Re: Where do we draw the line?

Dudley Hanks wrote:
> Crop lines, that is...
> 
> http://www.geocities.com/hanks.dudley/Dima.html
> 
> Thanks,
> Dudley
> 
> 
  Wow, lots of comments.

   Let's go over a few almost universal rules though.

   The eye is drawn to bright ares. On this image you have white areas 
on the edges of the image that take you out of the picture. Any cropping 
you do should get rid of these.

   Generally with a live "action" subject you should give it some room 
to move. I'm not sure what I would do here. Get a couple sheets of white 
paper and crop out the image with these and see what you think. Try all 
possibilities.

   The background is distracting. Do what others have already suggested. 
Or open up your editor and mask off the background and do something with 
it. Blur it, lower the contrast, darken it, something. Once you have a 
mask you can try everything.

   You have areas in the dog that are blown out and have lost detail. 
Perhaps a third of a stop less exposure might have kept them. You may 
wish to clone in a bit of fur. In general, you should not have blown out 
highlights (along edges is often OK) . You can always adjust the picture 
in your editor to bring the image back where you want it. Caveats apply.

   Get rid of the red eye. Desaturate this in your editor and perhaps 
add a catch light. Eyes are very important.

  What you really need to do is shoot more pictures. This is not a 
strong image. You have a digital camera and no film cost. Take lots and 
lots of images, try it with the dog moving. Try it in different places. 
Then open up a slideshow and look at all of them and see what you like.


   Jeff