Birdhouse

Hi Laura

I like your position of view, nicely captured.

Tips,

 your subject needs to be separated from the background, to do this, a wider aperture will blur the background.

I achieved it by using the blur tool.

Depth can be achieved by using the burn tool, I only do this in nature work, not on people. Some burning of the edges, or some bright areas like the top left corner, the fence bar.
You should see the effect of the bird house coming out at you.

I used the Hue/Sat, to bring out colors

And finally, Smart sharpen

Yeah Mike, I really like it too! I'm still trying to learn all the things that photoshop can do to improve pictures. When I started taking pictures I was only concentrating on composition becaue I didn't know what else I could look for (I was about 14 at the time). Just lately I've been trying to play around with the depth of field on things to create different looks, but I've only tried  it on flowers, I didn't even think to try it on this shot, so thanks for the tips!

I was just visiting in Riverton. My grandparents live up there, so I feel like I've half grown up in that area just because we visit so much. I was up there this weekend for a cousin's wedding, but now I'm back in California. :-( I'm hoping to move to Orem within the next year...But that's off topic... 

Very nice photo!  Cute to have the tailfeathers of the bird sticking out of the birdhouse.  I love what Mike did to enhance this photo.

~Julita~