Hello everyone,
This vertical pano is an exercise in post-processing being a challenge for me. There was also a terrible flare in the 1st image and sharp shadows against the sun.
I think your highlights are good. The shadows are a bit dark and all your foreground interest is a touch too dark for me.
I’d also work to emphasize the three rocks around the specular highlight in the foreground, I think that’d be really nice.
No doubt it is an interesting scene: a lot is going for it!
I am uncomfortable with the stretching at the corners of the image.
In all honesty its not well lit. I can see you’re trying to utilize some back light, but it just doesn’t work here. 90% of your image is in the shadows. No amount of editing can fix poor lighting.
I agree with @Rick, for me the problem is the lighting. The scene (especially in the sky and snow) is a bit too compressed for my taste, it doesn’t look very natural. I also see some haloing which I find distracting.
It’s very frustrating when you see an interesting scene but the capture just doesn’t turn out the way you thought. It happens to me all the time…
I think it’s an interesting scene and there could be done many things to improve it.
This is a quick and rough edit using Irfanview (I’m currently not on my computer with Darktable)
There are many things I would improve:
edit using Irfanview
As pointed out by Yogi in the ScanDig-Forum one must not use IrfanView for image processing, because it ruins colour management, if colour management is activated and you have a monitor profile. On the other hand, if colour management is not activated the colours are wrong.
As its name indicates, it should be used only to view images.
Hermann-Josef
This isn’t a play raw, and I’m not sure that @mosaster wants his image modified. Perhaps he can clarity.
Well, I’m open to any sort of critique 
let’s say @pphoto has illustrated his. I will, of course read through every comment and maybe, if RAWs are worth uploading, I’ll create a Play RAW game with it.
Shadows are better here. With a proper program one can also take care of highlights.
@mosaster
Have you any plans to deal with the rainbow flare close to the Sun? Flare isn’t of huge size, but can be at least desaturated, if not even cloned away. It can also be a creative element, if you like it.
Just IMHO: if you are going to use this picture online (white page backgrounds and bright screens), shadow recovery is kind of a must. If you print it in big size, a darker image (like the one in your opening post) can be also good and reflect different kind of moods. It depends from room lighting.
Agreed. I’m not planning to use it anywhere seriously. I jave better images. It would look its best only on a print. Social media compression would kill any attraction and its details. I will take care of the shadows and the rainbow (the flare was bigger originally but I managed to cover it with interleaving next frame).
This is just an exercise in recovering damaged highlights and I guess a successful one, cause everyone is complaining about shadows
