I did nearly nothing to this shot, its out of the cam and I just adjusted exposure and contrast.

The story behind it: Having been out of town for nearly 3 weeks, I was lucky to have lots of snow and fog where I was staying in Upper Austria. I found this trees last autumn and they are standing on the edge of an agricultural field which is descending towards the horizon. In the distance/background there are lots of woods, bushes and other trees which where irritating for the composition I had in mind. I am also able to predict the conditions for this location while looking out of the window from our house as its on the other side of a hill I can see. Finally we had a day where the weather was switching between rain and snow and thick and heavy fog formed. So I geared up and went outside to try my luck.

This one was taken in September 2020 on our annual company hike with my team. I left the tripod in the car as I knew that I was only going to be able to take handheld shots. I also knew there was not much time to stop for ages and look for compositions as we had a strict timeline and colleagues would not care a lot watching me while I look for the perfect photo. Also I just bought a new 70-200 lens back then which I mounted to the camera - so this was the only lens on board. But I liked the challenge as the bigger tele zoom forced me to look for different compositions.   

After only a few minutes into the hike I noticed this tree on an elevated hill next to us. It was all lit up by the harsh morning light, behind it there was a forest of old firs completely in the shadows which makes the background nearly disappear. The photo was taken at a focal length of 200mm handheld. The background was muted completely in postpro to raise the contrast between it and the tree.