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Cropping Photos


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5 replies to this topic

#1
Johnb

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Taking pictures of birds on a feeder in my garden with a 200-500mm f6.3 lens, I need to crop these photos and wondered what percentage area I can crop off without losing any photo quality. 

Taken with my D7500, 20.9 MP, DX format.

 

Thanks Guys 



#2
Merco_61

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That depends on your reproduction scale and your viewing distance for the final print.

 

Basically, somewhere around 270 pixels per inch for the print is similar to the resolutions we had in the analog days, using Reala and printing 12x18" This is good enough for exhibitions as the viewing distance is equal to the diagonal of the print or more. To make a print that size @270 PPI means that you need ~15 megapixels left, which means roughly 90% linear scale. If you need to crop more than that, interpolating with a good algorithm can make a file acceptable for print even if it isn't ideal. I have used 6 MP files from my Kodak DCS 760 to make A2 exhibition prints, but the processing needs to be as perfect as possible in that extreme situaution.

If the intended usage is to hang on the wall above a sofa and a coffee table, you can probably get away with 120 PPI or so as the viewing distance is longer than at a gallery.



#3
fallout666

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if you can give example of photo you took we can give you better idea. but what he said is true. 



#4
TBonz

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I have seen people describe an image as not the best - grainy and poorly processed that was not cropped and I have seen a severely cropped image that the same people say was well done.  The "in the eye of the beholder" kind of situation where you never know.  It depends on how they are viewing the image as well.  If I am trying to select a few photos for publication, I will be significantly more critical of the work than if I was flipping through a friend's vacation snap shots.  The same is true for all of us.  I think you have great info from Peter (Merco_61) above, but I am suggesting using that as a "rule" like you would the rule of thirds.  Don't be afraid to crop more than that and see what happens.  I have been put into situations where I had to do that and have had more successes than failures doing it.  But note that I have had both :)!



#5
Merco_61

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Tom, remember that shots for publication doesn't need anything like the resolution for exhibition prints. The printing raster + 20% is enough without skewing the grid, but if you can skew the photo 1-1.5° before cropping, you can go with the raster resolution + 3% since the pixels won't line up with the raster. This makes moiré much less probable.



#6
TBonz

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Peter, I agree!  That is why I said it all depends on how the image is being viewed (web, publication, exhibition print).  Very different requirements for the exhibition print as it should be!  But I don't see where the OP indicated a publication medium, thus I brought up thoughts regarding other mediums.  If it isn't for pay, in reality the OP only needs to please themselves, but I thought your print recommendations were spot on!