Do you Crop ?

[lambroving]

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Sorry to hear that. Get one of these! http://gallery.leica-users.org/My-Ms/50_ASPH_crop

[rvaubel]

Funny that it comes from people using inaccurate finders.

 

Actually, my loose cropping developed with my purchase of the RD1. Because of the crop factor, almost none of my lenses coorespond exactly to any of the framelines. For instance, my 40mm Nokton cooresponds to the 35mm frameline accept at close distances. Or my 28mm Ultron frames a little outside the 28mm framelines. Way too much for me to remember so I just take a step back and shoot.

Not very artistic, is it?

 

Rex

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[wilfredo]

Bill wrote: "I believe it is the Leica M religion, as you very well know!" It is also following in the foot steps of Henry Cartier Bresson which to many is a definite religion. As much as I am a great fan of HCB, I confess to having played with cropping some of his images (I admit I am a sinner) and in my humble opinion came up with some very viable interepretations of the same image, one might even argue improved. But that's just me, I'm no legend and personally I try not to crop, but sometimes you just gotta do it. In the end, I agree, it is a matter of choice. No right or wrong here. Why be limited by dogmatism?

 

Cheers,

Wilfredo+

http://www.BenitezRIvera.com

[Micheal]

Findus,

In a word, no. The 2x3 35mm frame is very close to the "golden rectangle" which has been thought of historically as the "ideal rectangle" If you envision the viewfinder as a picture plane ( painter speak) which extends all the way to the edges & corners, It might seem that if the subject matter doesn't fit the picture plane there may not be anything there. You should probably change formats. Sort of like" Be true to your school"

I found the painter analogy a little difficult as there are painters who do use the same proportions. Chuck Close & Richard Estes come to mind. Also the painter can change proportions on a whim. I found the finding photographs in photographs extremally difficult.

I often print the black line around the image produced by my glass negative carrier V35 enlarger. The old tradition of "this photograph has not been cropped". Using wide angle lenses exclusively, to crop would alter the spacial qualities of the image. Then there is the fact that the 35mm negative falls apart rapidly upon enlargement. So you throw away quality whether it be silver based or digital.

I realize I am on extremally thin, subjective, ice here. I felt I should put the attitude out there as a lot of us adhere to it dating back to Edward Weston, Steiglitz & the Photo Secessionists. It is a discipline, in a Minor White sort of way.

 

Sincerely,

 

Michael Dickey

http://www.stardustgrafik.com

[wbesz]

I try not to crop but most times yes for best composition, ..and only minimal.

[george +]

To crop, or not to crop: that is the question:

Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer

The slings and arrows of unwanted details,

Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,

And by cropping end them?

 

 

This preoccupation with not cropping seems a bit, well you know, ugh, personal at best. I mean, why would you leave it in the format of your film or sensor if the image looks better cropped? Seems to me too many of those insisting on not cropping take pride in something esotheric that can provide you with less of a finished product than what you had in mind. Of course if your mind is formatted to 24 x 36 millimeteres all the time that is a different thing.

 

As to myself, I crop, sometimes extensively. So what?

[Guest stnami]

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AHh George the path to heaven is easier if one doesn't crop so said the angels of purity that reside in those puffy white clouds.

Most of my images get cropped by editors in books and magazines anyway, art stuff and individual images I do as I please

Gallery images, I will usually exhibit in one or two format sizes as it gives the images a better chance to stand on their own and not be visually subject to the clutter created by chopping and changing of image sizes, thus cropping is natural.

[erl]

" the path to heaven is easier if one doesn't crop so said the angels of purity that reside in those puffy white clouds. "

 

Ah yes! But I suspect thre demons that reside in those smoky clouds below have much more fun.

[Guest guy_mancuso]

Well I think you can go back and forth on this issue , it is not religious or anything like that. The real issues for the older guys that shot transparency was a matter of no choice really, you simply had to think 35mm framing when you shot transparency film because that is what get's projected. So for guys that shot slides for years the thought process is already there. I mean I have shot every format there is but my brain always said work within the frame and compose that way. Is it better or worse really it's neither it simply is what you have been doing. Now there are limitations and such also but some of it is hate to say this but some folks are just flat out lazy also, with the thought process of i will fix it later. To each his own i say but I have been trained for years to do everything in camera and seriously guys of my generation that is what we have done, it has been 31 years at this there was no such thing as PS or computers or really any cropping except in the darkroom. so there are many factors , no one is right or wrong but more about how you learned to shoot.

[mgcd]

Darn Guy, did you have to pull me into YOUR generation! lol

 

Pretty much that's it, like Guy I learned to use the whole frame since I was using Kodachrome pretty much exclusively for over 20 years. It's only in the last 10 years or so that I went to negatives and then digital. So the mindset is truly anchored into using the whole frame, as Guy said we had no choice. In addition, we're playing with limited real estate and cropping would have direct quality implications depending on the end use of the image.

 

In any case, a few years ago I worked with a curator for one of my exhibits and he got me to relax my views on cropping, somewhat, not much mind you, just in terms of the aspect ratio.

[leica_girl58]

That is a good argument Guy. Many of our habits or procedures were formed many years before pc and photoshop were ever conceived.

I am not a professional and just enjoy photography as a hobby. So in my mind this is not a life/death situation. I shoot only slides and probably will do till the end. I may have remounted a few slides over the years, but I prefer to excerise my "good eye" when I compose my image. I am not ready yet to depend on photoshop to make a decent image for me. I am a diehard and will go back to the same place over and over to grab that special moment. I know of people who just use PS filters to get the same result.

 

This is just my opinion.

darlene

[Guest guy_mancuso]

I agre Darlene and did not mean to leave out women when i said guys, pardon me on that one . But like Conrad said there is only so much real estate when we shot 35mm and you also try to squeeze every drop of quality out of that frame , so these things just become part of your process and the way you see. I mean i shot square Hassy for a long time at the same time. I cropped more there because i was so used to the 35mm rectangle. Nice conversation BTW , I like these kinds of threads that talk about more how you think and do than just gear.

[lct]

I think my Grandmother was Laponish...

No Laponish flowers here sorry but i've just shot this one in Normandy for you, Darlene.

Would be better with a bit of cropping though...

 

[earleygallery]

I crop my images for a variety of reasons. Sometimes it's simply to fit the paper size - you have to crop if you want 10X8 for eg. Maybe I want a square image or I just think that the image will look better in a different format. Its fun to go a bit wild with the crop tool in photoshop! Why be constrained by the neg/sensor size?

 

TLR's use a square format simply because it isn't convenient to use a WLF in its side. You have a square frame within which you can choose to take a portrait or landscape shot. Of course many would choose to use the whole negative and produce square images (also suited to LP/CD covers!).

 

The analogy with painters isn't really appropriate. The artist can make a canvas to any size/format. Some artists would add to an original painting - adding on another section of canvas to enlarge the scene. David Hockney produced his polaroid images in a similar way making up one scene from many small photographs.

 

There's no right or wrong way with art after all.

[nyrich]

Although I try to "crop" in-camera, I will often crop further to improve a composition.

 

HCB, I am not. "-)

[leica_girl58]

No Laponish flowers here sorry but i've just shot this one in Normandy for you, Darlene.

Would be better with a bit of cropping though...

 

 

First thing..I don't even know who or what Laponish means. My Grandmothers were Italian and English.

Second..nice flower photo, and I agree it needs some cropping work. I would have taken a vertical of this flower to minimize the background. I bet you posted this photo just to get me to admit that I would crop away here.

Third...I probably would come back to this flower on a nice misty morning for a softer

effect.

darlene

Thanks for the flower

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[albertwang]

Of course I do crop! But I don't always depending on the situation you know. Esp. if you are doing art like me.

[kidigital]

I usually try to stay close to what I have shot without cropping. But, I find that each photo is open to as many interpretations as the scene that has been originally captured. When working with a raw file (with a digital image), cropping, saturation and contrast are all up for grabs depending on how I look at that image on that particular day.

 

Maybe I'm indecisive. Or just in awe of the possibilities when I look at all of the choices fighting for my attention in the cookie isle of the giant supermarket called life.

 

Kurt

[uulrich]

Yes. I crop every time when I take pictures. Even w/ a very wide lens. In my lightroom or darkroom I usually don't. This may sound rigid. Basically there is nothing bad in cropping pictures; but I usually just don't do it.

 

- Uwe.

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[jim0266]

Not in a way that alters the scene the way I saw it at the time of exposure. There are exceptions, of course, but I trust the instincts that caused me to take the photo.