I had taken a photo of the San Francisco skyline and I felt the derelict pier on Treasure Island was a bit boring. I had watched Jimmy McIntyre's Art of Cityscapes and thought I could achieve similar results using Pixelmator, a $30 Photoshop alternative for the Mac. Now, understand that Pixelmator and Photoshop are not 1:1 in features, but I think the fundamentals are there. 

I took my photo out of Aperture after editing the RAW file, and put it in Pixelmator. My first step: I know I want the texture of the water to overlay on the pier. So I copied that and stretched it out. Next I copied and inverted the skyline and experimented with Gaussian and Motion blurs.  Next was finding the right transparency. I wanted some of that water texture visible and not a pure, glassy reflection on the "water". I also wanted it darker and less defined, almost ghostly or a mirage. Then some minor embellishments to finish.