POLL - To crop or not

[Damien_Demolder]

They say, and I believe he said it himself, that Henri Cartier Bresson – that photographic deity – never cropped a negative. He printed everything the film recorded and all that appeared in his viewfinder. His eye was such that, without the aid of zoom lenses, he could frame the ideal composition of the perfect moment in-camera.

I wonder how many moments he missed or never printed because he couldn’t get close enough or he couldn’t bring himself to neatly trim some ugly distraction out of the picture. He dealt with reality of course, so whatever appeared in the scene had to be recorded, but the waste must have been amazing.

I suppose I’m a pretty poor photographer. I do like to crop. I like the way different frame proportions suggest different things – classic square, stately 5x4, groovy 16x9. The 35mm frame, and APS-C too, is a little too long for most subjects, whereas the 4x3 proportions of the digital compact and the Four Thirds format feels much neater and more visually manageable. I don’t mind cropping out ‘accidental content’, or making one format seem like another – it’s creative.

I do worry though, that when I get to heaven and discover Cartier-Bresson really is God I won’t be staying for long.

To take part in this week's poll Is cropping ok? head to the home page.

Thanks for playing

damien

[Zou]

Of course it's ok. My film or sensor is a fixed shape, but short of carrying a 3:2 camera, a 4:3 camera, a 1:1 camera, a 6:7 camera, a 5:4 camera, a 2:1 camera (and why not a 6:17 whilst I think of it!) around all at the same time I will inevitably need to crop an image. There are occasions when I want to use each of these ratios so why should there be any issue with losing a bit of recorded image you didn't want/need in the first place?

[JJM74]

When I had my first camera I was able to use a friends darkroom for printing, and found as a result I would experiment with different crops just to figure out what looked best. As an educational tool for composition, I found it very useful to play.

I will now take shots which I intend from the start to be a specific format other than that of the sensor I'm using, because I have a particular use or image in mind. I think the only time cropping is a non starter is in editorial pieces where it changes the context of the image.

[hhmr]

...........They say, and I believe he said it himself, that Henri Cartier Bresson – that photographic deity – never cropped a negative. He printed everything the film recorded and all that appeared in his viewfinder..............

Damien,

Is that correct? I seem to remember that soon after he died there was a TV program which included an interview with him going round an exhibition of his work. When they came to the chap jumping over the puddle outside the railway station he pointed out that the reason why it was printed without a surrounding black border, unlike most of the others, was because it was not from the whole frame.

Henry

[RogerMac]

...........They say, and I believe he said it himself, that Henri Cartier Bresson – that photographic deity – never cropped a negative. He printed everything the film recorded and all that appeared in his viewfinder..............

I suppose one can always blame the publishers but the copy of "Sunday on the banks of the Marne" in my reference book has an aspect ratio of 1.38, so some cropping must have occured. To be fair the other two examples of his work in the same book are almost exactly 1.5

Roger

[hhmr]

.............I think the only time cropping is a non starter is in editorial pieces where it changes the context of the image.

I don't think that is necessarily the case. Doesn't it depend on circumstances? The original photographer is in effect "cropping" from the whole scene in front of him. That in itself is an opportunity for misrepresentation long before the neg or digital data gets printed. The photographic process is open to sharp practice from start to finish and a reputation for honesty and fairness has to be earned.

There is a practical point too if the end product is a printed page. The size and shape of a picture is bound to be influenced by the space in which it is going to be placed.

Henry

[Malcolm_Stewart]

Your mention of

...Henri Cartier Bresson ...

has reminded me of how let down I felt after going out of my way to see a major exhibition devoted to his work at the National Portrait Gallery some years ago. I have bought one of his books ("The Face of Asia"), but I really did feel that the prints on display at the Gallery were over enlarged, and that we were allowed to get much too close. All I noticed was the grain, and generally poor sharpness. More than most, this exhibition really demonstrated why serious photographers chose MF or even LF for work aimed at the large display market.

OTOH, I felt encouraged that technically, my own 35mm work wasn't that bad. As for cropping, I'm happy to crop...

[john_g]

I believe that capturing the absolute, natural purity of the moment is paramount and that the photographic process should not be allowed to distract the photographer from concentrating on this. To this end, I eschew cropping and all other such fripperies. I also refuse to use any camera settings other than 1/125th and f8, with a 50mm equivalent prime lens focused to the hyperfocal distance. I think this is the ultimate way to capture reality. Mind you, my pictures are rubbish.

[TimF]

...........They say, and I believe he said it himself, that Henri Cartier Bresson – that photographic deity – never cropped a negative. He printed everything the film recorded and all that appeared in his viewfinder..............

Damien,

Is that correct? I seem to remember that soon after he died there was a TV program which included an interview with him going round an exhibition of his work. When they came to the chap jumping over the puddle outside the railway station he pointed out that the reason why it was printed without a surrounding black border, unlike most of the others, was because it was not from the whole frame.

Yes, you're correct. The picture "Behind the Gare St. Lazare" had the entire left side cropped off (plus a small area off the top to preserve aspect ratio), because it was merely an out of focus nothingness. HCB took the shot pointing his camera through a small hole in a wooden fence. I have seen the original uncropped neg on some website a few years ago, but don't have a reference. The image itself is on my old desktop, which isn't currently connected to the internet. For those who have access to a copy of the excellent "Henri Cartier-Bresson Scrapbook", both versions are to be seen on pp86-87.

According to the same book, HCB also decided to crop just one other picture, of a certain Cardinal Pacelli (later Pope Pius XII), as soon as he made it. All his others were presumably printed complete therefore.

Cardinal Pacelli at Montmartre, 1938

Moderator: image too wide for these forums. Curious - I'm sure it wasn't the last time I looked at this thread!

[Gromit]

The strange this is, when I used to shoot on film, that prints were often cropped. However slides were very rarely masked, and some of my best work was on slide film. Now I'm using digital I do crop some images. So how much difference does the medium we're shooting on make? Do we take more care with composition if it's more difficult to crop the final image? It seems as if I probably did.

[Terrywoodenpic]

In my early days I used to work mostly in 2 1/4 sq or 5x4
My rolleis always had the corners marked to give a 5x4 ratio
As most of my shots were made to fit 10x8

Apart from printing to these dimensions I rarely cropped anything, unless a different aspect ratio was required for the job.

Part of the act of taking a Photograph is framing the subject, so in the slow world of large format you should be able to get it right; in the other formats you should be aware, when you take the photograph, that two sides may need cropping.

We were constantly told in college (this was the days well before zooms) that we should move our feet to do the framing.

Later when most of my personal shots were taken on 35mm slides and later still machine printed colour negative. it became almost essential to frame correctly.

I do not understand the reasoning that cropping might be needed to remove an unwanted object that is "discovered" in the shot. Certainly such things should have been noticed.

Seeing is the essential element in taking a photograph...
You should certainly have seen...

the right elements to include...
The right light...
The limits of the captured image...
The right moment...
The things that might spoil the photograph...
(head-branches in people shots, or unwanted litter an architectural shot etc.)

However none of this ensures a "good" photograph, though this too is down to seeing.

I suppose most of our poor shots (certainly mine) are down to the frustration that we have not seen anything better and have "snapped" anyway.

[zx9]

.........but I really did feel that the prints on display at the Gallery were over enlarged, and that we were allowed to get much too close. All I noticed was the grain, and generally poor sharpness.......

A very good reason to crop tight in camera and maximise the return from (at the time) such a small format.

.... More than most, this exhibition really demonstrated why serious photographers chose MF or even LF for work aimed at the large display market....

And at the time they had access to many larger formats, and if ultimate picture quality was the aim they would have used them. IMO The value of these pictures are in using a new miniature format to record peoples and events that would not have justified capture on larger formats due to time, cost and difficulty of access.

OTOH, I felt encouraged that technically, my own 35mm work wasn't that bad. As for cropping, I'm happy to crop...

Too true, we have a lot to be thankful for, fine grain emulsions of a reasonable speed, multi-coated optics etc. I smile when people roll out the ' but HCB ONLY used an uncoated 50mm f/3.5, if it was good enough for him......' thinking to my self 'Yes and it shows'. We will never know what he could have done with a M8 and some modern glass but I bet he would have adopted the freedoms of digital imaging in the same way he did the miniature format.

[Terrywoodenpic]

Your mention of

...Henri Cartier Bresson ...

has reminded me of how let down I felt after going out of my way to see a major exhibition devoted to his work at the National Portrait Gallery some years ago. I have bought one of his books ("The Face of Asia"), but I really did feel that the prints on display at the Gallery were over enlarged, and that we were allowed to get much too close. All I noticed was the grain, and generally poor sharpness. More than most, this exhibition really demonstrated why serious photographers chose MF or even LF for work aimed at the large display market.

OTOH, I felt encouraged that technically, my own 35mm work wasn't that bad. As for cropping, I'm happy to crop...

HBC was a stickler for many things but sharpness and grain were not amongst them. If you look back over his work , from the earliest times to the last, this aspect did not change even though technically such things had improved.

His printing was done for him by his chosen printer and when it became available mostly on multigrade. He was certainly interested in tonality,light and his subject...
But other technical details did not seem to hold any interest. Considering his first and last days were concerned with Painting, it is not surprising these purely photographic elements were of no great interest.

Today we are perhaps so much more interested in pixel peeping, noise, ultimate sharpness and highlight clipping that we forget the all important image.

We do this to the extent of rejecting photographs, or at least feel they have been spoiled in some way, if these purely technical details are not perfect.

Does this make us less able to judge great Photography?

[Terrywoodenpic]

Too true, we have a lot to be thankful for, fine grain emulsions of a reasonable speed, multi-coated optics etc. I smile when people roll out the ' but HCB ONLY used an uncoated 50mm f/3.5, if it was good enough for him......' thinking to my self 'Yes and it shows'. We will never know what he could have done with a M8 and some modern glass but I bet he would have adopted the freedoms of digital imaging in the same way he did the miniature format.

During his working life he progressed up the screw and M range of Leicas and had the very best coated lenses, capable of extreme sharpness, Exceptionally fine grain films were available to him.(the choice then was wider than it is today)

However the films and processing he chose were not of that ilk but were more to his taste in terms of tonality and atmosphere. If he had wanted bitingly sharp grain free images the where-with-all was certainly available to him.

The interesting question is would that choice have improved his photography or not?

[zx9]

Terry,
Thinking about it you are right about how all his prints were made by others and only by insisting that the edge of the frame were visible in the finished print, could viewers be sure that the printer was not re-composing his images.

I do not agree with some of your other points re grain / sharpness but as I was going off topic from the OP already it will have to stay that way.

[hhmr]

Of course it's ok. My film or sensor is a fixed shape, but short of carrying a 3:2 camera, a 4:3 camera, a 1:1 camera, a 6:7 camera, a 5:4 camera, a 2:1 camera (and why not a 6:17 whilst I think of it!) around all at the same time I will inevitably need to crop an image..........

Zou,

Yes!

I think, when we are being told anecdotes about the working methods of people whose pictures we admire we do need to keep our BS detectors switched on. However accurate the anecdotes it doesn't necessarily follow that adopting somebody elses working methods, as opposed to trying them to learn about them, is going help.

Someone might just as well say "As well as avoiding cropping you need to mix with Surrealists and adopt some of their attitudes." That might be fun, or rather it might have been fun were not most of that generation dead, but it probably wouldn't help either.

Henry

[beejaybee]

Like so many other "controversies", the answer depends. If you shoot transparency film, part of the art is getting the framing right (and the fact that the viewfinder on many cameras does not show the whole frame doesn't help). If you're shooting anything else and making a print, a bit of cropping is neither one way nor another.

If you find yourself cropping most of the frame of the original off, you are of course asking for technical trouble, you should have used a different lens and/or stood somewhere else to get the image.

Even then, as a record of a one-off event, a heavily cropped image is preferable to none at all.

[hhmr]

...........If you shoot transparency film, part of the art is getting the framing right (and the fact that the viewfinder on many cameras does not show the whole frame doesn't help). If you're shooting anything else and making a print, a bit of cropping is neither one way nor another..............

Is this really the point any more? Positive transparencies, since scanning became an everyday business, are just as much an original source material for prints or computer displays as colour or monochrome negatives or the data from a digital camera. You probably wouldn't want to use an original transparency for projection nowadays, cropped or uncropped.

Henry

[Terrywoodenpic]

Terry,
Thinking about it you are right about how all his prints were made by others and only by insisting that the edge of the frame were visible in the finished print, could viewers be sure that the printer was not re-composing his images.

I do not agree with some of your other points re grain / sharpness but as I was going off topic from the OP already it will have to stay that way.

Not only did he have them printed full frame, but he insisted as a condition of their use that they were published that way.

however as I stopped buying any books about him or of his photographs in the late 70's I have no Idea how successful he was in keeping to that after that date

[sey]

IMHO, street/candid has never been about grainless, perfectly sharp photographs. By definition it's all about subject matter and many times gritty grain and a little out of focusness or movement simply adds to the impact of the photograph.

When out shooting we are busy concentrating on the subject, we are not thinking yet about final image/print format and we are limited by whichever format camera we are using at the time. In this genre of photography which is pretty much a spontaneous happening, there is no time for the technical niceties of photography. The photographer makes do with what he has at the particular "decisive moment for him". This includes available light, camera format, lens and subject.

When shooting slide film I always composed using the whole frame. I've never masked a slide. Otoh, when shooting B/W film I always compose leaving a tiny margin around the frame to give me a little leeway in composing the image/print according to the way I think is eventually the right format. I don't let standard film/paper sizes or 'rules' restrict the proportions of my photographs, it's the composition that's "boss".

To enhance the subject matter of a street/candid photograph, composition is of utmost importance as is depth-of-field. A valuable composition tool we have is cropping.

Perhaps photojournalism should be added to this genre, even though the 'togs use flash, which for me, is a no-no in street/candid photo.