My plant growing skills improved but I feel aquascaping is lacking. I'm not really sure what to do. I feel like it just doesn't have that wow or cool factor.
With that being said, you have the hardscape of a 3-stone iwagumi which is the obvious focal area, then you have the tall stem on the right and somewhat on the left that is not really connected to the stone arrangement. IMO it would look better if everything was connected (behind the stones) and trimmed in cohesion with the stone arrangement.
OR
You can just get rid of the stems and put some mid-ground plants in front of the rocks and let your carpet fill in. Others might chime in and get even more detailed by that's the bulk of it.
I think it looks great! Just let the carpet fill in a little bit more! And and maybe some nice plants to let them grow half way up like star grass which is a great fast growing plant.
The colors are very vibrant! And plants look very healthy. So that's already awesome.
IMO, the foreground needs to fill in mostly. But also, there aren't much mid ground plants. So the transition from foreground to background is nearly nonexistent on the left and right of the tank. You did a good job trimming the stems to be a transition but it doesn't really look natural like that. I agree with @houseofcards that the right side looks to be disconnected with the rest of the tank, and if you imagine the tank without that side completely, that would actually make a pretty nice scape. This looks to be a pretty big tank. So you could also add another stone on the right.
I love the vibrant red you have in there! I would definitely go with the aquascape #2 and add some midground plants as well or bit of driftwood +anubias?
And I don't know but I´m particularly keen on the simplicity the right side of the tank.
The red fish are cherry barbs. I have about 20-24 fish in this tank, you can barely see them. It's a 80 gallon tank. After studying Amano's books, I noticed he has at least 1 fish per gallon of water (ie. rainbowfish, congo tetras, larger schooling fish etc.). For his tetra/rasbora (smaller fish) single species tanks, he has at least 2 fish per gallon of water. Only then do the fish start appearing to compliment an aquascaped tank. Good news for me - I need to add 50-100 more small fish.
Good job that looks so much better. Everthing works with the rotala at that height. When it goes to high it will take away from the main focal area, but you can always trim or eventually replace with something not as tall.
Reason why people liked it after you trimmed down your Rotalas was because your hardscape, the rocks, are too small for the whole scape. Once the Rotalas gets taller and bushy, they just completely over take the focus of your hardscape and 1:Just a bunch of Rotalas by themselves are not too much to look at, and 2: Plants and hardscape are doing their own thing instead of working together to make the main focus pop.
Which fixture do you have? I've got a 36" ATI Dimmable Sunpower 6 Bulb but only run a bank of four. What Bulb combination are you using? I love the color.
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