Crop question PS ?

[loebas]

Attached i post a photo of a squirrel in a tree. (Original and cropped one)
I cropped the squirrel myself and posted it on another thread.
Got remarks with regard to out of focus, bad crop etc

Apparently I cropped wrong and as I want to have the squirrel "full screen", I wonder how I can do this by using the crop function and is this possible without loosing image quality.
Took photo wiht 70-200 (1000/f4) iso 400 at 200mm.

Would you be so kind to give me some advice on how to do this right

[KevC]

The reason it looks out of focus is because you enlarged it. Cropping is exactly that, getting rid of the pixels you don't want. Was your first image the original? ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS use as highest resolution as you can while working. Posting on the internet is a different story, as you need to compress and resize.

Take the huge RAW or JPG, and just crop the squrrel. Then compress and post. Don't resize. Don't compress for printing. :)

[Scottes]

Basically just use the Marquee tool and drag it over the area you wish to save and then click on Image... Crop.


Seeing the entire image gives some clues as to why you got some "out of focus" remarks, etc.
1 - You were just too far away (or had too short of a lens)
2 - A 100% crop like this will just about always look like it needs to be sharper, thus the "out of focus" comments.
3 - The surrounding branches and general muck may very well have thrown off your focus point - the camera may have picked a branch a little furthr than the squirrel.
4 - The surrounding blue sky threw off the exposure, so it looks dark. Well, it exposed correctly for the image as a whole, but didn't expose correctly for the squirrel. You could have used center-weighted exposure, or (what I usually do in this situation) take a shot, check the Histogram, and then apply Exposure Compensation to get the squirrel better exposed. With experience in this situation I would have been walking around with EC set at +2/3 or +1.

[loebas]

The reason it looks out of focus is because you enlarged it. Cropping is exactly that, getting rid of the pixels you don't want. Was your first image the original? ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS use as highest resolution as you can while working. Posting on the internet is a different story, as you need to compress and resize.

Take the huge RAW or JPG, and just crop the squrrel. Then compress and post. Don't resize. Don't compress for printing. :)

Thank you, the first photo was the original.
Indeed I enlarged it and that cropped it.
I will follow you advice.

[loebas]

Basically just use the Marquee tool and drag it over the area you wish to save and then click on Image... Crop.


Seeing the entire image gives some clues as to why you got some "out of focus" remarks, etc.
1 - You were just too far away (or had too short of a lens)
2 - A 100% crop like this will just about always look like it needs to be sharper, thus the "out of focus" comments.
3 - The surrounding branches and general muck may very well have thrown off your focus point - the camera may have picked a branch a little furthr than the squirrel.
4 - The surrounding blue sky threw off the exposure, so it looks dark. Well, it exposed correctly for the image as a whole, but didn't expose correctly for the squirrel. You could have used center-weighted exposure, or (what I usually do in this situation) take a shot, check the Histogram, and then apply Exposure Compensation to get the squirrel better exposed. With experience in this situation I would have been walking around with EC set at +2/3 or +1.

Lens was too short thats one thing. Focus point is exactly on the squirrel.
Thank you for the exposure advice, will certainly pre expose next time in the area i expect something to happen. This time I got surprised by him and it moved very fast around the tree and I was glad with this photo.

[Scottes]

Lens was too short thats one thing. Focus point is exactly on the squirrel.
Yeah, but do you see that branch that runs along his body? You have no way of knowing whether the camera focused on the squirrel or the branch. Shooting through muck like that is tough.

However, the squirrel and the branch in front of him and the branch just behind him all look equally soft in focus. So I'd say that the focus was probably OK, and it just needs some sharpening.

This time I got surprised by him and it moved very fast around the tree and I was glad with this photo.
Yep, you can't always check the shot and then set EC, but you have digital, so you can "waste" a shot or two on nothing. After a while you'll get used to things and you'll know the compensation amount.