I'm another one that likes to get the best shot I can with the camera, but it's also nice to be able to adjust things and make a good shot better if you can do.

I was just thinking about when I was at college. Part of the course (technical illustration) was actually photography but it was before the digital age LOL

Anyway - when we developed our pictures in the darkroom the first thing we would do is a test strip. For thise who don't know what a test strip is it's a 'strip' of photo paper which you expose under the light by moving a piece of card over at 1 second (or however long) intervals. What you get is a long thin strip of photo with a selection of exposure times which you then examine and decide how long you want your finished image to be developed at.

Then when you develop tour finished print you may decide to 'dodge' or 'burn' by holding things over the photographic paper. A typical example would be darkening the sky.

As far as i'm concerned this is all post processing but just not quite as we know it today.