Lessons
Lesson Info
Class Introduction
So today we're gonna talk about cropping. We're going to talk about the crop tool and its related counterpoint the canvas size. And I think that's something that people just I don't always know what that means. And I think for a lot of people, when it comes to cropping and really re sizing or reformatting images, people sort of stumble through it like I think this will work and then, like, I got what I want, Okay. But I won't help you consistently get what you want and know why and how to make that happen and a few other things So that will be doing today. So we're gonna start off talking about cropping. And I was actually talking about this with Jared Platt earlier, and he said, Um, cropping is the most important thing. He thought, so I thought, Good, that's what we're going to talk about. So I'm glad that someone, all things it's really important to. So why do we crop often times that we There's a lot of reasons, but initially a lot of times we were cropping post in post right to rec...
ompose our image. So over here this image on the left the subject is in the center. That's the way that it was shot. Um, and in this image over here are subject is on the right, so we were able to make that happen with the crop tool in post. Other reasons why we crop, of course, are to change the shape of an image. Obviously, most of the time we're capturing in horizontal or vertical format, so it's a rectangular format. And these days the square format has enjoyed quite a resurgence in popularity, of course, for things like Instagram, and so we might be cropping images into a square shape or a number of other kinds of different. Any time you need to repurpose your image, you can also crop to change size. Of course, you in that sense, the crop tool is very similar to the image size command in that you can use it to resize your image, although the crop tool, of course, is a little bit different than that. But you can use it to change the size of your image without changing the shape. The other thing that we're going to talk about is what I call reverse cropping, and I just made that term up, so I don't know. I don't know if anyone else calls it that, but I call it reverse cropping. And that means basically, um Oh, somehow that got out of order a little bit. Uh, sorry. The other thing that we can do is change the size and shape at the same time with the crop tool. Okay, now we'll talk about reverse. Copy. So what does that mean? Well, if we have an image like we have here on the left and it was, let's say, shot that way in camera. But maybe we need to make more space within the image for text or for maybe you're gonna build a composite of some sort, and you just you need to basically extend the image area. One way to think of it is reverse cropping. So I'm going to show you how we can do that with the crop tool. But another way that you can do that is by changing your canvas size. So we're gonna talk about that too. Here's an example where that might be necessary to reformat an image. Let's say that this image here is going to be used on a book and the images in a horizontal format. But in order to make it work for the book, it's not enough to just crop it into a rectangle. We actually would need to extend it in this case to be able to make room for a title. So I'm gonna show you how to do that as well. With the crop tool, we're gonna talk about changing the canvas size so we can do things like take an image and then basically added digital matte to a photo so you can bump up the size. And maybe if you have, like a, um, forget what I think I meet this as a four by six and we're gonna bump the mat out and make it into an eight by 10 with a little room for signature. Um, it's kind of a fun thing, and I don't know if you guys have run into this, um, in your Photoshopped photo world. But as a portrait photographer, I ran into problems a lot where clients would want a canvas wrap or a gallery rap campus, and, um, I tend to shoot really tight, especially like really close up portrait. And it never fails. But out of all the images that I shot, the one that was never gonna work as a gallery rap. That's the one the client would want as a gallery rap because that's the law of owning a studio, I think. And so I've come up with some tricks of how you can You can make it work and we're gonna use canvas size Teoh taken image that wouldn't work as a gallery rap and will make it fit. And then we're gonna talk about what I call power tips. So that's gonna be learning how to use the crop tool to rotate and straighten your image. We're gonna talk about, um, turning on or off the hide feature so you can actually crop without cropping without getting rid of pixels. And that's really handy because I don't know how many of you have when you're building, maybe a composite, say, and your, um cutting things and dragging them all around. And then you realize later, too late that you want to change the crop a little bit and there's some things you can do that will give you flexibility forever with the crop tool, and I'll show you some settings that you can tweak so you can see what you're getting a little bit better, and maybe it will help you make your compositional choices when you're when you're cropping. We'll talk about how to match size and create your own custom crop presets, which is great. I'm going to show you how to use the perspective crop tool. I don't know if you've dabbled in that at all, but that can be kind of ah, anything. And then I'm going to show you how to use custom crop shapes because typically, of course, when we crop were cropping into a rectangle or a square and maybe the rectangles horizontal, maybe it's vertical, and then the square is just a square. But you can actually crop into any old shape that you want, and so I'm going to show you how to do that. And when we are done, you will be a clever cropper.
Ratings and Reviews
Lael
Something that seems so basic, but so important! Big help & tips on gallery wraps, ratio vs size cropping and when to specify resolution or when you need to delete those pixels! Super fun technique to 'crop to shape' great ideal for web & social media. I appreciate that Khara covered the change from 'old crop' panel (previous versions) to 'new crop' (more recent CC versions), every time the interface changes it hard to switch the brain over ;)
a Creativelive Student
I just bought this class based on the previous reviews. I am so glad that I did, as I learned some new tricks to do in Photoshop! Thank you Khara for sharing this great information!
Amy Vaughn
I didn't think I'd learn much in a class about cropping, but Khara went over a few things I didn't know. I'm a Photoshop dinosaur that hasn't been keeping up with all the changes to the tools that came along in the CC version, and turns out there are a few new goodies for cropping. She also had some good tips for gallery wraps.
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