Find all the colors in this image...

[ggroess]

Julie,
You are getting very close...try reducing the saturation in the A channel of LAB and see if the colors look better..

If you look at it visually the greens ar3e overdone and the reds are too...therfore...A channel....
Greg

[ggroess]

here we go....

First things first Shadow/Highlight/Neutral in LAB. Shot2 / Shot3

Next I choose the Irish Grass Pin from the pin Gallery because it was the closest to the color of the pine needles I wanted.  Shot4
When I place the pin in the image by dragging it to the point I want the image changes quite a bit.  Shot5 
Notice that CM respects the neutral I pinned earlier.  This will only work for 1 neutral in LAB but you can use 2-3 in RGB sometimes...That is a trial and error process...
Apply the correction and exit CM.

More to come in the next post..
Greg

[ggroess]

Continued from Above...

Shot 6 is the whole image with the grass pin in place.
Now the red of the tree branches is too strong so I need to reduce it.

Open the Image in CM and use RGB mode. 
for shot7:
I selected a spot on the branch that has the color I want to reduce and I right click.  From the fly out menu I select "Mark"  This creates a mark on the RGB curve that represents the values under the mouse.  Switch to the red channel and notice the black spot where the mark is.  This is the area of the curve I want to adjust.

To make the adjustment I have to pin the curve down so my changes do not cause the rest of the curve to whip around and flex too much. 
In Shot 8 you can see the points I set so that the curve was adjusted only for the spots I wanted to adjust.  After the first adjustment I chose another spot to reduce because there was more red in another part of the image. 

Apply CM adjustments and exit CM.

Shot 9 is the Un-Sharp Mask I applied to the image to sharpen.  I did try a Highpass filter as well but in the end I chose the Un-Sharp for this image.  I like the details better.

More to come in the last post....
Greg

[ggroess]

Finally..
I adjusted the unsharp mask layer opacity using the slider as shown in shot 10.

And the final image is posted.  As you can see there was more to the image than meets the eyes...

Greg

[mikemeister_admin]

I don't think this is going to work.  I don't even know what a fly out menu is!  I'll have to spend a bunch of time reading the CM help file, which I admit to not have done. Maybe never will.  I am impressed with what you did on the frosty tree but...I may beg to differ with you prescription to not give up. Maybe after I've used CM's basic features and have more PS experience.

[ggroess]

Mark,
let's get through week 1 and get your mind inside the process a bit. 
If you right click on an image you will see a menu to choose items from...that is a fly out..

Greg