It's already a crop. I liked the color harmony, but in the compression to JPG from raw I lost a lot of the detail. I need to either crop it like you suggest, or rework it so the color/detail comes out in that lower left part as intended.
Well said maddogmurph - my philosophy with landscape photography I believe, is therefore the same as yours and that we should be happy and willing to do, whatever we need to do to get a result that satisfies us and our 'artistic' goals and to take with a pinch of salt what limitations others might wish to place upon us for whatever reason (Russ is also a cropper BTW, even though I am sure he will now try to say he isn't, because I still remember at least one cropped image he showed us on here when he got his new Nikon
).
The art of Landscape photography should be something we fully enjoy in all its parts and not something that we do under a 'hair shirt' type of mentality. Creativity is all about selection and the distillation of what we choose to include in the final piece and what we choose to crop out (or frame out) of the world around us and always has been, from the moment you pick up your camera and choose what lens to use before walking out the door, to the place where you choose to hang the final print. In other words, the art of landscape photography is all about choices and selections, of what you choose to leave in and what you choose to leave out.
Now in Russ's defence, I know what he is getting at and that we should always try to frame the shot as the final print in the camera, because it is good practice and shows the photographers has not only developed a very keen eye, but has also become a master of his/her craft. I get it and I don't disagree with this sentiment at all really. But if I am out and I see a shot that I would prefer to shoot in a square format and my camera does not allow for that option (which the A7R2 doesn't annoyingly), then I am going to take the shot the best way I can and crop it afterwards the best way I can, because the square crop was my intention and selection right from the start.
I can also see what Russ means about it being wrong to try and crop out a good shot from a bad one, or cropping into a shot so deeply and to such a point, where you can produce something that you didn't even see in the first place and had absolutely no idea was there, which again I agree is bad practice, or at least a practice that will not help you to advance your technique out in the field, or your skills, or your artistic eye etc.
So my final word on this subject is this - we should always do as much as we can to create the final image out in the field and yes if we are able to frame the world perfectly before pressing the shutter release, then that is a the ultimate thing we can do and something we should all aim to achieve. But if you are not there yet and you need to shoot with a little bit of wiggle room around the edges and select/crop out the final shot later in post, then so be it, just as long as you are enjoying yourself and learning, but perhaps on the understanding that if you do wish to reach that peak of artistic fulfilment, then you also have to be willing to admit to yourself, especially if you find you are having to crop every single shot that you take, that you have not arrived at that point just yet and still have a little further to go, but at least you are hopefully heading in the right direction by realising this.
God, it sounds like I am delivering a sermon now doesn't it? Well I am obsessed with landscape photography, so what else am I going to do
Dave
