woot!! hanging a sharp left lmao
p.s. hope my wife dont see this comment

Hahahaha, funny! And true XD

The statue of liberty has nothing to do with "Life, liberty & pursuit of God". This is her inscription: "Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame, With conquering limbs astride from land to land; Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name Mother of Exiles. From her beacon-hand Glows world-wide welcome; her mild eyes command The air-bridged harbor that twin cities frame. "Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp!" cries she With silent lips. "Give me your tired, your poor, Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me,
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"

Who cares what it stands for, let’s focus on the obvious. For such a simple chop, you could of at least fixed the left edge of the arm and blend it better. Try filter/liquefy for the edge and clone stamp for the blending. It looks a little fuzzy, even in this resolution and the blend is obviously chopped. Upload a high res so we can see the details of your chop better. In fact, since you did chop so little, why not just crop it from the torso? IMO, you should add more sourceimage to it.

actually dont try and clone it, instead use the burn tool at about 5% and burn it until it matches the tone of the rest of the metal you are blending to. the only thing you should clone is other bits of her dress where you get the seams in the metal, add that too the hand and blend it WELL (yes, not sloppy... whoodathunkit) so that it appears as if it actually belongs to the statue... it would atleast then look like its made of metal instead of stone. its a minor touch up that doesnt really need it, but i thought i would get all nitty gritty based on that last comment posted by jawshoewhah...

I don't get what you did here? Replace a torch with a hand? If thats it then i suggest u make another entry because this is bland and unimaginative. and how is a hand instead of a torch anybetter?

Yes, I forgot to fix the blur on the arm, thank you for that constructive photoshop criticism. As for the metaphor, I'm sorry for those of you who don't get it. But the statue of liberty is an icon of our country and this is just a humorous representation of our country is always pushing "God" on its citizens. Maybe I was wrong in thinking that it was a hot topic in our country. And it's nothing against the torch, that just so happen to be her pointing hand. It's really not that deep, nor was it suppose to be THAT fantastic. Just a laugh, kinda like the land of the blind in the new countries.

This is not a contest of "politically correct";ness . And, were not all American. Or French.

I got it right away.... and understood the message right away.. good luck author,

Ooooooh....Little hot in here....I'd be afraid to put a entry or a comment...lol

I got to give you props on your titles because it's true. This country has more religous nuts and Jesus freaks than any other country in the world. Don't believe me? Just look at the Stupid Laws contest. Most of the dumb laws are religious based.

Wow love this entry so much...great work...just minor observation...rays of light are to hard,make them a bit softer,and the text is not effective,maybe to try with some new font or to delete the text...and with or without changes this is great work...high marks from me and good luck author

Thank you erathion. I think your observation regarding the text is right. I dont know if i can edit it now though since i have already posted this. Im kinda new here.

update: ok i can. Thanks

Author, you can replace any entry and edit in "My stuff, My contests" after you've alrady uploaded it.

Thanks jawshoewhah .

Glad I could help. This is one of thebest I've seen. GL!

very good

great job

You can be commended - especially if you are new. Really great work!! Says so much!

Nice colors. Maybe I'd expect a bit of a distortion of the reflected thistle, because of the ripple effect. Good luck!

A little add on wazowski's comment: enlarge the ripple effect for more impact. Duplicate the layer with the ripple, Ctrl shift U to desaturate it, and add more contrast. Turn off the other layer, and save this as a psd file, different from your entry (it will be your displacement map).After that you can delete this layer. Select the reflection layer, go filters-Distort-Displace and choose the file you previously saved, Afterthat overlay or play with opacity. Do the same with the shadow. If it works it should look really cool, if not, check some tutorials for Displacement.

I ran out of space in the first comment.. Nice exploration path you took there, betting on the contrast. It's simple but it's probably the best from this contest.

To create the ripples i use the "zig zag" filter under the distort menu, and it uses contrast in colours to create a realistic ripple, however the water in this image is too plain, and so the only way for the ripples to actually show was to create many small ones, so unfortunatley the effect can;t be enlarged. I was also trying to create a displacement map for this image but even after desaturation and contrast adjustments the ripples weren't strong enough to create a good displacement map. Thank you very much for the suggestion as well as the positive second comment!

Nice color author

this looks fairly simple but nice end result,,,nice job

Congrats! for 2nd

congrats

Congrats for your second place and a Happy New Year, Matteo!

congrats Matteo!

Your image looks good. Who knows, if there was life in Mars, I think, yes, probably. Good luck author

Thank you guys! Nator, given the finishing I'm used to giving to my works, they not often look nice in low-res

great idea

Clean cut chop and yes just as Nator said, it does look good in high res. Well done, a deserving winner.