ansel Adams, I meant it because I had the exact same emotional reaction seeing your picture than I did seeing soem of hiss Yosemite pictures. I am saying this to you because too often compliments are overdone or exagerated to pet others ego but in this case, I did not care and said that just because I felt it was the truth. I am not an expert at judging pictures so you can't take my word as the word of a professional judge but the fact that it was genuine, for all it's worth....it was. I looked at the rest of your portfolio and you are no slouth, you have some very good stuff...very good indeed.