I showed this one as a thumbnail the other day – but it has developed into my
favorite picture so I show it in normal size, too.

An American Alligator is showing off

I did get a lot of emails about some of my images – so I take this opportunity to respond in more detail.
Heck yeah – of course there is postwork involved to arrive at those final results. However – when shooting them
I did already visualize how I would treat them in post processing. In this example – the result would have been
impossible in broad sunlight out in the open. In this case however these guys were doing their thing close
to the banks of the lake with the dark bushes in back and the amount of additional "info" like plants
was minimal to begin with – opening the chance to get where I wanted to go.
My tools in postwork in shots like these are the same great photographers in the past painstakingly applied in
the physical darkroom – dodging, burning – the sponge. No "Special Effects" or altering filters. Everything you
see in the picture was there exactly as it is now. Taken away is what was not necessary – or better, what the
human eye does not really notice, when taking in a scene like that, the more sensitive sensor of a camera
however records. The faint greens of plants in the background for example.

The question and often center of discussion is – is a reduction to the essence as I applied it here legitimate?
I guess the answer is – since there is no law against it – hell yeah! Or (that’s my personal opinion) if you’re
a purist that does not allow for an alteration of an image – my question is – what are you doing here? Each and
image that you see on the web has gone through some kind of post processing, that results in a change to
the original. Period. My goal in photography is to arrive at that point, that I experienced through the viewfinder.
My eyes do not even remotely match that what a sensor records and displays on the screen. I see much
less and when I observe an animal in the wild – my brain is filtering information that is not needed, leaving
me to observe what I am watching.

While I will be glad to get your input – here’s my bottom line, which holds true for all of my shots. I post ‘em
as I saw ‘em. I’m happy with it. And since no one is paying me for it – that is all that counts.

Cheers, Klaus