No postprocessing done here. It was actually a serendipitous mistake to try to use a fill flash to improve the exposure. The reflection off the chickaree's retina created the spooky look, turning this gentle creature into a "forest spirit".
Statistics
Place: 39 out of 117 Avg (all users): 5.5600 Avg (commenters): 6.8000 Avg (participants): 4.8214 Avg (non-participants): 5.7295 Views since voting: 1452 Views during voting: 485 Votes: 300 Comments: 10 Favorites: 1 (view)
The first three parts of this critique are written based purely on examination of your photo. "Final thoughts" is written after reviewing your score, photographer's comments, and voter comments.
TECHNIQUE Focus and sharpness are great. The tonal range seems a bit flat to me though. The picture has an overall gray feeling to it. That's possibly just what it should be, after all, the only real color is the greenery in the background. However, with snow visible in the leafy foreground, that seems like it's where the white point ought to be. Whatever that white is to the right of the squirrel probably would've blown out then, right?
COMPOSITION Well obviously it's an adorable animal! I have no idea what that reflection is in the eye. It almost has a face-look to it but for the life of me, I can't make it out. Your title seems to imply that it has some connection with your intent but I'm not sure I get the connection. As for fitting the challenge, it's probably a stretch but the voters have the final say on that. Compositionally, I like the mix of sharp leaves around him and gently blurred background. It looks very natural and in situ.
EMOTIONAL IMPACT It's a fine shot and one that's generally not easy to acquire, as these animals are pretty twitchy and tend not to sit around long when people are poking around. It's probably not bursting with "wow" to the extent necessary for highly successful DPC shots, but it's definitely nice. The odd reflection in the eye is enough to make me pause and really look closely at what's going on, but doesn't add enough impact to put this pic in the upper crust.
FINAL THOUGHTS Ah, now I see where the reflection came in, but I really question your decision not to post process. Even in basic editing, you could have adjusted your white and dark points and really made this image scream as far as tonal range. It didn't need any sharpening but could have really used a tweak for the colors and brightness. Your commenters, for the most part, liked the shot, but your final score of 5.5 shows that you scored mostly 5's and 6's with the voters. IMO, not bad for this shot for this challenge.
I've never seen a possessed-looking Chickaree before, interesting. I would have liked a bit more of a square crop on this one, to accent the critter's shape.
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