So, uh, pretty much, you're simplifying your grass in the wrong way. You've gone from overly-detailed high contrast grass to some super simplified thing that is grey, brown, and has sandy yellow hairs growing out of it. You should be simplifying the forms and reducing the contrast, not.. erm. whatever processed achieved such surreal results. Look at Stefano's edit, it's got some small visible plants to generate interest, and then a grass like mash-up that's hardly visible.
