One landscape, two skies

Well, two different sets of clouds, anyway... and the edit is slightly different, mainly the sky exposure.

Which one should I keep ?

IMAGE LINK: https://flic.kr/p/npkY​bd

HTTP response: NOT FOUND | MIME changed to 'image/gif' | Redirected to error image by FLICKR

I like the sky contrast in #1

Very nice shot - no.1 for me.

No. 1 has better color and contrast. But honestly, they don't do much for me from a compisition standpoint. My eye is led right into the middle of the frame, with nothing of interest there. The sky and its reflection don't have any interest either, they appear as negative space to me.

At a slightly different angle, you could've possibly used the reflection as a "golden triangle." That might've worked better here. These types of lake shots are difficult to make interesting. Try shooting low, getting some closer foreground subjects incorporated. Try using a ND filter and getting a longer exposure to smooth out the sky and water. Try different things, get creative with it. Those kinds of things will elevate a shot like this from snapshot status to something more artistic.

I prefer more contrast in both of them.. however, it's all subjective. It appears you prefer a softer look. I think a ND filter may have helped here, also perhaps and object in the foreground of the water, perhaps a large rock or a fallen tree branch...a canoe, row boat...etc etc.

HTTP response: NOT FOUND | MIME changed to 'image/gif' | Redirected to error image by FLICKR

Bianchi wrote in post #16919015
I prefer more contrast in both of them.. however, it's all subjective. It appears you prefer a softer look. I think a ND filter may have helped here, also perhaps and object in the foreground of the water, perhaps a large rock or a fallen tree branch...a canoe, row boat...etc etc.

HTTP response: NOT FOUND | MIME changed to 'image/gif' | Redirected to error image by FLICKR

Thanks, objectively it's a great edit, but a bit too "glossy" for my taste.

on my my monitor the picture has little bit of green tone. for landscapes i personaly like
to have details in clouds as well. and to have little bit more saturated and contrasty picture. here is one edit as per my taste . Taste differ from person to person.

Needs more detail in the clouds. The "glossy" edit there is nice for that reason (you can tone down the glossiness, the point is more about the cloud contrast).
I find a GND filter does wonders on these types of shots.
If you don't have one, then LR has a pretty cool GND tool which I use quite a bit to bring out details in the clouds. In fact, I've made it a preset that I apply to a lot of "bad sky" images I have and it does great.
I think it's something like Exposure -1.0 (adjust to taste), clarity +20, contrast +20.
(I don't mean the overall image settings here, but rather the settings of the GND tool itself).

Hope that helps.

Well, my point is, the clouds in the edits look beautiful, but to my eye completely unnatural.. "glossy" was just a polite way to say it.

As I have said above, I really like the original version #1 as is...if I had to edit anything, I might bring up the detail a bit (esp. the right forest) and crop out the water more in the foreground....note Amamba the sky is untouched but I also like Nattaya's sky.

To bring out definition in clouds, initially a polarized filter would be highly recommended while shooting, especially a scene like this.

As Puckman said, you can use the GF in LR or the Brush as well. However my point is use a polarizer, and you will be doing a lot less editing in LR and get better results, and then tweak as needed in LR

In my edit above, I used neither the GF or Brush in LR, just some adjustments in the Basic and Tone Curve panels.. With the techniques I use, I could of brought out definition in the clouds, however I didn't touch them

If you look at nittaya's sky edit, with the attempt of bringing out definition, color noise was added in red & green shades. That could of been remedied in LR

I think Spikes edit is more in line with your taste and perhaps his, as it appears he left water and sky un touched and added contrast to the tree line on both sides of lake.