Moved as requested.
Here are my thoughts. First of all, very good for one month doing Photoshop. Since you come from a photography background, I would say, engage your photographer's eye a bit more.
Post processing often needs to be subtle. But I can understand you are having fun playing with effects and that is how to learn what they are.
Your first image strikes me as being too dark in some areas. I like the atmosphere you created though. If you made your exposure, levels, or curves adjustment as a layer adjustment, you have a layer mask that you can use to delete to any degree the effect of that adjustment on the layer. So you might want to remove some of the darkness by softly brushing black over the mask to lighten the house. I'm not even sure what you did do there because it made the area flat and cloudy looking. The flares are indeed over done but like I said what the heck if it's just for fun.
A big thing to watch out in all your skies is that the highlights are washed out. You don't gain much when you darken them. It only gives them a bland grey cast. Just be careful how far you push them when you make adjustments. Or once you learn how to make selections and blend things, you might want to just change the sky. Or start out with multiple exposures. Just my opinion.
The second I don't like. All effect and the colors do nothing for me.
The other two with the sharpening filter? As you suggested, they are a bit overdone. Sharpening that much can blow out highlights and make some weird edges. This can create a useful effect in the right situation. And the way you are presenting the cars may be the right situation! Once again, the skies are pasty looking.
Crop . . . Most of them, especially the first and the last, would benefit from judicial cropping. Give your subject the spotlight it deserves.
Keep up the good work TBCobra, and welcome to PSG.
