To me, “replacing” a sky is not something that I would entertain but “enhancing” the sky like I did here is perfectly acceptable, as is the technique for tinting the sky demonstrated here.
But we already had this conversation back in 2021 and several times since and, as long as you insist on your no-longer relevant mantra…
(To me, it becomes a “photographic illustration” or something similar. )
… you are never going to progress in your photography beyond boring reportage shots of nothing in particular.
Most people do not think in such limited terms and, unless they pixel-peep, would never know what was originally there.
On the subject of bird photography, you are just as guilty of “faking it” by using a lens that doesn’t show how far away the bird was. You, as a photo-journalist, are lying about what you saw. Now, put a 50mm lens on your camera and retake the shot and do not apply any post-processing - that is truly what you saw - a speck in the sky that was barely discernible as a bird.
Oh, and use the same lens and never reframe your shots from your balcony over the bay. What do you get? Boring!!!
Cropping (within reason) is just as much image manipulation as using any other tool in the post-processing box.
By the way, my image of the lamppost is as framed in the camera - it was truly what I saw, taken at a 91mm focal length, to avoid having to crop in PL. I could see more detail of the whispy clouds in the sky, so, just as Ansel Adams would do, I used a red filter and increased the contrast to realise what I experienced when I took the shot.
Or would you say that using a coloured filter on the lens is also “cheating”?
Or is changing contrast, or over-exposing under under-developing to fit 14 stops of range into 8 stops of film changing what you saw? Without that technique B&W film photographers, including press photographers, would never have been able to print half of their work.
Take a look on my website and you will see colour images taken with my LF camera, on Fuji Velvia 100 film, using graduated filters to match the exposure because you can’t change development times on transparency film and, without such filters, the sky, or white sand beach, would be totally over-exposed.
I would dare to say that well over 90% of folks on this forum are not photo-journalists, they just want to create beautiful images.
You are trying too hard. It is a B&W image of an illuminated lamppost taken around dusk, with some detail in the sky.
The sky through the glass will look different because it is curved glass, which distorts things and lends a slight filtering effect.
There are no curved lines visible from the back of the lamp because the material between the lines on the front is translucent.
So your brain can’t cope with a B&W image because it doesn’t appear as “real” as a colour one? How on earth did you cope before colour film existed?
It’s an abstract image of a lamp. That’s all the viewer needs to know. And up-market galleries sell such images for thousands of $/€/£ all the time to discerning clients to decorate their living spaces or offices.