Some of the most iconic photographs of the century are actually cropped versions

[Rick Waldroup]

I try to get the image right in the camera as much as possible because it simply saves time in the darkroom or in PP work. However, I have no problem at all cropping a photo if it makes the image look the way I envisioned it.

 

[FrankS]

I try to get the image right in the camera as much as possible because it simply saves time in the darkroom or in PP work. However, I have no problem at all cropping a photo if it makes the image look the way I envisioned it.

+ 1


This is a non-issue/tempest in a teapot.

 

[Hsg]

Surely, the ones who get "touchy" are the anti-crop brigade. The rest of us are quite flexible about it and can't see what the anti-croppers are on about, apart from some quali-religious obsession.

As for 3:2, the 24x36mm just a double 18x24 cine frame (4:3), adopted by a number of early 35mm cameras because it's a convenient 8-perforation crop. Barnack apparently liked it especially. As soon as slides became common, any other size became impractical: Kodak were not about to provide multiple automatic cutting machines. Other frame sizes on 35mm, close to 24x36, have been 24x32 (Wray, Nikon I, Opema 35) and 24x34mm (Nikon M).

As for monitor sizes, no, this is sheer nonsense: there are (and have been, and will be) lots of shapes other than 16:9. The one in front of me at the moment is 16:10 and my last surviving CRT monitor is 16:12. Even if you are right about "most people" using 16:9, what of it?Should we all make 16:9 prints?

Likewise, standard paper shapes didn't (and don't) match all formats, because they can't. To talk about manufacturers "forcing" people into certain aspect ratios is ridiculous. It's all historical accident. This is why people crop: for convenience, or to suit their artistic vision.

Cheers,

R.

Thanks for that bit of information because we take such things as camera or monitor aspect ratio for granted.

As far as cropping is concerned, as I said before it requires skill just as framing in real time. But its good to consider aspect ratio while cropping because we live in a world of crops, namely aspect ratios that are historical standards.

 

[Hsg]

No it isn't. That's nothing to do with art. It's everything to do with convenience, for those who lack imagination or never make prints or go to exhibitions.

Cheers,

R.

You're right. It is not an artistic question if the artist does not think it is.

In my case it is a valid question.

 

[photomoof]

You're right. It is not an artistic question if the artist does not think it is.

In my case it is a valid question.

Ditto, for me valid, not agony. And if nothing else, on a purely practical level, I don't personally like a hodge podge of shapes and resolutions, especially in a large body of work, in one show.

I don't know how my friends arrive at the aspect ratios they like, but I see a lot of them sticking to one format for a large body of work. But of course ideas about "frame" change. I admit freely to being a victim of the horizontal western preference, and to this day painters like John Singer Sargent sometimes throw me off. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipe..._Singer_Sargent,_1884_(unfree_frame_crop).jpg

Like a couple of my artist friends, for many years, I made slides which obviously cannot be cropped, so I got used to a frame that never varied. Even when I made videos, I never used the "Ken Burns effect."

I have never seen a show of work by anyone on this thread -- so I really don't understand their concept of "arguments," "rules," fox holes," or "quali-religious." I have never heard this kind of discussion among those I know, I think most of my friends just do what they want (and maybe a bit what their dealers want).

 

[Hsg]

Ditto, for me valid, not agony but valid. And if nothing else, on a purely practical level, I don't personally like a hodge podge of shapes and resolutions, especially in a large body of work, in one show.

I don't know how my friends arrive at the aspect ratios they like, but I see a lot of them sticking to one format for a large body of work. But of course ideas about "frame" change. I admit freely to being a victim of the horizontal western preference, and to this day painters like John Singer Sargent sometimes throw me off. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipe..._Singer_Sargent,_1884_(unfree_frame_crop).jpg

Like a couple of my artist friends, for many years, I made slides which obviously cannot be cropped, so I got used to a frame that never varied. Even when I made videos, I never used the "Ken Burns effect."

I have never seen a show of work by anyone on this thread -- so I really don't understand their concept of "arguments," "rules," fox holes," or "quali-religious." I have never heard this kind of discussion among those I know, I think most of my friends just do what they want (and maybe a bit what their dealers want).

That is why I mentioned 'respecting' the aspect ratio, which I should have said 'respecting the aspect ratio consistency' so that the presentation does not come across as a hodge podge of various shapes.

And I believe what you also meant by not cropping was to use a consistent size (aspect ratio) rather than not cropping as a some sort of religious rule.

 

[johannielscom]

Cartier-Bresson made it so.

Not true. Read the article in post #1 and find this:

and I don't remember the widely-published 'original' image being fogged from a slow shutter curtain to the left side at all

 

[photomoof]

and I don't remember the widely-published 'original' image being fogged from a slow shutter curtain to the left side at all

Obviously it wasn't, unless he was suddenly using a Contax upside down. 🙂

Why there is such interest in this photo baffles me, it has nothing to do with cropping as an artistic mode of working. It was purely about "saving" an image. I guess it's an internet thing?

 

[Vics]

Or more accurately, a load of Cartier Bresson worshippers made it so.

Cheers,

R.

That's true. He only said that cropping wouldn't improve a bad photo. His contract with publishers was adamant on the subject.

 

[Vics]

Correct. The tanks are in different positions relative to each other.

And what is the point of the Beatles cover. One being the album and the other was not used for the album. To me it looks like there was limited studio space and the photo that was would be chosen for the album was intended to be cropped. Same with the Dali photo.

I don't think the two Beatles pictures match either.

 

[Vics]

The biggest surprise to me was the Stravinsky picture. Not surprised that it was cropped, as I knew it was from a 4x5 neg, but just surprised to see the full frame! It is perhaps my favorite picture of the 20th century.

 

[jarski]

Choosing best aspect ratio makes me crop, if nothing else. Choosing from common 4:3, 3:2 and 16:9 keeps things simple.

 

[jschrader]

Totally untrue. His famous "puddle jumper" is in fact heavily cropped. What he didn't want was other people cropping his pictures -- as will be easily understood by anyone who has ever had a picture butchered to suit a layout.

Also, he was not averse to building myths around himself, and plenty of others have built further on those myths -- such as the utterly nonsensical idea that he only ever used 50mm lenses.

Cheers,

R.

correct, I read that HCB instructed that his photos would be printed uncropped when he was covering mostly Asia, and never saw his photos before they appeared in print. He was desperate about how the newspaper people cut them to fill the space around the text....

The famous puddle jumper was 20 years earlier.

 

[rodinal]

and I don't remember the widely-published 'original' image being fogged from a slow shutter curtain to the left side at all

The story says that the "jumper" picture was shot through a fence, that's part of the fence not a faulty shutter.

 

[ForestCap]

Cropping can be dangerous.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Ditto, for me valid, not agony. And if nothing else, on a purely practical level, I don't personally like a hodge podge of shapes and resolutions, especially in a large body of work, in one show.

I don't know how my friends arrive at the aspect ratios they like, but I see a lot of them sticking to one format for a large body of work. But of course ideas about "frame" change. I admit freely to being a victim of the horizontal western preference, and to this day painters like John Singer Sargent sometimes throw me off. https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipe..._Singer_Sargent,_1884_(unfree_frame_crop).jpg

Like a couple of my artist friends, for many years, I made slides which obviously cannot be cropped, so I got used to a frame that never varied. Even when I made videos, I never used the "Ken Burns effect."

I have never seen a show of work by anyone on this thread -- so I really don't understand their concept of "arguments," "rules," fox holes," or "quali-religious." I have never heard this kind of discussion among those I know, I think most of my friends just do what they want (and maybe a bit what their dealers want).

Nor I. It's the sort of nonsense that exists only on line -- and you have been sucked into it as much as I. "Quasi-", of course: sorry for the typo.

Sure, no-one wants to see a hodge-podge of sizes and shapes. On the other hand, minor variations are seldom important. Frances prints to a constant dimension on one side, and I cut her mattes to a constant upper margin. This is the sort of thing you do with exhibitions.

Cheers,

R.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Obviously it wasn't, unless he was suddenly using a Contax upside down. 🙂

Why there is such interest in this photo baffles me, it has nothing to do with cropping as an artistic mode of working. It was purely about "saving" an image. I guess it's an internet thing?

With a replacement left-right shutter instead of up-down.

Cheers,

R.

 

[DNG]

There is no 'holy grail' other than what limits of creativity you place on yourself to justify your lack of post process creativity.

I crop, I don't crop... both are exercised creativity to the 'end result' I want and like.

 

[photomoof]

Sure, no-one wants to see a hodge-podge of sizes and shapes. On the other hand, minor variations are seldom important. Frances prints to a constant dimension on one side, and I cut her mattes to a constant upper margin. This is the sort of thing you do with exhibitions.

Cheers,

R.

Saw a show today at MoMA NY, where slides were printed with the irregular cardboard mount edge as a mat, Walid Raad. Found it pleasing in the narrative setting.
http://www.sfeir-semler.com/gallery-artists/the-atlas-group-walid-raad/view-work/

I have never shown random sizes, at least not yet, but I think it would drive me nuts to have varied verticals, and constant horizontals, for instance. I would see nothing else, it would literally drive me crazy.

But still I have considered showing squares, which would require a considerable crop. I can't however see myself cutting out a bit of a photo, as HCB did.

 

[Roger Hicks]

Saw a show today at MoMA NY, where slides were printed with the irregular cardboard mount edge as a mat, Walid Raad. Found it pleasing in the narrative setting.
http://www.sfeir-semler.com/gallery-artists/the-atlas-group-walid-raad/view-work/

I have never shown random sizes, at least not yet, but I think it would drive me nuts to have varied verticals, and constant horizontals, for instance. I would see nothing else, it would literally drive me crazy.

But still I have considered showing squares, which would require a considerable crop. I can't however see myself cutting out a bit of a photo, as HCB did.

Not random, and not much variation: 10% at the outside, usually 5% or less (often zero). Odd that such tiny variations would matter more to you than content and composition. I don't think I'd even notice.

Cheers,

R.