I saw these leaves today in the morning, obviously newly torn by the wind from some tree nearby, and immediately liked the still fresh colors that nicely contrasted with the the dull gray of the pavement. I took them, arranged them to my liking and later, in Photoshop, tried to increase color variety and contrast in the leaves, while at the same time keeping the pavement dull.
This is really an application where Lab color mode shines. All parts of the leaves are yellow as opposed to blue, thus the “Blend if” slider for channel “b” in the blending options almost perfectly isolates the leaves. I still needed some detail work in the mask, but that was much less than I would have needed without blending options. Nice.