Painted in B and W +++

I think you nailed this, Marylynne. The tones look wonderful and I like the shapes of the hills. The nice sky is an added bonus and really ties everything together. Nicely done!
--P

Very nice Marylynne.  I like the dappled light and the cloudy sky.  I kinda wish there was a bit more of it.   Other than that a fitting b/w for the Painted Hills.  Oh yeah,, too bad you have to go back to work

Thanks, guys.  Gary: did you mean a bit more sky?  
And yeah, that whole "day job" thing sucks during the school year.  It's a binge and purge life for sure.  I'll still take 2.5 months off in summer in exchange for 14 hour days the rest of the year, but man am I looking forward to this next weekend!  I need it.
 

There's a wonderful organic shape to this hill as it fills the frame. It's almost reptilian. I don't think I've ever seen these painted hills done in black and white, but you've shown how good it can be. My only suggestion may be to increase contrast/clarity/texture in that main hill, particularly in the shadow area. It could 'glow' a tad more than it does now. Like the distant hills on the left.

I like this a lot.  While this is a location that I would normally associate with color photography, this has a great tonal range throughout and the lines and textures work well in B&W.  The panoramic format works well also.  I also like that you have included more of the surrounding landscape to give this context. 

Thanks, everyone.  I brushed in some fine structure in the shadow areas at the top of the main hill and lifted the shadows there just a tish.  Let me know if this achieves the result imagined (if you can tell from the smaller file). 

Marylynne,

This scene and image does very well with the b&w presentation. This hasn't been mentioned, so maybe it's just me. To me, it's as if there was a grad/gradient applied here - either on camera or in post, where the bottom of the hill brighter, relative to the top and the sky.  Of course very possible given the puffy-cloud day, but it has the appearance of having a grad line (although not completely straight as one would expect.)

If it's not an issue for you or anyone else, then just chalk it up to me being nitpicky... ;-)  I might think about burning down the lower slope in the LR and maybe even brightening the sky/clouds a tad - if you can do that without losing the nice contrasts that are already present.

Lon

I agree with Lon about the sky, Marylynne. Instead of having a dramatic AA look, which is what I think you're going for, they have a heavy dreary look. If you can change that it would improve the overall feel of the image. But that may be a tall order.

Thanks Lon and Igor.  There was a big difference in the light on the lower flanks of the hill (hole in a cloud) compared to the top.  I did darken the sky because tonally it was not greatly different from the hill tops (although of course in color the blue contrasts with the tans and greens).   I burned the lower right and lifted the sky a bit.  Let me know if you like it better and whether I went far enough.

Thanks as always....my work always improves with your input.
ML

This is excellent, Marylynne. I like your framing and the mottled lighting is beautiful. Final repost looks great.

Marylynne,

Subtle changes, but I like the results and think an improvement.  yeah, I figured it was natural light - a "hole in the clouds" as you mentioned... just the way it played out seemed more like a grad than natural.  Not a huge deal. Thanks for taking the time to re-work.
 

Here is one last version of this scene.  This is a different frame, with slightly less light and shadow from the quick moving clouds, and with more sky.  Just curious whether people like this one better.

This is the sort of sky I would have liked for the earlier posts. I just like the light heartedness of this last image. This is my favorite image. Those clouds look and feel like clouds. Someone wrote that realistic clouds are the hardest thing to achieve. It may be possible that you could add a bit of drama to them and still maintain the optimism they now provide. Thanks for putting all this work into it.