About cropping ... but not the normal should you shouldn't you argument!

Sparrow said:
Is that just a declaration or is there some sort of proof to go with it?
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Just an observation.

If I change the framing by cropping or by moving my camera a bit, I'm not just changing the composition. I'm changing the content as well.

On the idea of viewing the picture upside down or somehow abstracting it to help evaluate it... These things never made sense to me. If I can't tell whether the picture is working right-side-up, how am I supposed to tell if it's working upside down?

Cheers,
Gary
 
I sometimes do flip the image in postprocessing.

I do it to free my mind from the memories.

IMO the problem is that even if an image is poor, it reminds me of the scene I have seen at the moment of exposure, together with all my feelings and other sensations. However when I flip the image, it looks completely new to me, and I can objectively say whether the composition is good etc.
 
Dear gns, you said:

"On the idea of viewing the picture upside down or somehow abstracting it to help evaluate it... These things never made sense to me. If I can't tell whether the picture is working right-side-up, how am I supposed to tell if it's working upside down?"

Your question/approach is way too stringent and negative, the baby with the bathwater kind; sorry. Looking at a pic from multiple angles is not decisive on whether it works, it just helps in evaluating, seeing new perspectives, the liveliness or over-simplicity of it, etc.

Try it and you may loosen up and see more with the other side of the brain, the non-rational one. Please try it just as a game and it might strengthen your work, too.
 
uhligfd said:
Dear gns, you said:

"On the idea of viewing the picture upside down or somehow abstracting it to help evaluate it... These things never made sense to me. If I can't tell whether the picture is working right-side-up, how am I supposed to tell if it's working upside down?"

Your question/approach is way too stringent and negative, the baby with the bathwater kind; sorry. Looking at a pic from multiple angles is not decisive on whether it works, it just helps in evaluating, seeing new perspectives, the liveliness or over-simplicity of it, etc.

Try it and you may loosen up and see more with the other side of the brain, the non-rational one. Please try it just as a game and it might strengthen your work, too.
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I agree, just didn’t think it worth the argument :)
 
uhligfd said:
Try it and you may loosen up and see more with the other side of the brain, the non-rational one. Please try it just as a game and it might strengthen your work, too.
Click to expand...

Oh, I've tried it. It is old advise that's been around longer than I have. It didn't interest me nor help me. To me, this is very simple... In the end, the picture has to work right-side-up. So that is how I want to evaluate it. Ditto for any other method of trying to somehow separate the form from the subject. Again, in the end everything has to work together, so that's how I want to evaluate it.

If Cartier-Bresson turned his pictures upside down, great for him. I don't argue with results. He was a great photographer. I admire his work. But that doesn't mean his methods are for me. Winogrand is great too. I read that he hung good luck charms on his enlarger. I'm not doing that either.

Cheers,
Gary
 
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