Entrance to Lost Maples State Natural Area

Today's photo is of the entrance of Lost Maples State Natural Area, located near Vanderpool, Texas. The sign and (for now, at least) brightly colored tree are the first things that you see when you enter the park (it also helps that if you have never been before, it is kind of hard to miss, which acts as a visual way-point that is extremely helpful!).

I wanted to really bring out the color of the reddish-orange of the maples and distinguish them from the the background colors (and the foreground of the fence) so I selected everything except the trees and desaturated the colors a bit, giving the color a bit more "pop". It is a technique I read about on how to make autumn colors stand out a bit more and I think it worked pretty well. It is definitely something that you could get too carried away with but I think I managed to maintain a pretty good sense of realism while ensuring that the contrasting color does stand out a bit more. (Oh, the wonders and joy of post-processing!).

As always, any questions or comments are very much appreciated!

Entrance to Lost Maples State Natural Area