Here is one classic Pompei shot with Vesuvius in the back. Midday sun, crowds all over the place, too bright sky, poor contrast:

Cropping (in Camera Raw) allows focusing on the center temple and eliminates the worst part of the crowd:

Here is the Raw conversion: mainly tone curve for added contrast, graduated filter to pull back the sky and adjustment brush to bring back top of the building and columns that were too dark after the grad filter:

Here are the histograms before (left) and after (right):

One final clone tool in Photoshop removes the unwanted visitors. Voilá:

Posted in POTN here.