Shadows combined with HDRi Skies

Hello I was hoping you guys could help me with a problem that I am having
when rendering. If I'm using an HDRI sky I can't seem to get the shadowing
right. The software does render shadows but they are not as refined or as
reaslistic as I would like them to be. If I turn the sun function on, it
gives me the kind of shadow I'm looking for but it darkens my HDRI sky and
looks worse. Please see attachment. I would greatly appreciate your input.

You can turn on the Sun with HDRi skies to get harsher shadows.

Note:There is currently no easy to align the SketchUp Sun to the sun in the HDRi image

When both HDRi skies and the sun are used for illumination you may need to balance the illumination from the sun and the HDRi sky using lighting shadows.

HDRi Sky with no sun

This image is a beach cottage illuminated by only the HDRi Shy Preset. 
The sun is off and there are only subtle shadows.

HDRi Sky with Sun

Here I turned on the sun to get a distinct shadow, but it made the HDRi sky too dark.

Balanced with Lighting Channels

I used Lighting Channels to lower the intensity of the sun from 1.0 to 0.1

This gave me the brighter sky which I wantred.

Using a Background Image instead of an HDRi Sky

For this image, I turned on the sun, and used a background image instead of an HDRi sky.