Cropping size?

[IA40D]

What size do you guys crop your images you will be putting online for sale? Do you leave it original size then upload it as a JPEG then edit it when the order is placed? Sorry for all the dumb q's just value all your guys opinions and appreciate all your knowledge thank you for all the help with everything this far

[tim]

Camera native.

[tracknut]

I think the answer would be very dependent on the business the particular photographer is in. I crop to whatever "looks good", for my online proofs, then edit it again per the specs of the order.

Dave

[Mike R]

Dealing in HS sports, I only crop and edit a shot when it's purchased. This saves me time since I only work on shots that are making me money AND I'm able to adjust the crop to give my customer a shot they will be happy with.

[asysin2leads]

Dealing in HS sports, I only crop and edit a shot when it's purchased. This saves me time since I only work on shots that are making me money AND I'm able to adjust the crop to give my customer a shot they will be happy with.

Same here w/ youth sports. Why spend all kinds of time cropping when it might not sell? I'll crop to whatever size they order prior to uploading.

[Hikin Mike]

I do nature photography, so I crop what looks the best...be it a 1:2, 1:1, 2:3 etc. What I have listed on my website is what the crop is.

[tracknut]

Same here w/ youth sports. Why spend all kinds of time cropping when it might not sell? I'll crop to whatever size they order prior to uploading.

In my case I crop because I think it makes the image more likely to sell. Hard to measure if or how well my theory is working, and yes it is a bunch of work. But it certainly distinguishes me from my competition.

Dave

[asysin2leads]

In my case I crop because I think it makes the image more likely to sell. Hard to measure if or how well my theory is working, and yes it is a bunch of work. But it certainly distinguishes me from my competition.

Dave

In the immortal words of someone on here (I'm sorry I can't remember exactly who it is) but, "Shoot tight. Crop tighter." I try to shoot tight enough so that I don't really have to crop. Sometimes I have to crop a bit before uploading, but not for the most part. I keep enough free space so that I can crop for something other than a 4x6 and will keep the entire subject in the picture.

[tracknut]

In the immortal words of someone on here (I'm sorry I can't remember exactly who it is) but, "Shoot tight. Crop tighter." I try to shoot tight enough so that I don't really have to crop.

Ah, you're a wild man! What's next, you'll ignore the rule of thirds too?? ;)

Seriously, that's why I said in my initial post that the answer would be dependent on the business each of us is in. Some will crop, some won't.

Dave

[asysin2leads]

Ah, you're a wild man! What's next, you'll ignore the rule of thirds too?? ;)

Seriously, that's why I said in my initial post that the answer would be dependent on the business each of us is in. Some will crop, some won't.

Dave

Rule of thirds? What's that?;)

[Fenster]

I took a page from the Book of Flickr and put three sizes up; although they are not always publicly utilized they will be on my site's FTP: 900px long side, 600 px long side and a 280x280px square thumbnail. This gives me convenient sizes to work with for linking my images around on the web.

[boubou]

I usually crop my picture the way I want, to look good. So, my pictures aren't standard size, and I get troubles when I want to print them in a lab, cause they print just in standard size. How do you deal with that? Do you crop just in standard size?

[bobbyz]

Related question for the sports shooters. The mantra you hear is shoot tight. Even if you leave room, how do you guys pull say 8x10 from 2:3 format without cropping off lot of the frame, unless you shoot really loose?

[tracknut]

I usually crop my picture the way I want, to look good. So, my pictures aren't standard size, and I get troubles when I want to print them in a lab, cause they print just in standard size. How do you deal with that? Do you crop just in standard size?

Well the OP asked how folks crop proofs for their web sites, not how they crop for making prints. When you're creating an image for a print, then yes of course you need to know what the size of that print is, not only for the aspect ratio of the crop, but for the PPI, sharpening, etc.

Dave

[tracknut]

Related question for the sports shooters. The mantra you hear is shoot tight. Even if you leave room, how do you guys pull say 8x10 from 2:3 format without cropping off lot of the frame, unless you shoot really loose?

In my case, I don't consider a 8x10 crop out of a 2:3 frame to be "really loose". With dogs running all directions, at up to 35mph, I shoot as tight as I can, but most of the time there is plenty of room for whatever shape crop I need to pull out of the frame. Once in a while I get too close, in which case I hope that particular print size is not ordered... and if it is I send my apologies to the customer and see if we can do something different (like, print a 6x9 on 8x10 paper). I don't think I've ever had a customer get upset about it.

Dave

[paulvive]

How does cropping affect the resolution or quality of the picture. I use JPEG for images on my web site but use RAW for the prints

[paulvive]

123

[tracknut]

How does cropping affect the resolution or quality of the picture. I use JPEG for images on my web site but use RAW for the prints

Let's say you crop the original image, such that the crop is half the width and height of the original image. You have 1/4 as many pixels in the crop, right? So when you print those pixels, they will be further apart than if you'd printed the original (assuming you're printing on the same size paper). So the image gets a bit blurry. Say you crop again, taking half off the image. Print it, and your pixels are even further apart, yielding more blurry. The more you crop, the less pixels, the lower the quality of the print.

Dave

[paulvive]

I agree thats why I avoid cropping. If you want to sell your photos as high res then cropping is not the way to go. As someone said "shoot tight" if you can't don't shoot