Why don’t you crop my photos closer?

WHY DON’T YOU CROP MY PHOTOS CLOSER?

Sometimes, when you look at my images, you’ll notice a “large” amount of space on either side of the main subjects in the image. It is usually most noticeable in family photos – where you’ll have this large group of people all together, and then a “chunk” of empty space on either side of the family. Is this a mistake? Laziness?

Not at all! It is completely on purpose.

Let me explain:
I want you to print your images. Truly! That’s why I give you the digital negatives. The most common sizes to get your photos printed are 4×6, 5×7, and 8×10. If you go to the store, the “frame” aisle is packed with those 3 sizes. That’s fabulous, but there’s only one problem – 5×7 & 8×10 aren’t the same ratio as the original photo. That means, when you have an image printed as a 5×7 or 8×10, you are going to lose part of the original image – the sides. And with an 8×10 – you lose 2 whole inches of your image – 1 inch off of either side!

Seeing is believing – so take a look at this image:

That’s the original photograph, exactly as my camera took the photo. If you are having it printed as a 4×6 – no problem whatsoever, you are going to get 100% of the image.
However, if you wanted a 5×7 of this photo, a little bit of crop is introduced – notice we get a little closer to the family in this next image that is cropped to a 5×7 size.

And then it gets crazy! 8×10’s are probably the most popular size to be printed – they’re great for hanging on the wall or displaying in a frame on a table – not too small that you have to squint to see who’s in the photo, but not obnoxiously large either. The problem is, an 8×10 size chops a lot of space off of the sides of your photo! Here is the same image, cropped to an 8×10 size:

See how close we get?
Now you know why I leave extra space in your photos! If I had cropped this image any closer, you would literally sacrifice family members to have this printed as an 8×10.

To illustrate this a little clearer – here is the same image one more time. The very inside line is the 8×10 crop, and the outer line is the 5×7 crop, and the full image would be what you’d get if you were printing as a 4×6.

So, what happens if you want to print an image, but don’t want to lose so much of the photo? Most labs have the option of printing an 8×12 – which would be the entire image. Finding a frame that holds an 8×12 is a little trickier though, you probably won’t find one at WalMart, so you’ll more than likely have to order one online or go to a specialty store.

One last note: when ordering prints like 5×7’s or 8×10’s – photo labs will always give you the option of adjusting the crop. Always make sure you do! Technology is great and most of the time it can make some great “assumptions”, but it can’t replace your eyes looking at the image & making sure that it isn’t going to cut anyone out of the photo!