In the attached photograph I'm trying to capture the skyline and use a slow shutter to create the lights in the road effect, but in order not to blow out the extremely bright lights on the building near the center and to get good focus throughout the image I used f/11. The EXIF data is f/11, ISO 100, 29 seconds, Nikon 24-70mm lens @ 24mm. No filters. I've seen a lot of your pictures where you manage to capture the shadows and still not blow out the bright lights. I managed to get a pretty good correction in PP, but I should be able to get a much better image straight from my Nikon D850. Your help and advice would be most appreciated. Thank you all in advance.

So I decided to go exploring in my current city of residence - took an hour and half bus ride to get to the other side of Shenyang (SY is BIG folks!). Wound up beginning my walk at a an old Buddhist monastery called Falun Temple (also known as North Tower Temple) which was built around an old Qing Dynasty tower called Falun Tower (or North Tower). It's one of four towers built back then and has something to do with appeasing the gods of the four winds or some such. Was a very cool, quiet and reflecting visit. I only got a few shots from inside as I was told to be extremely respectful of the many prayer buildings and room housing all kinds of Buddha statues.

Finished up there and the girlfriend decided she wanted to visit a local street market. Spent the rest of the afternoon strolling through that - eating street food, letting her shop, and taking a bunch of snaps. And inevitably saying 'Hello' back to local folks who have never seen a westerner before (much less an American) and wanting to use the one English word they know... "hello!". Except the kids - the kids take English mandatory from 8th grade through the end of university -- when they could overcome the usual shyness they really wanted to practice English. It's that way in every city I've been to in China. :)

In the attached photograph I'm trying to capture the skyline and use a slow shutter to create the lights in the road effect, but in order not to blow out the extremely bright lights on the building near the center and to get good focus throughout the image I used f/11. The EXIF data is f/11, ISO 100, 29 seconds, Nikon 24-70mm lens @ 24mm. No filters. I've seen a lot of your pictures where you manage to capture the shadows and still not blow out the bright lights. I managed to get a pretty good correction in PP, but I should be able to get a much better image straight from my Nikon D850. Your help and advice would be most appreciated. Thank you all in advance.