I had another encounter with a Red-shouldered Hawk yesterday. It's getting to be a regular at the place I frequent and it's nice to be able to photograph another Raptor when the Eagles are out and about.
Removed part of the main tree in the lower left corner and in the upper left corner of the frame. Cloned out some bright patches in the bg, lightened the eye some.
Self critique: The light was harsh (taken around 11am) and the bg seems a tad busy even though I feel it's blurred enough not to take away from the subject too much. Looking at the image now I could have rotated the image 1-2 degrees CW. I have many frames from this perch with different head angles but I just randomly chose this one to process.
Neat looking individual, nice back pose. The eye is very sharp. Good vertical comp. I agree with your self critique, excpet for the rotation (not needed IMO). The many whitish branches in the BG on left side need toning down...try either cloning at about 50% opacity (soft brush), or the burn tool to simply darken them a bit.
Nice for you to know it is regular...perhaps it will choose a better BG next time :-)
Nice specimen and I like the look back pose. With the given background it might be easiest to select it all and then desaturate it a few points putting the emphasis on the hawk.