Reptile & Amphibian Forums

Seriously, I think some are. Some of these images are tweaked beyond recognition, and one that has some dragons brighter than a neon crayola, even goes so far as to tell you how to figure out that their's are not faked (even though with my experience in photography there's no doubt in my mind they've been highly saturated and poorly so at the same time). I guess some people will fall for it.

I was wondering if there are any breeders that you guys have delt with or heard of way over tweaking or dying their beardeds so I don't end up buying one from them in the future if I decide to get another. If you want to email me with such info that would be fine.
Thanks

I have seen some pics I wonder about but I think most pics do not display the true beauty or colors of the dragons. I see more photos in ads for expensive dragons that cannot possibly be as good as the dragon really is for the price the breeder is asking.

I am usually frustrated with the inability of my camera to capture how good the dragon really is and I am sure others are too. The picture I am including falls short of showing how truly amazing and florescent "Big Red" really is (it shows him more orange than the red-orange he really is) but it's the best I can get without messing with color and I'm not smart enough for that.

There are some incredible colored dragons out there. I have no problem with people coming to the house to see them in person. And no, they do not look like that 24/7, but most pics are real, in my opinion.

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Forgot to mention, your photos are incredible; the detail and color is truly superb! I wish I could get half that good a pic. The Dragons you have pictured are awesome too. With dragons like that, it’s hard for me to believe, that you don’t think there are dragons like that (or even brighter) out there? Here is a pic of a male that sold last year, not even close to the detail you have. I have also noticed that many pictures taken under artificial lighting are saturated with a yellow/orange or greenish color. Keep posting those great photos.

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Thank you for the compliments on my work. I however know how colors play off each other and noticed the interaction of some of those lights in my tank when I took those, and he happened to look wonderful that day!

I'm attaching a photo that shows the degree of ridiculous color I feel I've seen on some sites to show what I mean. It's the same image as before, but tweaked to stupidity.

Here is that same image you uploaded. A truly beautiful dragon. With my photo experience, I"m guessing this is truer to what you saw with your eyes that day> The exposure was just a little underexposed and the it was VERY low contrast light. But I know (from the original image Levels) the adujustments I made created a huge difference, but the final result is more accurate.

Please take a copy of it if you'd like and I will delete your image from my gallery. I hope you didn't mind me fixing it for you

Ok, I was going to leave this one alone but I can't resist lol. I'm assuming your not talking about the photo you have posted here (I'm pretty sure that's yours and I really don't see anything wrong with the colors on it). One thing you need to realize is that most people don't have a studio at home. They are useing some cheapo digital point and shoot and don't have enough knowlege with photoshop to properly color correct the cast that almost all digis put into the pic. In addition they are usually just taking grip and grins with direct flash that washes out color so in an attempt to get what they see in real life yes some probably go too far with the saturation instead of using levels and curves to get a proper balance. Even though I've got a spare speedo 4803cx sitting at home I rarely drag it out for photos opting instead usually just to bounce a sunpack 622 off the ceiling and then drop it into ps and fix it. If you really think they're off do what I do, right click and save then open it up in ps and read the numbers or the exif data if it's there and you can usually tell right away if they've been taken too far (or level it yourself and then look at it). BTW, since you're taking a stance as an expert a couple things I noticed about your photo, you've got a crink in your black paper on the lower left side and you need to either snoot or use some type of gobo with the blue gel so it doesn't bleed off onto your dragons nose, a little separation between the stick and the background would also help that (lol just a little critique).

Sean
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Heart Mountain Herps

That was actually a grab shot in the cage, and I did do some tweaking to it to make it truer and clearer, and I actually feel it accentuates him a LITTLE more than what he looked like then, BUT i'm not selling them either. Most breeders out there seem realistic, but incredible none the less (I'd love one like some I'd seen, especially with my photographic experience), but the FEW I'm talking about actually make them GLOW with color. It's unreal to think that they might look anything like that - unless I just haven't seen enough beardies.

I'd show you the sites or sites, but I don't think that would be right. You guys have to have seen some of these sites. There's at least one that seems fairly well known.

By the way - I got mine from MyBeardedDragon.com, and they looked BETTER than the images (just a bit better, but still I was hoping they'd look close to as good. Isn't that the feeling you want your clients to have ... not you Sean.. just a retorical question to those breeders that are grossly exaggerating color)

just saying breeders are breeders not photographers. I doubt that most even calibrate their monitors and you know how bad that can throw things off. My guess is most are honestly trying to represent their animals by what they see on their screen (at least I would like to think they are).

Sean
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Heart Mountain Herps

I agree with sean (for once). most breeders dont know crap about photography and try to make the pictures look as real as possible. also remeber they make it look real on THEIR monitor.... everybodys monitor is different so its not gonna be the same....
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sincerely,
Jonathan D. de Kluyver
JDDK Reptiles
Quality Reptiles and Amphibianswww.jddkreptiles.com