To level your photos or not

Just because you didn't hold the camera level does not mean you pictures should be jacked up! Fix the level please.

Drewc2010 wrote in post #13856889
For me I shoot NHL, the Hurricanes in particular, and I can't tell you how much it bugs me that the AP guys and Getty guys don't care about their horizons, when that is one of the main things I look for with my pictures...

And that's one of reason why they are working for AP/Getty and you are not Sometimes rules are there to break them, and leveled horizon is something, what doesn't NEED to be there. Sometimes you just need to look at things with a bit wider perspective and forget those "golden rules of photograpy" everyone are so keen to stick with. If you don't you will never get higher up the creativity level.

I think your average sports fan when seeing a piccie with a skew horizon on the back page of their favourite newspaper, welll.....doesnt notice!
The most artisticly perfect shot is not neccesarily the most bankable in the sports reporting biz.
But I bet all the horizons in their portfolios are level!

primoz wrote in post #13900563
And that's one of reason why they are working for AP/Getty and you are not Sometimes rules are there to break them, and leveled horizon is something, what doesn't NEED to be there. Sometimes you just need to look at things with a bit wider perspective and forget those "golden rules of photograpy" everyone are so keen to stick with. If you don't you will never get higher up the creativity level.

I somewhat agree here and somewhat disagree. Reason being, some of the photo's that get produced online you have to tilt you head to see...not because "hey this looks cool" but just because thats how the photographer was holding his camera giving the viewer a false perspective of the ice level view. Sure they have their creative shots and those are good, but there are some that aren't meant to be creative and just look plain bad. Those are the ones I'm referring too.