Lovely pose and detail. Some might not like the oof foreground but you get what you are given, and it's not too bad. The pic looks bit flat to me and I found that even auto curves in PS5 gave it a nice lift without blowing the whites.
There's something very intriguing about this image that I like Ramesh. To my eye, the spoonbill takes on an almost human body posture and I also like the very stark landscape.
Yes, a bit brighter would work. I love the image design and the starkness. Your getting one inch higher would have separated the o-o-f berm from the bird's feet. A contrast mask on the face would make it look really sharp: Unsharp Mask at 15/65/0 on the face and bill only.
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