The final reason you may know you want to crop a photograph even before taking it is if you want to magnify it. The sad truth is that no matter how long a lens is (that is, how much magnification it will get) it will never be long enough. There will always be subjects that are simply too distant for you to get the type of photo you want. This is especially the case when you are photographing wild animals. In this case, compose the photo so that you have your subject in the situation you want it, and take the photograph knowing a fair amount of the image will later be cropped out.



In the above image, the hawk was simply too far away and I couldn't walk off the boardwalk to get any closer (the hawk would have flown away even had I been able to get closer). I had a decent 10x zoom on this camera, but it wasn't enough, so I "zoomed in" even further by cropping to get in close. less

The final reason you may know you want to crop a photograph even before taking it is if you want to magnify it. The sad truth is that no matter how long a lens is (that is, how much magnification it will get) it will never be long enough. There will always be subjects that are simply too distant for you to get the type of photo you want. This is especially the case when you are photographing wild animals. In this case, compose the photo so that you have your subject in the situation you want it, and take the photograph knowing a fair amount of the image will later be cropped out.



In the above image, the hawk was simply too far away and I couldn't walk off the boardwalk to get any closer (the hawk would have flown away even had I been able to get closer). I had a decent 10x zoom on this camera, but it wasn't enough, so I "zoomed in" even further by cropping to get in close. less

The final reason you may know you want to crop a photograph even before taking it is if you want to magnify it. The sad truth is that no matter how long a lens is (that is, how much magnification it will get) it will never be long enough. There will always be subjects that are simply too distant for you to get the type of photo you want. This is especially the case when you are photographing wild animals. In this case, compose the photo so that you have your subject in the situation you want it, and take the photograph knowing a fair amount of the image will later be cropped out.



In the above image, the hawk was simply too far away and I couldn't walk off the boardwalk to get any closer (the hawk would have flown away even had I been able to get closer). I had a decent 10x zoom on this camera, but it wasn't enough, so I "zoomed in" even further by cropping to get in close. less

I'll give y'all a few minutes to digest all that, and while I'm waiting, I'll give out our first EdenFantasys gift card of the evening.

I'm going to give everyone a minute or two to catch up before posting the trivia question less

I'll give y'all a few minutes to digest all that, and while I'm waiting, I'll give out our first EdenFantasys gift card of the evening.

I'm going to give everyone a minute or two to catch up before posting the trivia question less

OK, the first person to answer this question correctly will win a $25 EdenFantasys gift card.

Cornell University did a study a few years ago detailing the most photographed places on Earth. The number one place was a landmark in New York City. What is its name? less

Congratulations Starkiller87! Yes, it is the Empire State Building!

In all honesty, had I guessed, it would have been the same guess as Curiouscat. I guess Americans might photograph the Statue of Liberty for frequently, but after "King Kong", "Sleepless in Seattle" , and others, I suspect the Empire State Building is more well known around the world. less

Congratulations Starkiller87! Yes, it is the Empire State Building!

In all honesty, had I guessed, it would have been the same guess as Curiouscat. I guess Americans might photograph the Statue of Liberty for frequently, but after "King Kong", "Sleepless in Seattle" , and others, I suspect the Empire State Building is more well known around the world. less

Congratulations Starkiller87! Yes, it is the Empire State Building!

In all honesty, had I guessed, it would have been the same guess as Curiouscat. I guess Americans might photograph the Statue of Liberty for frequently, but after "King Kong", "Sleepless in Seattle" , and others, I suspect the Empire State Building is more well known around the world. less

The other type of cropping is rescue cropping. This comes in two forms. First, sometimes, no matter how careful you are, you'll miss some distracting object poking in from the side. Maybe you photographed a flower and a stick is poking in at the edge of the frame. The flower looks great, but the stick is distracting as all heck. A minor crop can frequently remove the distracting element without doing damage to the overall photo. Had I not known, for example, that the handrail in the canyon photo I showed earlier was there before I took the picture, cropping it out would have been an example of this type of rescue cropping.

Rescue cropping can occasionally rescue an entire photo that just didn't work out. Maybe you took a landscape shot that you thought would be wonderful because it incorporated several subjects you really liked, but it simply didn't quite work for whatever reason. Don't give up on that photo, though. Even though what you had in your mind's eye didn't work out well when you looked at the photo later, you might still be able to recompose the photo and make it a photo of which you can be proud.



In this set of photos, the top one was the one I actually took. I was going for a whole ptarmigan-in-its-ecosy stem vibe, but it just fell flat because the ptarmigan totally blended in to the snow (that's the whole point, I realize). However, rather than just dumping the photo, I cropped out most everything except the ptarmigan, and ended up with a quality photo of a ptarmigan walking through the snow. less

The other type of cropping is rescue cropping. This comes in two forms. First, sometimes, no matter how careful you are, you'll miss some distracting object poking in from the side. Maybe you photographed a flower and a stick is poking in at the edge of the frame. The flower looks great, but the stick is distracting as all heck. A minor crop can frequently remove the distracting element without doing damage to the overall photo. Had I not known, for example, that the handrail in the canyon photo I showed earlier was there before I took the picture, cropping it out would have been an example of this type of rescue cropping.

Rescue cropping can occasionally rescue an entire photo that just didn't work out. Maybe you took a landscape shot that you thought would be wonderful because it incorporated several subjects you really liked, but it simply didn't quite work for whatever reason. Don't give up on that photo, though. Even though what you had in your mind's eye didn't work out well when you looked at the photo later, you might still be able to recompose the photo and make it a photo of which you can be proud.



In this set of photos, the top one was the one I actually took. I was going for a whole ptarmigan-in-its-ecosy stem vibe, but it just fell flat because the ptarmigan totally blended in to the snow (that's the whole point, I realize). However, rather than just dumping the photo, I cropped out most everything except the ptarmigan, and ended up with a quality photo of a ptarmigan walking through the snow. less