You're right, Terry, there are times when you simply have to crop, but if you didn't know that before you tripped the shutter, you screwed up.
I agree. A competent photographer makes the most of the frame ...in a perfect world - but I don't live in one, nor am I perfect. Sometimes I see things afterwards on a large screen (or on a print in the darkroom) that weren't apparent through a minuscule viewfinder or LCD. It's one of the things I miss most about 4x5 – having that large view, but even then, no photographer is perfect every time.
I don't know of anybody on here who's said "never crop under any circumstances." If you can give me a link to that statement please do.
Obviously, Russ, no one has come out and "said it", but it is clearly implied with sarcastic comments like "Did you forget to crop it, Chris? You should know better. It's just not complete until it's cropped." You might have said this tongue-in-cheek, but I think not.
But more than one of us believe you always should try to frame in a way that fits the aspect ratio of your camera.
Good for them, but many of us think: "How limiting!" Since when does the world fit into a nice neat 3:2 or 4:3 or 1:1 or 7:6 or 5:4 space? "Harummph, let's fit this square peg into a rectangular hole." If some want to live their photographic lives that way, that's their choice, but don't force it on others.
I understand that some photographers make this part of the "game" or even part of the "seeing" - in fact it is a valuable
exercise in seeing, and as an exercise it is quite helpful. But on "game day", I need to rely on what I learned from the exercise, but use it as the tool it is meant to be: to adapt to new and changing situations. I mean really, this is a creative medium not an engineering design contest. For Henri Cartier-Bresson, it was part of his mantra/schtick - great, good for him - but we shouldn't all live our lives in the way the "masters" did, otherwise there would be no innovation.
When somebody as competent as Chris posts a picture you have to assume he saw what he wanted to see when he clicked.
Really? I don't assume anything, after all, when you assume... Besides, this is a discussion forum and we're in the User Critiques section. If it's perfect, then why post it here?
In this case I'd probably have moved the camera bit to the right to give the bird more space into which to walk, but I don't think cropping is going to improve what I see.
Exactly my point in the beginning. We usually agree on things, Russ, and it looks like we still do (but maybe not about that four-letter "c" word).
