I cant remember how many times I have aired my opinion on "blown highlights" quite a few now. Anyway Richard, looking at your shot, I would expect that to look similar to the eye which indeed has a much greater tonal range. There are times when blown highlights work/are acceptable and times when they dont work/arent acceptable. I really like your shot, and whilst there are possibly some blown or close to blown highlights, they are controlled and dont IMO detract from the overall image All so subjective anyway, who can really say whether an image that has blown/clipped highlight and shadow is either good or bad, so much depends on the subject matter and what is being portrayed. On the flipside of blown highlight is loss of shadow detail, which you dont want too much of either, like Tom says this can be more forgiving than blown highlights, but will also most likely have more noise lurking in them too, bringing up excessive shadow can really enhance the noise. Love the shot, really like the compo and POV too. Shelia, like your image, think it is well executed, not over exposing the highlights in the arches is probably not possible without the use of artificial light to compensate, which !MO wouldnt have worked as well.

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