Pixiq

Only an amateur wouldn’t take advantage of the simple tools of cropping geometry. Of course I agree that it’s important to get your image tightly framed and composed right in the camera, just as it’s vital to strive for the right exposure and color balance.

But is this actually true? What is the “right” framing?

The king of “right” framing is historically Henri Cartier-Bresson. Most of us can never hope to work so precisely as he, time and again. We applaud his famous pictures, complete and concise, framed so perfectly that further cropping would be virtually unthinkable. His niche style was married to the Leica camera format, and we know him for this life-long approach. While H C-B found his format a liberating experience, more often we lesser mortals find sticking to one format and proportion is a severely limiting factor.

Here are some examples of H C-B's work. We perennially laud his style, but see if you entirely agree with his framing in camera.

For most of us, photographic composition is an imprecise endeavor - sometimes a messy business. We have assignments, expectations, composites, time and publication constraints to deal with. Life in front of our cameras sprints past, and we’ve still got to make a living. Framing, formatting and composition through corrective and interpretive cropping is a way to make our photographs look different than everybody else’s. That’s one of the prime ways we make money.

Oil painters and watercolorists don’t confine themselves to one size or proportion of canvas or paper. So why would a photographer allow herself to be limited by the format of the camera? And what would that proportion be anyway? 2 1/4 square? 6x7? 6x8? 6x9? 35mm? SX70? Widelux? Superslide? 11x14? 4x5? Pinhole? 645? 16x9? Smartphone? For the record, my overwhelming favorite is 2 1/4 square, followed by iPhone, SX70 and 16x9.

There is no perfect proportion or shape, only the direction your inspiration takes you. Cropping is something that can be pre-visaulized, but is equally valid in post.

The moment you choose a particular camera, and insist on working only with that proportion, you are imposing limits that aren’t part of my visual vocabulary.  What I’m trying to do is get you to think “outside the bun” of fast-food photography dominated by the 4x6 print.

Here's a portrait of us in Maui by our excellent colleague Eddie Tapp. He calls his pre-visualized/postproduction composited technique the "Pano-Portrait"

Instead of always playing to your specific format, I insist that the meaning and subject of your photograph should be the deciding factors of how an image is composed and refined in postproduction. NOT just the frame you see in the viewfinder! Pre-visualizing shape and proportion does wonders. The more unusual compositions tend to be the ones that get noticed. Read that bring in jobs and money.

One of the best pieces of advice I know is to always be thinking in advance how a picture may be used later (in a wedding album, a newspaper layout, a gallery exhibit or even just a personal scrapbook). What is the market for your image? How can you interpret the subject for greater value? We always think of images in groups, not single, and pre-visualize how a sequence will go together to make meaning and sell more images.

This means we think in a multiple image design, a spread of pictures, a structure built on the feeling we want to evoke. Therefore we can easily note how photography and architecture have much in common, in addition to aesthetics and use of materials. There’s this big element of geometry. Architecture is never just a box repeated over and over, or even a rectangle. These days buildings are often constructed without any rectangular sides or square corners at all. Witness the best of Frank Gehry's radical and much lauded constructions.

One mark of going pro in photography is using all the geometry (and other techniques) you have at your disposal. Ansel Adams would like that! And it’s not all that difficult in practice; it’s a matter of open attitude.

You have to be willing and able to break out of the 4x6 snap shot. 

Your clients all have good 35mm cameras, and are well versed in the ubiquitous 4x6. If you want to earn their dollars, you’ve got to give them something they can’t do themselves. One of the easiest ways I know to make a niche for yourself is with the two types of creative postproduction cropping. 

First there’s corrective cropping. Some comments I’ve received sneer at this idea, but in the real world of random events and found objects, the need to crop is a reality. We should be doing this almost without thinking, just like we would correct a near miss in exposure or color tone. 

Corrective cropping simply means cropping in to bring forward a subject originally too far away, to remove unwanted elements or to center (or off-center) the subject to artistic taste. Meaning and impact are the name of the game.

Next I ask you to think how an image may be well composed by all the rules, and yet need something more to give extra punch to the meaning. This concept moves into the realm of the second type: interpretive cropping. Don’t get stuck inside the bun; this is when you use your creative vision to turn “ok” into “great”.

In my last article I suggested a variety of ways that a circular crop or vignette can be effective and romantic, particularly for weddings, to enhance mood and feelings. Not something you’d do often, but a nice touch when subject and occasion may dictate. A great, simple trick to file away in your tool bag. 

I should have also mentioned how important photographers in Italy and Australia (currently some of the most prominent trend setters in style) are using triangular or trapezoidal shapes as well as circles, ultra-slims and rounded corners. They’re not stuck with just one crop, just one proportion - and they’re the ones making the big bucks.

Enhancement cropping means to do something more to the image that adds impact, appeal or legibility. Yes, we read photographs just like we read text. Again, meaning and impact are key, along with appropriateness. 

The architecture of photography requires that you never close your mind to image geometry, and what you can do either in pre-visualization or postproduction to make your image stronger with cropping.