Photoshopping Photography

I have been submitting some of my photography to DeviantArt. I've been enhancing the color on some of them, and have found two very important tools for doing so.
You can make any clear (as in not blurry) photograph have great lighting.
All you need is image>adjustments> levels... (or Ctrl L / Command L).

You bring the outer white and black arrows to where the graph begins and ends. You do it for each of RGB, Red, Green, and Blue, choosing them from the top menu. Then you have to slide the middle ones until you get the "correct" colors you're looking for. Do the RGB one last, as doing the other three increases the brightness. That's all RGB will most likely do, and in combo you may go overboard. Afterward, going to image>adjustments>brightness/ contrast... you can fix the brightness properties as you desire. As you might notice, the bottom one is quite an improvement from the top. I didn't do very much, but the improvement is awesome.