Symbiosis

Excellent!

I have gotten two suggestions regarding my processing. Jack, even your criticisms make me smile. So I am going to post the same image without the Ortin Effect to see if it is more appealing. For the record I did nothing to sky and background to blur it beyond using the Ortin Effect. My focal length was 300mm and as you can see it's still quit blurred. However, if it doesn't look right it doesn't look right. Have a look. Thanks

One other thing. I don't know why, but my whole experience in remote NW Mongolia in the fall of 2014 was almost surreal, especially the week I spent alone among eagle hunters. Their lives have remained constant and relatively unchanged for thousands of years. This is hard to find and I felt like I had passed through some portal into the past. Thus the use of dreamy effects on some of these images from that "trip". Looking back on it, it seems at times like it didn't really happen......Now it sounds like I'm on a different kind of trip. :-) 

Paul, I prefer the less processed version. In my opinion the sky looks odd because the gray part which looks a bit like a bird itself almost meets up with the bird's head. Looking at the larger versions of the images, I also found the face in the original rather odd looking - almost like plastic.  The version you posted later is more to my taste.

However, our opinions should be secondary. We point out things that strike us as good or bad, etc., but it's you who has to decide whether an image reflects what you saw and felt.

Interesting image and narrative. I too prefer the picture you posted below in the comments.

My vote for the second too. Great image! wow!

We agree with Chris G. The subject is amazing, either way. Hard to say who has the  harder stare....

  Powerful image!

So here is where I've landed after reading all of your comments a time or two and speaking to my photographer spouse. I love the eagle in the original post with the Ortin Effect and everything really, except the mans face and perhaps the sky. So I will be going back to the drawing board to find some middle ground, but get the same look as the eagle in the original. Thanks for a great discussion.

Good luck. Personally, I think the eagle looks 100 times better in the second picture. It loses all of its punch. Possibly the grass in the background looks better because of more blur with the effect, but nothing else. If that's what you like, then by all means....