Can you also add the DOP file?
I don’t know what that is
I found it, but new members are not allowed to upload them
Put it on WeTransfer like you did with the image file
You should share an uncropped image if you can. Premature speculation, but my guess is you are really pushing what your lens is capable of, especially if you’re shooting at 500mm (with an extender mounted, or not?) wide open, and cropping in more than a tiny amount. Birds are among the most demanding of subjects, especially smaller birds.
Is this a full-frame sensor camera, or micro-four-thirds, or what? Those photogs getting images with a lot of feather detail are likely using perfect technique with very expensive lenses and filling the frame with the subject when they shoot, i.e., no cropping. If they’re shooting full-frame, they are likely on a tripod or at least a monopod. You can do better handheld in micro four-thirds, but there are limits, depending on the light and lens quality.
An app like Topaz Sharpen AI may do better than DxO at detail, but you have to be careful with it, as it’s easy to push it too far to get feather detail, and then you’re just mucking up your image with other artifacts.
No extender, it is 10_-500 zoom. I posted a raw, and cropped jpg.
I don’t seem to be able to do it through wet transfer.
Had a look at the cr3 file with Canon DPP and PhotoLab and … got the impression that the take was not as sharp as it could be. I therefore checked metadata:
While ISO and shutter speed settings were adequate, aperture was fully open, but upper and lower Focus Distances are recorded as 114m and 82m respectively. While this range seems sufficient for a sharp image, focus might have been missed within that range nevertheless, even though one would not expect that with on-sensor PDAF. Still, mis-focusing an EF lens on a RF body might happen due to sone inertia in the lens or because the camera was set to prioritise shutter release over focusing.
Neither DPL nor DPP were able to produce a sharp appearance of the birds feathers on the 27in 5K screen of my iMac, but a customised image should still be good enough for small prints.
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Zip it and then send the zip.
Well, Peter, I don’t know what adjustments you made because I don’t yet have the DOP, but I can tell you that you’ve really got to stop trying to take images at such long distances with such a short lens ! 
You’ve basically made a 3-4Mpx image which if printed, would only be 18cm across.
Here is a screenshot of your image, viewed at 400%, in PL7…
As you can see, it not bad but also not great and won’t print to reasonable size.
However, I passed it through Topaz PhotoAI and enlarged it to 6712px x 6712px, which will print to around 71cm square.
Here is a screenshot, viewed at 100%, in Topaz PhotoAI…
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Apparently it was flagged as advertising spam, not sure what that is about, but I think that image was also with the old lens. I will post more recent one, and hope they don’t decide it some form of advertising or spam. I never mentioned a product, other than the camera and lens manufacturer.
Ok, so I need to specify size? I never think about that. I have topaz magapixel. I am not allowed to post attachments,
Thank you. I never look at size I just enlarge in the frame of the editor, while cropping.
I do have both of those topaz apps, but was hoping to do all in one, I get really confused with tech, and thought I could do it all in one app. I will have another bash at a few.
If I can email you a zip, it will be a more recent pic, I was hoping would be quite good, but isn’t, detail wise. It is the raw, edited and dop.
Ok, peeps, my post has been labelled as advertising, so adding images might be a problem, not sure if it will be reviewed by someone., it seems a bit odd.
I think that lens was the 100-400 zoom, now I have the 100-500, I didn’t think of them as “small lenses”
Ok here is another pic, not a very distant subject. I wanted again to improve the feather detail mainly, especially the whites, I tried warming, reducing highlights, and exposure, and vibrancy of the white. Added some clear view plus.
Ok, so I saw my question was reinstated, but I cannot post link to wet transfer, to post doc and cannot post CR3 files. Here was my attempt at editing this Barn owl.