Hi Kara,
One of the big challenges in photography is coming up with new ideas and seeing beyond the obvious. In this image it looks like you have significantly desaturated and darkened the background while leaving the dandelion alone.
My initial question is, why? What are you trying to say in this photograph?
Is it that this dandelion brings a little dash of colour into an otherwise grey world? Is it that you just like the colour yellow against black? Either way I feel that this photo is just a little too simple.
I think most good photographs should have some degree of sophistication to them. Convey an idea, but then support it with additional information or juxtaposition.
If this photograph is simply an exercise in design then I would get a little more creative in Photoshop… get people wondering what you have done, or how you achieved a visual effect.
In the example below I duplicated the Background layer (in the Layers palette of Photoshop) and then I used to transform tool to enlarge the new layer by 120%. I also changed the layer mode from normal to divide; about now the image should go very bright.
Now here is the kicker, I adjusted the colour of the Background layer by placing Hue and Saturation adjustment layer above it and changing the colour slightly (this adjusment layer needs to be between the Background and the Background Copy layers to work).
Now all you need to do is move the Hue and the Saturation sliders about to get the effect that you desire. Do not forget that you can also move the upper layer about too.
Keep on exploring the options.
Cheers,
Anthony
Dandelion - Image Doctor's edited version
