cropping question.
Amateur. Canon T7i. Usually jpg, sometimes raw & jpg. Besides cropping for composition, I generally crop all my keepers at a 6"x4" size with PSE when processing. am i doing my images an 'injustice' to crop to that size versus a larger size, or does it not matter. I'm sure i picked that way back due to the size i would print out pictures at home. I do very little home printing nowadays, so if cropping, is there a better size? Most of my work gets put on electronic picture frames, emailed to family, or ends up online. I do some canvas printing, usually 16x20, but probably had already cut it to 6x4 when PSE processing originally. Thanks.
stanikon
Loc: Deep in the Heart of Texas
I only crop for composition purposes. Size can be managed in several other ways in this digital age.
If you save the original, always a good idea IMO, you can produce cropped images of any size and dimension you wish at any time that you need them. If you are cropping and then discarding the cropped portions then a 3x2 ratio, which will yield a 4x6 print is going to be the most useful if that is the size you normally print. Your 16x20 print is a 5x4 ratio. Some electronic frames are 1x1. Having the original allows you more options for these and other applications.
Don't crop. Keep the whole image. Never know what you're gonig to need until you need it...
I recommend you download the images on your camera to a separate hard disk drive. Create a new folder on the drive for each shoot. Terabyte, and larger, external USB drives are inexpensive. Tell PSE to open the images from this image disk. Do your PP, including re-cropping and resizing for the way it's going to be displayed, and save on a different drive. This way, you can always go back to the original if you want to process it a different way or resize it. Highly recommend you shoot raw or raw+jpg. As you PP skills improve, you can go back to your favorite images and make them even better.
Your sensor size is already a 3x2 ratio (6000 × 4000 pixels). Unlike LR where the cropping is presented as a ratio, I believe PSE prompts you for a size and resolution in pixels / in. You might try just maintaining the same ratio with selection "Use photo ratio" and leave the resolution at 72 pixels / in. I just tried this in PSE10 doing file-as save to another JPEG of an image at 6000x4000. The resulting JPEG as the same pixel length and width after the crop.
Only crop the minimum needed - you are just throwing away pixels some of the 24.2 mega pix you paid for in the camera. you can always just print as a 4"x6".
billnikon
Loc: Pennsylvania/Ohio/Florida/Maui/Oregon/Vermont
buckscop wrote:
Amateur. Canon T7i. Usually jpg, sometimes raw & jpg. Besides cropping for composition, I generally crop all my keepers at a 6"x4" size with PSE when processing. am i doing my images an 'injustice' to crop to that size versus a larger size, or does it not matter. I'm sure i picked that way back due to the size i would print out pictures at home. I do very little home printing nowadays, so if cropping, is there a better size? Most of my work gets put on electronic picture frames, emailed to family, or ends up online. I do some canvas printing, usually 16x20, but probably had already cut it to 6x4 when PSE processing originally. Thanks.
Amateur. Canon T7i. Usually jpg, sometimes raw &a... (
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2X3 or 3X2 is considered FULL OUT. In other words, that image size usually prints everything that you saw through the viewfinder when you took the shot. I prefer this crop size for my show prints, your print sizes would be, (in 2X3), 4X6, 8X12, 16X24, and 20X30. A 16X20 would be cropping off about 3 mm (two inches) from each side of you photo, it would not be a FULL OUT photo.
Gene51
Loc: Yonkers, NY, now in LSD (LowerSlowerDelaware)
buckscop wrote:
Amateur. Canon T7i. Usually jpg, sometimes raw & jpg. Besides cropping for composition, I generally crop all my keepers at a 6"x4" size with PSE when processing. am i doing my images an 'injustice' to crop to that size versus a larger size, or does it not matter. I'm sure i picked that way back due to the size i would print out pictures at home. I do very little home printing nowadays, so if cropping, is there a better size? Most of my work gets put on electronic picture frames, emailed to family, or ends up online. I do some canvas printing, usually 16x20, but probably had already cut it to 6x4 when PSE processing originally. Thanks.
Amateur. Canon T7i. Usually jpg, sometimes raw &a... (
show quote)
I crop for composition, but I resize only for uploading to social media. If you are "cropping" and not resizing, then yes, you are likely losing a lot of image. In any case, printer drivers and print labs can figure out what to do with the extra resolution. It's far harder to make a big print from one that has been "cropped" or resized to 6x4.
Cropping is chopping out a portion of the image (that is not needed or wanted).
Are you doing that or just changing the resolution?
Like Paul said, the image is already a 4x6 aspect ratio. How are you "cropping" to a 4x6 aspect ratio?
Why reduce the resolution?
I keep everything full resolution, and let the printer figure what it doesn't need.
fehutch wrote:
Don't crop. Keep the whole image. Never know what you're gonig to need until you need it...
Save the cropped image as something like IMG_####8x10.JPG or IMG_####cropped.JPG
buckscop wrote:
Amateur. Canon T7i. Usually jpg, sometimes raw & jpg. Besides cropping for composition, I generally crop all my keepers at a 6"x4" size with PSE when processing. am i doing my images an 'injustice' to crop to that size versus a larger size, or does it not matter. I'm sure i picked that way back due to the size i would print out pictures at home. I do very little home printing nowadays, so if cropping, is there a better size? Most of my work gets put on electronic picture frames, emailed to family, or ends up online. I do some canvas printing, usually 16x20, but probably had already cut it to 6x4 when PSE processing originally. Thanks.
Amateur. Canon T7i. Usually jpg, sometimes raw &a... (
show quote)
Crop only for composition, keeping the original format (whatever size your camera produces) and later, crop for prints you order. I use Lightroom, so I never lose the original photo, and when I print, I crop to the paper I am using. In PSE, you would probably have to do a "save as" from your uncropped photo (and don't save the crop to the original) for each different print size you might make.
Also, note that many printing companies now have "digital formats" so your out of camera crop can be printed directly.
As has been pointed out, 3:2 is already your aspect ratio with the T7i unless you changed it in the camera (prints 4x6, 8x12, 12x18).
For your digital frames you may want to
re-size so that your files are smaller - have fewer megabytes. Here's one explanation for Elements:
https://helpx.adobe.com/photoshop-elements/using/resizing.html.
Hey buckscop, in addition to Linda's link to the PSE documentation, here's a link from UHH on resizing images:
https://www.uglyhedgehog.com/t-512745-1.htmlWhat was missing from your original post (OP) was the purpose of "why" for cropping? With a few more details, the collective 'we' of responses will understand what you're trying to accomplish. And, we can help with ideas on the long-term best practices when editing your images.
We all crop for composition, no issue there. But, your post seems to speak to cropping for other purposes? Other good ideas include making sure to save the result to a new name and not corrupt the original image. Of a related usage question, are you saving the edit work into a PSD?
Let us know with some more background.
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