Well lesson be learned on the background then lol. The subjects are fun to look at. I love how the pupils on one bird are larger than the other's. Must be some kind of signal. :) And the colors of the feet are wonderful. So now you have some kind of benchmark for next year's BEST OF :)
Well I cant believe this scored like it did. It got a straight up 7 from me and I thought I had maybe been a little harsh
Wonderful sharpness, especially on the bird on the right and strong blacks and whites which work well on their own but also serve to heighten the impact of the incredible colour of the webbed feet and eyes of these birds.
Nice picture, but the fake out-of-focus background is really distracting, considering there are small, blurry artifacts around the birds, especially around their heads, would eb nicer if you just left the background as it originally was.