I was not set up for nature photography from some remote-controlled blind.   I happened to have my camera at my desk, and I used the opportunity to grab several shots very quickly without moving around much and shying the cat away.  Teh's arrival was also sudden and unexpected.  I wasn't sure how long he would stay on the narrow window sill.  I shot very rapidly and did not adjust the exposure or focus at all.  I was never sure when either cat would bolt from the window.

With CaptureNX,I now know to go through the basic setting first, thanks to the second day of Nikon School.  Because I use Nikon's RAW format all of the time, I was able to over-ride some of the exposure adjustments that were made in the camera.  I changed the exposure compensation to over-expose the images and bring up the shaded foreground as much as was safe.  The white balance was adjusted for cloudy daylight.  This was all after the fact.  To rescue the Teh Amor pictures, I also needed to be extra-creative with brightness and contrast.  Seeing them together I see that it would have helped to take the contrast down some more and dull the back lighting to match the first image.  I may try that again just to see how much better I can do. 

I still don't have an efficient workflow, but I notice that I am learning to avoid experimenting with adjustments that won't be useful in a given situation.  That picks up the pace, but there is still a great deal of trial-and-error, as you can see.