Battle Creek Bear #2

I like the action pose with lifted paw and the nice turn. Although the exposure looks close, I am wondering how it might look with about a -.3 compensation. How about some experimenting? I suspect the metering tried to bring out enough of the shadow background to slightly overexpose the main subject. If that doesn't make the bear pop more from the surroundings, I would add some contrast to the mid tones of the head area (maybe add selective sharpening) and darken the water. Further I think it would enhance your efforts to crop about a third of the foreground water where it is brightest and not contributing much to the image. Then you might take a sliver from the right for balance. I think with some of those selective tweaks, this might go from quite good to superb!

You have a great pose from the bear. I agree with the crop of some of that foreground water.

I really like the action in this image. I agree with Lon's comments about the crop.

Nice comp. I think it is a bit overexposed and consequentely the highlights are a bit glarey. Is glarey a word?
Cheers
RickT

Thanks for the suggestions folks, especially Lon for the specifics. I've attempted to make a few of the suggested changes within my very limited repertoire of PSE skills and think it looks a bit better. How's this one look?

I am in complete agreement with Lon's sugggestions on this one. I would give them a go also, because I like the action in this and the claw and think it would be worth the extra effort.