i took this picture while hiking in the alps last week, but some seems bland,
how could i have made it better?

it lacks contrast IMO. I think it could be a really interesting shot.

Welcome here, Thierry! Very cool shot! I would agree a wee bit more contrast....shallow 's' in curves....would be nice.
Look forward to more from you.

Barry

i tried playing with contrasts in NX2, using the slider, but found the dark areas too dark then, but i don't know much about curves, will play around and see what i can come up with

It was probably a low contrast scene and therefore should not appear too contrasty in the photo. You might try some local contrast enhancement but I wouldn't bother. I'm not sure if there is a simpler way to do that in Capture NX2 but it can be done with Unsharp Mask by using a low amount and a very large radius (the opposite of what you'd normally do for sharpening with USM).

The trees all lean to the left. Is that as they are or was the camera not horizontal ?

- Alan

I like it as it is.
Try to underexpose it a little next time and be careful with sharpening.
Karl

This is really cool. It looks almost like a painting.

I like this very much. If you want to add some subtle punch, you could reopen the file in ACR and lower the blue and cyan luminance a little bit. This would add some contrast in the sky. You could also very slightly dodge some of the tree edges. I think I would keep a very light hand on this, though. The subtle contrasts work for me.

Sharon

thanks for all the feedback.
To Alan, i think you're right... they would look better straight ;o)

To Karl, i am not sure what you mean about the sharpening, if you mean the bright spots in some of the trees (hslo that people get sometimes from too much sharpening), that was natural, the trees were all soaked from 2 days of rain and the bright spots is the sun hitting the drops hanging from the trees, i did a closeup will post it in another post

thierry bordet wrote:
thanks for all the feedback.
To Alan, i think you're right... they would look better straight ;o)

To Karl, i am not sure what you mean about the sharpening, if you mean the bright spots in some of the trees (hslo that people get sometimes from too much sharpening), that was natural, the trees were all soaked from 2 days of rain and the bright spots is the sun hitting the drops hanging from the trees, i did a closeup will post it in another post

Under such conditions when there is diffused light you might get a better result in respect of better contrast when you underexpose a bit. This is not a a dogma only a feeling. Try it out
Karl

thanks Karl,
i tried what you suggested, but the results are not so great i found:

A trick that sometimes works with pictures like that is to add a duplicate layer and change the blend mode to multiply. If it works, it's like magic.

The easiest way is to add a levels adjustment layer, don't make adjustments, just change the blending mode to multiply, and you can vary opacity.