I agree with the others Jayne, keep the foreground. It shows a more wild view of the Head, which can look a bit "seasidey".

I would however suggest that you maybe darken the foreground as it a bit light and lets the picture "Leak out of the bottom", in fact maybe a darker vignette all round the image would hold it in and make for a stronger image?

excellent control of light to my eye.

You have a lovely back light (almost rim light effect) and the dark auburn red colour looks hot but natural.

The dark eyes, strong lips with just a hint of tongue showing all add to the sultry impact as does the slightly sideways look.

Works well against the black background

I think I may steal effect this for my next studio shoot (so long as the model isn't one of our "old lads" from the club - horrid thought

Sorry quick edit now I've got over the immediate impact of the image, I feel that you've cropped it a little tight in the horizontal plane, particulalrly on the right side

Version 1 for me, it has real impact and vibrancy.

I have a daughter in-law who is a goth and heavily into fairies and a wife who paints images like this onto china so your image was an instant hit as far as I was concerned.

I just got my wife to have a look and her comments were that she liked what you have done but that, for her, it seemed to be an image of two parts. She loved what you have done with the lower half of the image and, in particular, the ethereal look of the dress but felt that from the waist up the image looked to "Solid" (she couldn't express it any better but it looked maybe too realistic? )

Gets my vote

A cracking action shot really showing the effort and concentration they put into the sport.

(I watched some of this on the Box today and, as always, was amazed at the skill they demonstrate)

can't give you any technical tips except maybe to dial in a little +ve exposure compensation to lighten the faces a tad and use AI focus (if you have it) to keep the focus spot on the face.

Hopefully one of the resident watersport experts will be along to help later

Useful comments for you so far. Its v1 for me and as has been suggested maybe change the angle slightly to move the sluice to the left but more importantly in my opinion, to allow more of the yellow flower + reflection (Top right side) to be seen in the image.

This then provides a diagonal balance to the yellow flowers bottom left.

I think I may also have been tempted to crop a little off top and left side - primarily to lose that little bit of trunk (as an alternative to Pamelajean's suggestion)

Good focus on the eyes and sufficient DOF to get all the information on the Owl but subdue the background.

The wind blowing the feathers made me smile, the Owl looked quite offended

I've put up a mod which you may think adds some more detail

I've just spotted that this is only your third bird pic, I'de say you are doing well.

On the question of aperture, I think f4 was a good choice, as I said, you've got quite a good blur of the background. In part you may have been limited by the distance between the bird and the background - if its too close its difficult to get an ideal out of focus effect.

You are using the right lens for this type of shot, have you tried it at f2.8? It may lose you some of the feather detail but if you focus spot on the eyes you may find its even closer to what you want.

I would hve been tempted to crop out the (piece of wood?) in the foreground and, if possible, taken the exposure reading from the cat's fur. In this way you would have captured more detail of the cat and lightened the background (which isn't very interesting )

You've got nice bright eyes, but wouldn't it be nice to see those fine whiskers!

I've had a quick play with it to see if I can get even more from this for you and loaded a "mod".

The original has good eye sharpness with a lovely catchlight.

You have good feather detail but (on my screen at least) some of the chest feather detail is lost in the dark areas.

You have got the focus on the eyes, which is good and they have a nice sparkle with the catch-light.

I think you would improve it by leaving a little more space around the face, particularly under her chin, which is almost touching the bottom of the frame.

A good first upload