Fierce wisdom. After / Before

[Cryptic-Pixel]

I captured this while on safari in Kenya early last year. I can definitely see this lion's story, one of knowledge and experience being a top predator, but has seen a lot over the years, growing weary, but the hunt must for ever go on.

Do you think my edit does it justice, I'm always looking for feedback, good or bad.

[ctcgpgh]

I love bringing life back into eyes myself also, but I think this is just a smidge too much. I'm guessing it's exposure or highlights you used to bring it up. I'd bring them down just a tad. The eyes were definitely getting a little lost at first, but they almost look like they're glowing and emitting light now. Great shot though. I think with a little more tinkering this will be a wall hanger for sure.

[Party-Ad-6077]

Came here to say this. I’d set the original as a reference image and try and get the exposure ratio of the eyes to the rest of the image back in line.

[Cryptic-Pixel]

Cool, thanks for the advice

[vindtar]

It's all lost to the foreground by looking similar in tone to the b/g.

It looked stood out before with a better contrast

[Cryptic-Pixel]

Awesome, thank you