Crop Help

[CarCapture]

I captured this at a friends wedding recently. They were quite pleased with a lot of my shots and i'm cropping and printing as I go now. They have specifically requested a print of this one though. I had very liottle time to compose the shot and it's not well framed.

Can anyone help with a crop that works (printing 7x5 and A4) and any suggestions on post proc' requirements.

TIA

Si

[Grace]

well you can just pretty much leave it like that. If you crop it smaller (tighter) its going to be more obvious that the couple is out of focus. Its a great snap :)

[CarCapture]

actually the couple aren't out of focus. That's the JPEG compression I had to use to sneak under the 100K limit. The only blur is on the flowers the groom is holding but that's motion blur.

Hi-res original after i straightened it. (http://www.kinnect.co.uk/mono/crop help large.jpg)

[sblais]

There's like a white haze in front of the picture... Not sure what caused that!

Here's my try at a different crop. I also did the following adjustments: set the black and white points in "Level" (black point on the groom's tux and white on the bride's dress), added a bit of saturation and contrast and added some vignetting (Filter-Distort-Lens Correction and set vignetting to darker). There are other ways to add vignette, but I liked this one for the shot.

BTW, if I had more time to spend, I'd try to remove (clone out) the truck and the sign on the fence. They spoil the shot for me.

177514

EDIT: the crop is 3:2 ratio, not suitable for 5x7. I'd just remove a bit from each side to get the right ratio and keep the framing by the trees.

[Grace]

actually the couple aren't out of focus. That's the JPEG compression I had to use to sneak under the 100K limit. The only blur is on the flowers the groom is holding but that's motion blur.

Hi-res original after i straightened it. (http://www.kinnect.co.uk/mono/crop help large.jpg)


ahww.. ok :) gotta love the resize!

[sblais]

ahww.. ok :) gotta love the resize!

and gotta love even more the 100 KB limit. For some shots (with a lot of details), you really have to reduce the jpg quality to get it to fit within that limit!

[howzitboy]

There's like a white haze in front of the picture... Not sure what caused that!

Here's my try at a different crop. I also did the following adjustments: set the black and white points in "Level" (black point on the groom's tux and white on the bride's dress), added a bit of saturation and contrast and added some vignetting (Filter-Distort-Lens Correction and set vignetting to darker). There are other ways to add vignette, but I liked this one for the shot.

BTW, if I had more time to spend, I'd try to remove (clone out) the truck and the sign on the fence. They spoil the shot for me.

177514

EDIT: the crop is 3:2 ratio, not suitable for 5x7. I'd just remove a bit from each side to get the right ratio and keep the framing by the trees.

wow, from that picture, I thought the OP put up a different shot hahe. I had to check usernames to see haha. It 100% doesnt look like the original shot. Its amazing what u can do nowdays yeah?

too bad she still looking at the ground...

[tdodd]

My humble effort.....

Edited in Lightroom with the following adjustments....
- Use Lightroom default preset tone curve to add punch to the brightness/contrast and reduce the fog effect;
- Crop at 7*5 ratio to remove the white van on left and blue van on right, leaving picture framed by tree trunks. Also leaving room in front of people for space to "walk into" and avoid chopping through the Land Rover;
- Warm it up a touch with +11 on the temperature;
- Sharpen to 49/100
- Resize to jpeg 800*XXX at 50% quality.

http://eezytiger.googlepages.com/20070414_141630_L-2.jpg/20070414_141630_L-2-full.jpg

[JimAskew]

Here is my attempt...I really liked the large tree on the left so I kept as much of it in the crop as I could.

This is a 5x7 crop, adjusted levels, and used curves to darken it slightly.

I agree with cloning out the sign and truck if time permitted.

Overall this is a great capture...

[Eagle]

Just cropped to 7 x 5. Looks about like tdodd's. Got rid of the cars in the corners. The Land Cruiser, buildings, and rocky road give ythe pic an old time look.

[CarCapture]

Thanks for all the ideas on this.

I did this last night and showed it to the couple. They were really pleased. For me, I still dont like not having the space for them to walk into but everytime i've tried to do that I get the distrations of the hotel. I might try it but desaturating the umbrellas and more of vignette. This one was a winner.
(note, I also took onboard to comments about the sign, the hotel name was signficant so I just did a bit of a doctoring)

[tdodd]

How about going portrait?.....

http://eezytiger.googlepages.com/20070414_141630.jpg/20070414_141630-full.jpg

[JimAskew]

Hi,

One more suggestion...I took the crop I posted earlier and applied a "Lens Blur" to areas you might want to de-empasize. I aplogize for the quick job...my hand is not as steady is it used to be and I did this rather quickly...but you can see the concept very well.

[BJ Pulsipher]

I like the lens blur effect. It is a little too much for me. I think you have to crop it to show enough road in front of her to make the lifting of the skirt logical? reasonable in the story of the pic?

[MiniMemories]

i had something for you but i don't know how to post a url in the reply so i guess it's not going to help

[goforphoto]

What about leaving the crop as is, and doing a little cross processing?

[MiniMemories]

I think I kind of like that.? iI think i'd do all the people.

[monter]

How about going portrait?.....

http://eezytiger.googlepages.com/20070414_141630.jpg/20070414_141630-full.jpg


This is my favorite by far!!!!!!!

[CarCapture]

I think I kind of like that.? iI think i'd do all the people.

Yeah, agree. I like the idea and i'll give that a go

[Nan08]

here's my crop version, sorry for the blurred faces, would have been ok if i had the original but you get the point. all crop versions above are great. we've got some talents in this forum.

take care..

<a href="http://photobucket.com" target="_blank"><img src="http://i157.photobucket.com/albums/t47/ronan08/crop-help1.jpg" border="0" alt="Photo Sharing and Video Hosting at Photobucket"></a>

[Nan08]

sorry, used the wrong link.. here..

http://i157.photobucket.com/albums/t47/ronan08/crop-help1.jpg