A US Photographer has been fired from his newspaper for altering the colour balance on an image PDN reports.

Patrick Schneider, a staffer on the Charlotte Observer in Carolina captured an image of a firefighter silhouetted against the sun but subsequently changed it prior to submission to his editors.

Schneider is said to have changed the colour of the background from a brownish gray to a vivid orange.

The image was used on on the front page of the paper, but when a comparison between the raw file and the finished version was made Schneider was fired and an apology issued in a later edition.

This is not the first time the photographer had come under fire. In 2003 Schneider was suspended by the Observer and had an award revoked for the over manipulation of his images .

Most US papers have strict self-imposed rules forbidding photographers from manipulating images. Adjustments are allowed only when they do not significantly change the photograph.