It depends entirely on the effect you want to achieve, some tricks are better done in photoshop, others in camera, it also depends entirely on that persons creative process...
One argument for photoshop would be that if you took two photos, one long exp and the other at a higher shutter speed for sharpness you could mix and match the blurring of elements without having to fake the blur...
OK, yes... I'll agree for sure that natural long-exposure blur out-performs the software produced blur special effects. You can't get blur to look as nice "back at the office"... you need a nice ND filter and time. :-)
I'm a big fan of long exposures myself, mostly with lightpainting. I'm also prone to doing a little bit of contrast/sharpen/gamma adjustment with the Kipi tools too (no PS in my FOSS studio), as long as it helps the pic which, as it turns out, it almost always does. I'm not a big fan of artificial blur and do it only very rarely when I can't get it any other way
@davidchrtrans Yeah thats what I used, a ND 4 grad and a nice long exposure. At first I didnt like it, but its added to the whole relaxing end of the day vibe
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Before:
After:
Actions in photoshop:
1. Levels Layer -> Modify "Auto"
2. Exposure Layer -> incease exposure slightly
3. Flatten Image
4. Spot heal to remove a couple dust specks
5. Unsharp mask -> Amount: 100%, Radius: 2.0 pixels, Threshold: 20 levels
Total time: 2 minutes
Some would say this is "cheating"; others say it's part of the standard production workflow... everyone's entitled to their opinion.
One argument for photoshop would be that if you took two photos, one long exp and the other at a higher shutter speed for sharpness you could mix and match the blurring of elements without having to fake the blur...
Original:
Photoshopped: