AskJoeB: Would It Be More Dramatic?

Dawn is a very good shooter that recently took my “Springtime in Paris ” workshop. She sent me this photo to take a look at. and as usual, I like to put the exact message my fellow photographers send me. the reason is that so many of you out there have similar questions or have been in similar situations. Here’s what Dawn had to say:

“Hi Joe,

Attached is an image I photographed a few days ago at the Mucem, the  new museum in Marseilles, as it left the camera. I wonder if it would be more dramatic, if that’s not too serious a word, if I were to crop the sides and the foreground to make the 3 people bigger? Crop the sides to the edge of the blue-ish lights at the top left and to the edge of the horizontal light on the other side; and cropping the foreground so the side railings end at the same point. This would reduce the depth of the scene, however……

Thank you in advance for your comments,

Regards,

Dawn”

First of all, as I tell people that take my online class with the PPSOP, and my “Stretching Your Frame of Mind” workshops I conduct around the planet, NEVER CROP your pictures in front of a computer. You’ll never know where the edges of your frame are and you won’t be able to use those edges as a compositional tool. Henri Cartier-Bresson said that when you crop, you lose the integrity of your original composition. If it wasn’t good enough at the point of clicking the shutter, then it never will be.

That said, since you know how I feel about cropping, you must be talking in theory and would have cropped it the way you thought before clicking the shutter!!!

🙂