Mark, Because I compose "loosely," I crop everything. Depending on how I'm gonna use the final image, I have different specific crops I employ. Ever use a Scale o Graph on a polaroid? Thank-You, Mike
Pretty much every photo! I mainly try to get the horizons straight when cropping but hearing about all these overlays opens up a whole new world in terms of improving compositions! Thanks for showing this.
@@mikemitchell3889 I do the same thing Mike - shoot for the crop! I always like to give myself some extra room on the sides. No - haven't done really anything on polaroid.
I crop pretty much every image. Obviously with a Sony A7R it's easier don't loose much of information in the shot compared to other cameras, but it's the convenience of havin a 42MPX sensor :) As always it's a pleasure to watch your videos. Greetings from Italy Mark!!
When I first started, every video I watched said to fill the frame. So I started doing that. That worked great until....I got ready toy start printing my pictures to hang on the wall. When you shoot in 3:2 and you want to print an 8x10 you are going to have to crop something out and it might ruin your composition. Sup I learned to zoom out and not fill the frame. Now I can crop exactly where I need to go either post on social media or to print.
Mark Denny... thank you for these videos, excellent material. Question, you mention using your drone to photograph that road in Maui (great pic!).... what drone set up do you use (equipment)? Didn't see it listed and I'm thinking of getting one to add to my arsenal of tools.
Light and Composition are the essentials of photography. And you are correct, one should use the Crop tool to refine their compositions. For my part, once I’ve crop my photos I continue on to highlight the elements that coincide with the chosen composition (where the lines meet) and then reduce the intensity (mainly light) of what tries to overcome it (corners and unwanted strong highlights). BTW your original photo of the road taking from above with your drone wasn’t bad - although you chose to crop it to eliminate the bottom part of the road which you thought distracting. Sometimes, a composition goes beyond what a photo shows. A composition can go beyond the initial frame - and this is a good example. We must not forget that it’s not the eye that sees but how our brain perceives vision. In this case, the brain was filling the blank by automatically completing the missing segment (of the road). Here a spiral composition that went beyond the frame would have shown that the focus point would have been the missing segment - which usually you want to avoid. But here, not only do you have an outward point (exit of the road) but your brain creates an entry one to come back within the frame (back to the road). Many painters have use that technique, mainly cutting down mountain roads in such a way for you to progress out of the frame to then return into it. Nice video!
I come from a time when being a good full frame photographer was important and desired. For all you newbees out there, full frame is not that silly camera format ( that I know as 35mm). What it means is try to compose your shots so that you don't have to crop later. But I guess if you are using a medium format camera, you can get away with it. My advice is: try to think better before you press the shutter.
Excellent explanation of the various crop tools available in Lightroom but I hope that this video doesn't lead to folks having an over dependence upon post processing cropping. When all is said and done every inch trimmed from your original image is data thrown away with a resultant drop in image quality, especially when making large prints. While it's true that composing perfectly in the field is more difficult than in post processing it's not impossible and almost invariably the effort to do so will both improve your ability to "see" as well as yield a higher quality image
Awesome content Mark! This video was highly informative. Actually would love to see more of your thoughts on composition. Thanks for your great content!
Oh. My. God. I did NOT know about the crop grid overlay tools in Lightroom. How did I not know about this? (it's probably in the instructions somewhere that I didn't read, but that's not important) This is amazing!! Thank you, thank you, thank you!! I'm going to resist the urge to re-edit a bunch of photos right now. Thanks also for NOT treating the crop tool as a dirty word. I, too, crop the majority of my shots at least a little. ( I think I'm at 99.8% ) ;-) Seriously, though, THANKS!
In general, I feel shooting to allow for some measure of post-process cropping is fundamental when composing the shot. As you stated frequently, what you visualized during the exposure was not always what felt right when you finalized the image. Plus, the proportion of the sensor is often, not that of the final image. Still, with a cropped-sensor camera like a D500, one sometimes hedges on the crop allowance because we're reluctant to sacrifice pixels in post processing when an image will be enlarged. A mistake because an improved final image is better than simply saving pixels.
I've found that one of the quickest ways to find a good crop is to download the image to my iphone/ipad and pinch/zoom. Often a crop you wouldn't have thought of will appear instantly
You don't need 61 Mpixels. 42 Mpixels is fine for cropping. Got to be something more to layout $3500 for a camera when the last camera was 2 years ago. I still have my 4 x 5 camera made in 1960s. I crop that scan a lot.
Gosh, I'm loving your video series! So much real talk, so much practical advice. Yay!
5 років тому+3
Very good and super interesting. There are thousands of videos from Photoshop and Lightroom; but this is one of those "weird" videos that really contribute a lot and in a very special and simple way, about a little treated tool and that we can use it in something as fundamental as the composition of our photographs. Thank you very much, a hug and blessings. Muy bueno y súper interesante. Existen miles de videos de Photoshop y Lightroom; pero este es uno de esos videos "raros" que realmente aportan muchísimo y de una forma muy especial y simple, sobre una herramienta poco tratada y que podemos utilizarla en algo tan fundamental como lo es la composición de nuestras fotografías. Muchas gracias, un abrazo y bendiciones.
You’ve taken great pictures, sir! But let me think about „todays“ schizophrenic. We love awesome landscapes, photos of beautiful nature and animals. Take these pictures isn‘t easy because the most of our targets are far away. So we take a flight, or even worst, a cruise ship to reach our destination and pollute the sky, the ocean and the athmosphere. This will slowly destroy these things we are loving so much. For what? A picture? Great...! We have to Look around in our local areas to find good places to shoot and not travel too much.
Yeah, that's the issue with photographing Jordan Pond in Acadia National Park as you showed in the early part of the video. When shooting from the shore toward the twin peaks in the distance (they're called The Bubbles for those not familiar with the park) the rocks add a great feeling of depth, but you do have to decide where to crop in that foreground. BTW I appreciate the material you presented--nicely done.
You show your explanation through the process but then show a radically differently cropped final image. Kind of weakens the point and work you put to get there since you’re saying that you ignored your own advice to get to the final image.
Since buying my Nikon d850 I don’t crop much...rule of thirds hmmm I’m not convinced it’s spot on either ... If everyone suddenly used rule of thirds all the pics would very similar or “samey” and that’s not something I want to see
Very true and one of the underated features of the camera is the ability to shoot in a multitude of aspect ratios. This is another compositional tool for photographers.
Hello Mark, again a great inspire video. Thank you for it and please, do more videos like this. I already know, there are no bad photos, but mainly bad post-process. Are you a fan of Nintendo? (On yours left hand side I see the classic one ;) ). Have a great time, looking forward for next week video. Regards, Jan.
Excellent video and some great information. I hate it when I hear people say "you have to get it right in camera" and "you waste pixels when you crop". Yes, getting it right when you shoot is fantastic but it's not a hard and fast LAW. And yes, you do waste some pixels but with the resolution of cameras today, you aren't losing that much (and we're not talking about only using 10% of the frame). I sometimes also shoot a scene with a different ratio (than the native 3:2) and since my camera doesn't allow me to change it, crop is the only method. Again, great information as I didn't know about some of those crop overlays. Take care.
my first lens ever to shooting was a 70-200... my back was against the wall the whole time but after a year shooting with it it really made me learn a lot !
Great video. I do crop often but forget about the overlays. I will be trying this in the future. I have a suggestion. It was hard to visualize the changes you made, so maybe in the future you could show them side by side? This is not meant to be critical, just hoping it could help your viewers see the changes. Keep up the good work!
I've read somewhere that shapes found within nature follow rules similar to the ratios that make up these compositional guidelines. The golden spiral of a snail is an example. So it makes sense then that photographs of things we find visually pleasing follow or compliment these rules found in nature.
@@MarkDenneyPhoto I have a book called 'Nature's Chaos" which is an absolute verification of this - whether in full scale or macro photography examples. Check it out if you get the chance.
Similar to photographing a group of objects whether it be in nature or man made. Usually an odd number of objects just looks right to the eye while an even number doesn't.
what percentage of you is worried about hurting the ability to possibly make large prints? Is that something you take into consideration when deciding on the crop?
Usually the biggest print I make is 24X36 so I've never really run into any cropping/resolution issues, but if I was going to print something much bigger than that - then yes.
I am with you that I crop a lot/most photos. Useful video - thanks . I am not a great user of shortcuts - Is there a menu option or an area I can click on to access the different crop overlays ? thanks Mike
Another well delivered video Mark and I totally appreciate your honesty regarding the crop tool. Yes I use it and I am pretty sure all those "pros" out there that say they get it right in the camera use it too. A couple years ago I bought one of those negative scanners and started scanning/copying my images from negatives to my hard-drive. Then I would take those scans and post-process them in Lightroom and yeah... I would crop them too. Now many of these negatives are from my military days from the 80s and they are a bit scratched up, so not only did I crop them, I would also clean up the scratches and then I converted most into B&W images. ~Ron
Once again you taught me something I didnt know and that was about the different overlays in Lightroom 👍 Yet ANOTHER informative video Mark that is greatly appreciated by me. G'day from downunder mate! 🇦🇺
Great to see others using the crop tool as much as I do. My heavy use of it has made me question how good my field eye actually is. But sitting in a quiet room and revisiting a site via the image does give new insight into composition corrections. Thanks so much for reminding us of the crop tools value.
It's >95% for sure,,, and as I look back on some of the pics I took recently in Alaska, I often say to myself... "If you would have taken another 30 seconds to think about that shot, it would have been quite a bit better." Live an learn. (I did get some good ones though) Actually a pretty cool one of a nun, which I'd love for you to see and give me your thoughts on.
@@molopez619 Here is the picture of the nun. She was just at the top of the mountain when I got there. ??? Maybe she floated up there? :) ibb.co/SsT3QQ8
I've known about the rule of thirds forever, but I've been using it wrong. My photography/journalism teacher had just taught us everything should be like even throughout. Really appreciate the new knowledge about putting interest in the intersections!
It is eazy to croop if you have 40MPx and moore. But if you have like 24Mpx you have to be carefull so you dont loose much of quality. But again thanks for sharing your thoughts.
Oh 24mpx is plenty to still crop, you wouldn't want to crop half of your photo out, but there is certainly enough resolution to crop a decent amount with 24mpx.
I have a 24Mpx and crop all the time. I don’t print larger than 8x10 though. I would probably try to get a better composition in camera if I were to print larger.
Just curious if you ever have concerns about image quality after cropping large portions of what the sensor captures. Like, for printing, would a heavily cropped image be as sharp as an uncropped image?
anLTproduction If I plan on printing large then yes I’m pretty cautious with regards to cropping but if the image is just going to be shared online you can get a little more loose with cropping.
Thanks a lot. I always crop my photos... Maybe helps a viewfinder with a correct 3rd rule, eos 70d is a little funny viewfinder in live mode and eos 6d mk2 i can only see one when i review the photos in display. Cheers.
Hey Mark! You're doing a terrific job at this and one reason why I follow your channel is your clean, straight to the point concepts and succinct. Thank you! To answer your question: I probably crop every 90% of my photos and only with a handful ones, I make multiple copies with a few different compositions to see which photo looks better.
Thus far two tuts under my belt with you Mark, and both enjoyable, educational and delivered at a even pace.. I would like to add one more element in the mix to the crop, and that's flopping it, as an old timer friend calls it, or as we call it today, flipping your image either horizontal or vertical depending on the image. Keeping in mind we read from left to right horizontally or from top down vertically..and then the next step, shaping your light to draw the viewer to the high light of the image ..
Too bad they don't make an "anti-crop" tool for those landscape photographers (like me) who get so focused on the subject that we end up zooming in too closely, and as a result end up cropping too much in-camera. [SIGH!!]
Thank you so. Mucfh fur this Fidel in croping. It gave me tips I. Can start practicing with immediately. I used the rule of thirds for years. I was aware of the other overlay by not educate in how they work. Your vid will make a big difference. Thanks for the post
Again ...the moss I love in the Rock pic ....no one thinks moss is interesting ...waterfalls ...they all the same Who us to say the moss can’t be the focus of the pic? Think photography still needs to be art ...our art You don’t see a painter or drawer with so many rules ..
Great tutorial! I always have shot with a the rule of thirds for my landscapes, but using this crop tool, I've gone back and looked at a lot of my work and found ways to refine some of them. I will be using this feature a little more than before.
Wonderful tutorial. I immediately went and cropped several of my photos (I use GIMP which also offers grid lines). Couldn’t believe the difference. Not bad’ suddenly became ‘wow!’ Thank you so much for sharing this powerful information.
I had the exact same feelings with my latest photos ( www.flickr.com/photos/andy_saturn/48471413077/ )... "Good but.... fu**** composition"! Great video, as ever!
Recently I have been more conscious of the rule of thirds when composing pictures in the field. Not always so easy when there are multiple points of interest in a landscape. So I still end up cropping almost all of my pictures to some extent. I've only used the rule of thirds overlay. Will need to try out these others. Thanks
Since you have this issue quite often, did you consider to start using a less wide lense on your composistions? Maybe this will help you reduce your cropping.
This goes back to the comment from the other night answering your question "what's the BEST photo advice you ever received?" and I almost went with... "shoot big, you can always crop it down"... and that goes back 40+ years, when my Jr High School photography teacher (Joe Maxwell) was giving me advice for shooting sports for the school newspaper, all of which I processed in black and white, myself. Even before post processing was a thing I was cropping film shots, back in the day when you could get a CD with your processing/prints. I'm gobbling up your content like a mad man... in another week or so you'll be like "oh shut up, Trout!"
I think composition, along with light, are the most important factors in photography. And composition is often the most challenging aspect of photography IMO. Great video Mark.
This is when high megapixel cameras are useful. You did some aggressive crops in some examples. Don't know if I can get away with those on a D500 (20mp) for my 40x30cm prints. I print out a book with 24-48 pictures whenever I travel somewhere.
HI Mark, thanks for this great video! My Lightroom interface looks a lot different than yours (no histogram, for example). It's as if what I have is more basic and the editing is less customizable. Any idea why that is? THANKS!
Great advice Mark, many people do not know about the different crop overlays. You're images look good, but looking at your histograms I think you would benefit from a technique called ETTR (Expose to the right) .
Thanks Mark! I recently flew to Bend Oregon from Seattle and captured some really cool highway shots (like yours). Your composition tips really helped me explore different techniques to give the images even more pzazz!
Cudos again on a terrific tutorial video! Something that might also help many users is knowing what your front end process is for scouting, and identifying a landscape photo ‘subject’. Obviously, that’s a somewhat broad characterization, but more specifically what I’m looking for is knowing how do you go about identifying your ‘subject ’ in advance? Do you use a tool like The Photographers Transit, PhotoPills, The Photographer’s Ephemeris, Planit Pro, etc. to identify and layout your shot in advance (location, day/date, time of day, etc.) so that you have an effective idea of how you intend to frame the shot in advance and more importantly, how much time you might have to frame and take the shot? Or do you just wing it when you get there, or better still what you do when you scout the potential locations for the camera placement to get the framing you desire? I’m sorry for the detail requested here but but it could really help some folks who have difficulty with this part of process. Thank you in advance!!!
Awesome video! Finally somebody who talks about photography and not about pen pressure tablet and gear! Thanks a lot for the video and keep coming up with similar content!
I’m not a fan of the native 6x4 crop out of camera so I expect crop right out of the gate, and I think I’m on a similar page as I now use the crop as a creative step quite early in the workflow rather than just tidying up at the end.
I use the crop tool in about 90% of my images and almost constantly. It is a great tool and as you mentioned, you can go back to an image at a later date and re-style your work so that it becomes more pleasing to the eye
Hi Mark, great video and awesome images. My question is when I’m planning on printing an image do I need to set the size I’ll be printing in and then cropping from there.
This was a perfectly timed topic for me since I just started working more with crops after learning about the crop short cut from your video a few weeks ago. I’m going to play with it more today. May I also make a suggestion for a future topic? Matching the color on your screen to the color of a printer be it your home printer or a commercial printer. I’ve printed a few images that just didn’t have the same color on paper that I did on the screen. Thanks.
Great video this. I agree about the crop tool. As a keen amateur I find composition the most difficult part to grasp. Now I look as the crop tool as a learning device and I think my composition is getting better (I hope). This was very helpful as I just crop until I like the image. I have not used the crop grid overlays. Of course the great thing with lightroom as I can go back over my past images and re-crop. Thanks for the video.
Great vlog Mark! You’re killing it! Keep up the great work! It’s exactly what happens too. You’re so excited what you see on the camera just to open it up on the computer and it’s like the wind stalled in your sail. The crop tool in Lightroom is the best tool in LR in my opinion. Keep on keeping on!
Broke it in and took it to Vancouver Island. It hauled most of what I wanted to take ( which was too much 😂) and it was heavier than what I wanted to hike with. It made a great on location portrait pack that fit a light stand, tripod, small light modifier, flashes, bodies and lenses. However for longer hikes I noticed it would probably be a bit much on the weight side. I love all the room and all the pockets. Sometimes not knowing the unknown we tend to overpack, I feel that's probably what I did. So it's another learning curve. Thanks again!
Perhaps someone has already said it, but I think it would have been especially instructive to show the uncropped and cropped images side-by-side, before and after. Thanks.
Thanks again, Mark. Keep 'em coming. When you crop and haven't decided whether or not it will be printed, is your crop based on the best overall composition (which you can re-crop if you later decide to print) or is it based on the dimensions of a possible print? (Kind of a rambling question!)
I agree and I crop many (most) of my images, but of course, the downside is that you're loosing all those expensive pixels you paid for when you bought your camera. Still, its better to improve the composition than worry about loosing pixels (and a little bit of IQ).
Roughly what percent of your photos do you apply a crop to? I'm at about 99.4%!
Mark,
Because I compose "loosely," I crop everything. Depending on how I'm gonna use the final image, I have different specific crops I employ.
Ever use a Scale o Graph on a polaroid?
Thank-You,
Mike
Pretty much every photo! I mainly try to get the horizons straight when cropping but hearing about all these overlays opens up a whole new world in terms of improving compositions! Thanks for showing this.
@@mikemitchell3889 I do the same thing Mike - shoot for the crop! I always like to give myself some extra room on the sides. No - haven't done really anything on polaroid.
@@DJustmusicMusic Glad to do it Chris - happy to hear it was helpful!
I crop pretty much every image. Obviously with a Sony A7R it's easier don't loose much of information in the shot compared to other cameras, but it's the convenience of havin a 42MPX sensor :) As always it's a pleasure to watch your videos. Greetings from Italy Mark!!
His palms are sweaty, speed's weak, ISO heavy / he keeps forgetting to check file quality settings /
Hahaha!#truth
LOL!
Or in the old rangefinder camera days, the lens cap....
Eminem of photography lol
nice
I love the fact that you don't have to talk like the coolest guy on earth in order to make a really educational and yet fun video to watch. Thank you
Thanks Bruno! I'm most certainly not the coolest guy anywhere:)
Mark crying while responding 😂
When I first started, every video I watched said to fill the frame. So I started doing that. That worked great until....I got ready toy start printing my pictures to hang on the wall. When you shoot in 3:2 and you want to print an 8x10 you are going to have to crop something out and it might ruin your composition. Sup I learned to zoom out and not fill the frame. Now I can crop exactly where I need to go either post on social media or to print.
Thanks for putting out your work! It's very educational and pleasant to watch and listen! Keep up the good work Mark!
Mark Denny... thank you for these videos, excellent material. Question, you mention using your drone to photograph that road in Maui (great pic!).... what drone set up do you use (equipment)? Didn't see it listed and I'm thinking of getting one to add to my arsenal of tools.
Light and Composition are the essentials of photography. And you are correct, one should use the Crop tool to refine their compositions. For my part, once I’ve crop my photos I continue on to highlight the elements that coincide with the chosen composition (where the lines meet) and then reduce the intensity (mainly light) of what tries to overcome it (corners and unwanted strong highlights).
BTW your original photo of the road taking from above with your drone wasn’t bad - although you chose to crop it to eliminate the bottom part of the road which you thought distracting. Sometimes, a composition goes beyond what a photo shows. A composition can go beyond the initial frame - and this is a good example. We must not forget that it’s not the eye that sees but how our brain perceives vision. In this case, the brain was filling the blank by automatically completing the missing segment (of the road). Here a spiral composition that went beyond the frame would have shown that the focus point would have been the missing segment - which usually you want to avoid. But here, not only do you have an outward point (exit of the road) but your brain creates an entry one to come back within the frame (back to the road). Many painters have use that technique, mainly cutting down mountain roads in such a way for you to progress out of the frame to then return into it.
Nice video!
Great video. I really like the way you explain photographic theory using practical examples
Aaron Haußmann Thanks Aaron! Glad you enjoyed it👍
I come from a time when being a good full frame photographer was important and desired. For all you newbees out there, full frame is not that silly camera format ( that I know as 35mm). What it means is try to compose your shots so that you don't have to crop later. But I guess if you are using a medium format camera, you can get away with it. My advice is: try to think better before you press the shutter.
Excellent explanation of the various crop tools available in Lightroom but I hope that this video doesn't lead to folks having an over dependence upon post processing cropping. When all is said and done every inch trimmed from your original image is data thrown away with a resultant drop in image quality, especially when making large prints. While it's true that composing perfectly in the field is more difficult than in post processing it's not impossible and almost invariably the effort to do so will both improve your ability to "see" as well as yield a higher quality image
The X cross he advises was used for dynamic compositions by the Baroque painter Rubens.
@1:19 Palms are sweaty , knees weak arms are heavy , he's nerves, but on the surface he looks calm and ready ✌😁
HAHAHH!!!
Damn, Ive been using Lightroom for about 2 years and didn't even know about these crop templates!! Lol, very helpful!
Yewbzee Great to hear the video helped👍
I knew this trick but then I forgot 🙈LOL
Awesome content Mark! This video was highly informative. Actually would love to see more of your thoughts on composition. Thanks for your great content!
Anders Askasen Thanks Anders!
Oh. My. God. I did NOT know about the crop grid overlay tools in Lightroom. How did I not know about this? (it's probably in the instructions somewhere that I didn't read, but that's not important) This is amazing!! Thank you, thank you, thank you!! I'm going to resist the urge to re-edit a bunch of photos right now. Thanks also for NOT treating the crop tool as a dirty word. I, too, crop the majority of my shots at least a little. ( I think I'm at 99.8% ) ;-) Seriously, though, THANKS!
David Shores it’s definitely the most powerful tool in light room!
Glad to do it David and super happy to hear the video provided some helpful information!
In general, I feel shooting to allow for some measure of post-process cropping is fundamental when composing the shot. As you stated frequently, what you visualized during the exposure was not always what felt right when you finalized the image. Plus, the proportion of the sensor is often, not that of the final image. Still, with a cropped-sensor camera like a D500, one sometimes hedges on the crop allowance because we're reluctant to sacrifice pixels in post processing when an image will be enlarged. A mistake because an improved final image is better than simply saving pixels.
jimrb67 Well said! I agree with it all👍
I've found that one of the quickest ways to find a good crop is to download the image to my iphone/ipad and pinch/zoom. Often a crop you wouldn't have thought of will appear instantly
I never knew about these overlays in LR. Loved the info and your video. Thanks.
mzeeshan Thanks so much!
Thank you so much Mark, your tips and explanations are extraordinary, look forward to your future tips.
F Farag Glad to do it and great hearing that you enjoy them as well!
Didn’t know about the different crop overlays! Thanks for great video
My pleasure! Thanks for watching it!
Don't use them.
Why do people give thumbs down to Mark's videos? He is one of the few photographers who gives his heart to his followers. Shame on you .
TheRedrusso Always appreciate the support friend🙌
Another great video Mark. This is where the A7riv will come into it’s own.😀👍👌
Much appreciated - thank you!
You don't need 61 Mpixels. 42 Mpixels is fine for cropping. Got to be something more to layout $3500 for a camera when the last camera was 2 years ago. I still have my 4 x 5 camera made in 1960s. I crop that scan a lot.
One “duh” thing that’s helped me tremendously is to keep those dang grid lines switched on in the viewfinder!
Gosh, I'm loving your video series! So much real talk, so much practical advice. Yay!
Very good and super interesting.
There are thousands of videos from Photoshop and Lightroom; but this is one of those "weird" videos that really contribute a lot and in a very special and simple way, about a little treated tool and that we can use it in something as fundamental as the composition of our photographs.
Thank you very much, a hug and blessings.
Muy bueno y súper interesante.
Existen miles de videos de Photoshop y Lightroom; pero este es uno de esos videos "raros" que realmente aportan muchísimo y de una forma muy especial y simple, sobre una herramienta poco tratada y que podemos utilizarla en algo tan fundamental como lo es la composición de nuestras fotografías.
Muchas gracias, un abrazo y bendiciones.
José E. Silva F. Thanks so much Jose!
You’ve taken great pictures, sir!
But let me think about „todays“ schizophrenic. We love awesome landscapes, photos of beautiful nature and animals. Take these pictures isn‘t easy because the most of our targets are far away. So we take a flight, or even worst, a cruise ship to reach our destination and pollute the sky, the ocean and the athmosphere. This will slowly destroy these things we are loving so much. For what? A picture? Great...!
We have to Look around in our local areas to find good places to shoot and not travel too much.
Yeah, that's the issue with photographing Jordan Pond in Acadia National Park as you showed in the early part of the video. When shooting from the shore toward the twin peaks in the distance (they're called The Bubbles for those not familiar with the park) the rocks add a great feeling of depth, but you do have to decide where to crop in that foreground. BTW I appreciate the material you presented--nicely done.
You show your explanation through the process but then show a radically differently cropped final image. Kind of weakens the point and work you put to get there since you’re saying that you ignored your own advice to get to the final image.
Since buying my Nikon d850 I don’t crop much...rule of thirds hmmm I’m not convinced it’s spot on either ...
If everyone suddenly used rule of thirds all the pics would very similar or “samey” and that’s not something I want to see
Very true and one of the underated features of the camera is the ability to shoot in a multitude of aspect ratios. This is another compositional tool for photographers.
I am always afraid to crop too much, your video makes me that I should perhaps rethink this. Thanks
Thanks for watching Denis! Great to hear the video was helpful!
Do you crop before you edit or do you edit before you crop
GTTC410 I actually do a little bit of both. Before and after
Hello Mark,
again a great inspire video. Thank you for it and please, do more videos like this. I already know, there are no bad photos, but mainly bad post-process.
Are you a fan of Nintendo? (On yours left hand side I see the classic one ;) ).
Have a great time, looking forward for next week video.
Regards, Jan.
Thanks so much Jan! I pretty much like anything from the 80's which was the era I grew up in:)
Excellent video and some great information. I hate it when I hear people say "you have to get it right in camera" and "you waste pixels when you crop". Yes, getting it right when you shoot is fantastic but it's not a hard and fast LAW. And yes, you do waste some pixels but with the resolution of cameras today, you aren't losing that much (and we're not talking about only using 10% of the frame). I sometimes also shoot a scene with a different ratio (than the native 3:2) and since my camera doesn't allow me to change it, crop is the only method. Again, great information as I didn't know about some of those crop overlays. Take care.
Craig Allen Thanks Craig - it’s great to hear the video was helpful!
Another great video Mark, presented in an interesting way using good examples of your pictures. Thank you
Robert Harrison Thank YOU Robert!
my first lens ever to shooting was a 70-200... my back was against the wall the whole time but after a year shooting with it it really made me learn a lot !
Excellent video and tips thanks Mark - really clear and great communication style - thanks!
Graham Gall Many thanks Graham!!
thank you Mark for the useful video. is this function available on Lightroom Mobile iPadPro?
mrz 1342 Glad to do it - I know the crop tool is available but I don’t believe the grid overlays are.
Great video. I do crop often but forget about the overlays. I will be trying this in the future. I have a suggestion. It was hard to visualize the changes you made, so maybe in the future you could show them side by side? This is not meant to be critical, just hoping it could help your viewers see the changes. Keep up the good work!
I've read somewhere that shapes found within nature follow rules similar to the ratios that make up these compositional guidelines. The golden spiral of a snail is an example. So it makes sense then that photographs of things we find visually pleasing follow or compliment these rules found in nature.
Oliver Saxon the Fibonacci sequence is found in music, nature, and photography. It works!
You're exactly right Oliver.
@@MarkDenneyPhoto I have a book called 'Nature's Chaos" which is an absolute verification of this - whether in full scale or macro photography examples. Check it out if you get the chance.
Similar to photographing a group of objects whether it be in nature or man made. Usually an odd number of objects just looks right to the eye while an even number doesn't.
It's a myth.
what percentage of you is worried about hurting the ability to possibly make large prints? Is that something you take into consideration when deciding on the crop?
Usually the biggest print I make is 24X36 so I've never really run into any cropping/resolution issues, but if I was going to print something much bigger than that - then yes.
I am with you that I crop a lot/most photos. Useful video - thanks . I am not a great user of shortcuts - Is there a menu option or an area I can click on to access the different crop overlays ? thanks Mike
MIKE BAVINGTON When you’re in the crop section you get hit the shortcut key O and this will cycle through the overlays👍
Another well delivered video Mark and I totally appreciate your honesty regarding the crop tool. Yes I use it and I am pretty sure all those "pros" out there that say they get it right in the camera use it too. A couple years ago I bought one of those negative scanners and started scanning/copying my images from negatives to my hard-drive. Then I would take those scans and post-process them in Lightroom and yeah... I would crop them too. Now many of these negatives are from my military days from the 80s and they are a bit scratched up, so not only did I crop them, I would also clean up the scratches and then I converted most into B&W images. ~Ron
I used to do the same thing with older prints - it's actually pretty fun to see how much you can clean them up digitally!
Once again you taught me something I didnt know and that was about the different overlays in Lightroom 👍 Yet ANOTHER informative video Mark that is greatly appreciated by me. G'day from downunder mate! 🇦🇺
Thank ya Shane! Always great to hear that the videos are helpful! Many thanks friend!
Great to see others using the crop tool as much as I do. My heavy use of it has made me question how good my field eye actually is. But sitting in a quiet room and revisiting a site via the image does give new insight into composition corrections. Thanks so much for reminding us of the crop tools value.
Glad to do it John! Thanks for watching it!
It's >95% for sure,,, and as I look back on some of the pics I took recently in Alaska, I often say to myself... "If you would have taken another 30 seconds to think about that shot, it would have been quite a bit better." Live an learn. (I did get some good ones though) Actually a pretty cool one of a nun, which I'd love for you to see and give me your thoughts on.
Vow of Practicality where can I see these Alaska images?
@@molopez619 Here is the picture of the nun. She was just at the top of the mountain when I got there. ??? Maybe she floated up there? :) ibb.co/SsT3QQ8
I've known about the rule of thirds forever, but I've been using it wrong. My photography/journalism teacher had just taught us everything should be like even throughout. Really appreciate the new knowledge about putting interest in the intersections!
Amills50 Glad to hear the video helped!
Heart beating faster? Palms getting sweaty? I really don’t think I take this photography thing half serious enough 🤔
LOL!
Love watching all your videos. goes directly right to the point...
Amocha Sagolsem Thanks so much!
It is eazy to croop if you have 40MPx and moore. But if you have like 24Mpx you have to be carefull so you dont loose much of quality. But again thanks for sharing your thoughts.
But i will croop if i someday have that r4 i dream about 😉
Oh 24mpx is plenty to still crop, you wouldn't want to crop half of your photo out, but there is certainly enough resolution to crop a decent amount with 24mpx.
Don’t use that high MP Camera as a crutch though! 🙌🏽
I have a 24Mpx and crop all the time. I don’t print larger than 8x10 though. I would probably try to get a better composition in camera if I were to print larger.
Mark this video was awesome and jam packed with wonderful advice for beginners like me. Thanks!!!!!
Awesome Ben! Music to my ears - Thanks buddy!
Ben Williams the crop too is so damn important! Happy shooting!
Hi Mark!
Good video... good explanation, but.... I love the intro. That's exactly what I feel.
Good job. Well done!
Thanks Sergio! Thats exactly the way I feel sometimes as well:)
Just curious if you ever have concerns about image quality after cropping large portions of what the sensor captures. Like, for printing, would a heavily cropped image be as sharp as an uncropped image?
anLTproduction If I plan on printing large then yes I’m pretty cautious with regards to cropping but if the image is just going to be shared online you can get a little more loose with cropping.
I am learning a lot of things with your classes!! Great video!
Fabiano Bergoch Monteiro Sambati That’s great to hear! Thank you.
So helpful, Mark. As always.
Jay Cowen Thanks Jay!
Nice work as always, informative and entertaining.
dragondrummer33 Much appreciated - thank ya!
I came for the photography advice.
I stayed for the Gameboy.
J.T. Minnesota Haha! That’s Awesome man👊
Great video Mark! Really very helpful. Thanks.
Daniel Bastos Thanks Daniel!
Thanks a lot. I always crop my photos... Maybe helps a viewfinder with a correct 3rd rule, eos 70d is a little funny viewfinder in live mode and eos 6d mk2 i can only see one when i review the photos in display. Cheers.
Hey Mark! You're doing a terrific job at this and one reason why I follow your channel is your clean, straight to the point concepts and succinct. Thank you!
To answer your question: I probably crop every 90% of my photos and only with a handful ones, I make multiple copies with a few different compositions to see which photo looks better.
Arindam Chanda Really appreciate it friend - thank you🙌
The Golden Ratio on that image just....works.
Fantastic tutorial.
a.ramappa Many thanks!
A very helpful tutorial, Mark. Thanks for sharing.
Jane Andrew I’m glad you think so - thanks so much Jane!
Thus far two tuts under my belt with you Mark, and both enjoyable, educational and delivered at a even pace.. I would like to add one more element in the mix to the crop, and that's flopping it, as an old timer friend calls it, or as we call it today, flipping your image either horizontal or vertical depending on the image. Keeping in mind we read from left to right horizontally or from top down vertically..and then the next step, shaping your light to draw the viewer to the high light of the image ..
Loved this tutorial simple easy to follow and makes sense Thanks Mark
Great to hear - thanks Mark!
Too bad they don't make an "anti-crop" tool for those landscape photographers (like me) who get so focused on the subject that we end up zooming in too closely, and as a result end up cropping too much in-camera. [SIGH!!]
Sounds like a "reverse crop" is in order!
They do. It's called knowing what you are doing.
Very informative, thanks. Pity I don't have lightroom!
Thanks Eric! Glad to hear it!
Thank you so. Mucfh fur this Fidel in croping. It gave me tips I. Can start practicing with immediately. I used the rule of thirds for years. I was aware of the other overlay by not educate in how they work. Your vid will make a big difference. Thanks for the post
Mark DeMarte Glad to do it Mark and I appreciate you watching it👍
Again ...the moss I love in the Rock pic ....no one thinks moss is interesting ...waterfalls ...they all the same
Who us to say the moss can’t be the focus of the pic? Think photography still needs to be art ...our art
You don’t see a painter or drawer with so many rules ..
Thanks Mark, learnt a lot from this. Big hi from Australia!
The JW Channel Thanks so much!!
Great tutorial! I always have shot with a the rule of thirds for my landscapes, but using this crop tool, I've gone back and looked at a lot of my work and found ways to refine some of them. I will be using this feature a little more than before.
Thank ya Buddy!
Pet peeve: a photographer ALWAYS sticking to Rule of Thirds. I want to say to them, "Yeesh, people, it's not gravity!"
Great video !! brilliantly explained... the composition techniques... Your photographs and locations are too good !!!
Enlightening! More tools to add to the bag of tricks. 👍👍
Thank YOU!
Wonderful tutorial. I immediately went and cropped several of my photos (I use GIMP which also offers grid lines). Couldn’t believe the difference. Not bad’ suddenly became ‘wow!’ Thank you so much for sharing this powerful information.
P AR Glad to do it and many thanks to you for watching it!
I had the exact same feelings with my latest photos ( www.flickr.com/photos/andy_saturn/48471413077/ )... "Good but.... fu**** composition"!
Great video, as ever!
Thank you! Really enjoyed you sharing your thought process on how you cropped your photos.
kapurar Glad you enjoyed it👍
Recently I have been more conscious of the rule of thirds when composing pictures in the field. Not always so easy when there are multiple points of interest in a landscape. So I still end up cropping almost all of my pictures to some extent. I've only used the rule of thirds overlay. Will need to try out these others. Thanks
Glad to do it Richard - thanks for watching it!
Very helpful video! Thank you so much!
Great to hear the video was useful!
Since you have this issue quite often, did you consider to start using a less wide lense on your composistions? Maybe this will help you reduce your cropping.
This goes back to the comment from the other night answering your question "what's the BEST photo advice you ever received?" and I almost went with... "shoot big, you can always crop it down"... and that goes back 40+ years, when my Jr High School photography teacher (Joe Maxwell) was giving me advice for shooting sports for the school newspaper, all of which I processed in black and white, myself.
Even before post processing was a thing I was cropping film shots, back in the day when you could get a CD with your processing/prints.
I'm gobbling up your content like a mad man... in another week or so you'll be like "oh shut up, Trout!"
Hi Mark. This is really useful. Many thanks for sharing.
Thanks Tim! Glad to hear it was helpful.
I think composition, along with light, are the most important factors in photography. And composition is often the most challenging aspect of photography IMO.
Great video Mark.
Much appreciated Leandro!
This is when high megapixel cameras are useful. You did some aggressive crops in some examples. Don't know if I can get away with those on a D500 (20mp) for my 40x30cm prints. I print out a book with 24-48 pictures whenever I travel somewhere.
HI Mark, thanks for this great video! My Lightroom interface looks a lot different than yours (no histogram, for example). It's as if what I have is more basic and the editing is less customizable. Any idea why that is? THANKS!
Off topic but I love that Game Boy. I still have mine too :)
Great advice Mark, many people do not know about the different crop overlays. You're images look good, but looking at your histograms I think you would benefit from a technique called ETTR (Expose to the right) .
Thanks Mark! I recently flew to Bend Oregon from Seattle and captured some really cool highway shots (like yours). Your composition tips really helped me explore different techniques to give the images even more pzazz!
Fantastic tip. Thank you so much for sharing.
Happy to do it! Thanks for watching Taylor!
Great video Mark! The going back in time reference, along with the classic gameboy and a Flip is a nice touch.
Thanks Andy! You're the first to mention the Flip - remember those things?!? Man tech has come a long way.
The Flip was the greatest before cell phone video was a thing, Many a foolery was captured with mine in my youth.
Cudos again on a terrific tutorial video! Something that might also help many users is knowing what your front end process is for scouting, and identifying a landscape photo ‘subject’. Obviously, that’s a somewhat broad characterization, but more specifically what I’m looking for is knowing how do you go about identifying your ‘subject ’ in advance? Do you use a tool like The Photographers Transit, PhotoPills, The Photographer’s Ephemeris, Planit Pro, etc. to identify and layout your shot in advance (location, day/date, time of day, etc.) so that you have an effective idea of how you intend to frame the shot in advance and more importantly, how much time you might have to frame and take the shot? Or do you just wing it when you get there, or better still what you do when you scout the potential locations for the camera placement to get the framing you desire? I’m sorry for the detail requested here but but it could really help some folks who have difficulty with this part of process. Thank you in advance!!!
Brilliant video, aa always you teach me something new. I had no idea about those crop overlays 😂. Thank you.
Awesome video! Finally somebody who talks about photography and not about pen pressure tablet and gear! Thanks a lot for the video and keep coming up with similar content!
Miloš Grujić Haha! Thanks Milos!
I’m not a fan of the native 6x4 crop out of camera so I expect crop right out of the gate, and I think I’m on a similar page as I now use the crop as a creative step quite early in the workflow rather than just tidying up at the end.
I usually shoot for the crop as well - I almost always try to pick up some extra room on the sides when I'm out shooting.
I use the crop tool in about 90% of my images and almost constantly. It is a great tool and as you mentioned, you can go back to an image at a later date and re-style your work so that it becomes more pleasing to the eye
Hi Mark, great video and awesome images. My question is when I’m planning on printing an image do I need to set the size I’ll be printing in and then cropping from there.
I always match the aspect ratio that I'll be printing in and then crop from there but make sure the padlock is int he locked position.
Thank you for the tip Mark!!
So overlooked, yet effective. Now I'm re-doing photos!
Pam Walz Thanks for watching Pam!
This was a perfectly timed topic for me since I just started working more with crops after learning about the crop short cut from your video a few weeks ago. I’m going to play with it more today.
May I also make a suggestion for a future topic? Matching the color on your screen to the color of a printer be it your home printer or a commercial printer. I’ve printed a few images that just didn’t have the same color on paper that I did on the screen.
Thanks.
Great video this. I agree about the crop tool. As a keen amateur
I find composition the most difficult part to grasp. Now I look as the crop
tool as a learning device and I think my composition is getting better (I
hope). This was very helpful as I just
crop until I like the image. I have not used the crop grid overlays. Of course
the great thing with lightroom as I can go back over my past images and re-crop.
Thanks for the video.
Great vlog Mark! You’re killing it! Keep up the great work! It’s exactly what happens too. You’re so excited what you see on the camera just to open it up on the computer and it’s like the wind stalled in your sail. The crop tool in Lightroom is the best tool in LR in my opinion. Keep on keeping on!
Chuck Hultberg Thank ya buddy! How’s the bag workin out for you?
Broke it in and took it to Vancouver Island. It hauled most of what I wanted to take ( which was too much 😂) and it was heavier than what I wanted to hike with. It made a great on location portrait pack that fit a light stand, tripod, small light modifier, flashes, bodies and lenses. However for longer hikes I noticed it would probably be a bit much on the weight side. I love all the room and all the pockets. Sometimes not knowing the unknown we tend to overpack, I feel that's probably what I did. So it's another learning curve. Thanks again!
Perhaps someone has already said it, but I think it would have been especially instructive to show the uncropped and cropped images side-by-side, before and after. Thanks.
Thanks again, Mark. Keep 'em coming. When you crop and haven't decided whether or not it will be printed, is your crop based on the best overall composition (which you can re-crop if you later decide to print) or is it based on the dimensions of a possible print? (Kind of a rambling question!)
I agree and I crop many (most) of my images, but of course, the downside is that you're loosing all those expensive pixels you paid for when you bought your camera. Still, its better to improve the composition than worry about loosing pixels (and a little bit of IQ).
Loved the waterfall picture so much. . New subscriber .👍👌👏. Good content You've explained here ..
Rishi Manu Many Thanks Rishi!