Have I gone too far?

[Simon Bennett]

Back in May a flock of endangered Swift Parrots visited our district and I manage to get some shots of them when the came down out of canopy to drink. I liked the pose of this image, but the tail was obstructed by oof foliage. I have managed to do a tail reconstruction by merging in bits of tail from other images taken at the same time. I also started removing the oof foliage, but have I gone too far with the foliage removal?

Canon 40D, EF500 f/4 + 1.4 tc, tripod, 580Ex flash + gold diffuser, fec +1, evaluative, ISO400, f/7.1, 1/125, image grossly manipulated.

[Simon Bennett]

Here's the original image.

[Bryan Erb]

I like the "reconstructed" image much better. Good PS work.

[Tony Whitehead]

You've done a good job, Simon. The original looks underexposed despite your +1. You have opened it up well and extracted some good detail despite this.

[Ramon M. Casares]

It looks better, no doubt about that, but yes, to me that is just too much PS :)

[James Salywoda]

A far better looking image excellent ps work...... I like the outcome.

[Ken Watkins]

It may not be allowed in WPTY but at least you were there!. Seriously though who would know and why would it matter?

[Daniel Cadieux]

My goodness, you have much more patience than I do when it comes to post processing!! The result is quite striking though...great job! As far as going too far?...if you are comfortable with this, then there is no disputing it...especially that you were very honest about it :-) Keep it up!

[Brandon Holden]

wow! I think you did an awesome Job! I think anything you do in PS is fine, as long as you say what you did! (which you did) and the end result is just fantastic! congrats

[Juan Aragonés]

Superb PS job on this one Simon:eek::eek::eek:, the result is simply stunning and it is OK for me because you are being very honest about that:)