Thanks for the tinker time with this one, had lots of fun. Used PS CC 2019 for the edit. A lot of ACR filter was used for sharpening and overall brightness/contrast adjustments, and then in PS itself I gave it a high pass filter for more sharpening. Used the color range to adjust the sky color.

Me too.

Basic steps:
1. use a tool to select just what you want to keep (in this case, the owl) (the better the selection, the better the results)
2. Jump a copy of the selection to it's own layer (CTRL+"J")
3. Turn eyeball "OFF" on original layer (eliminates confusion)
4. Open up your new background image that you want to use and adjust your window view to where you can see both photos at the same time (2 up vertical or 2 up horizontal will work)
5. If you want to move the BG image to the OWL image then make the BG image active, click and drag the "LAYERS PANEL" icon over to the OWL image and then release the mouse. (The new BG should now be copied on the OWL image)
6. If not already there, move the new BG layer below the OWL layer.

DONE...........just do clean up work now

You can change the blue glow color somewhat by using a hue/saturation layer, clicking on the little hand, then clicking on the color that you want to change. You can then use the sliders to change the saturation, lightness, and hue of that particular color, but it is somewhat limited in what color you can change it to. Fun to play with though. Here is a sample with the hue/sat later applied to the "glow cone" above.

As long as you are still in the editing mood/stage, I would up the blur just a tad on the tree shadow, so that it would better match the rest of the shadows in the photo. That would also tend to make it more "believable". Nice work.

Interesting to say the least. I like what it did at the pixel level to give it that unsharp sharpness (that's the only way I know how to describe it). I may go venturing in that direction just to see what I might create with my little ole T3i.

For some reason the photo didn't load. Here is try #2

(Download)

2nd one is definitely my favorite, it has great clarity and a whole bunch of interest to me. Here is what I came up with. It says Majestic to me.

All I can say is "UGH"! Thought I was going pretty good till I took a closer look. I have spent too much time to go back and start over, so it is what it is.

(Download)

Go here: thecoffeeshopblog.com

I know you have elements, but just wanted to see if it could all be done in PS CC 2017. I selected and copied Gramma to new layer, moved her and sized her to more like the others. Adjusted hue and saturation of the other ladies, and cloned out the original area where Gramma was (including the white). If you can work ion layers in Elements, I think you will be able to get it done.

Being from the South, I couldn't let this photo slip by without adding a touch of warmth and brightness to the scene.

(Download)

I thought for sure that I was able to do it a few years ago while making some round crops from rectangle photos, and you would think it would be an easy thing to do. If you can trim away transparent pixels in a regular photo, or selected color pixels, then why not transparent pixels? Tis a puzzler to me.

Sorry, double post.

So if I do need a new card, my card name is "Intel(R) HD Graphics", no other letters or numbers, how hard is it to change out? I have a Lenovo desktop.