Cropping An Image
Average digital photographers have an advantage over the average
film photographers. The average film photographer has no input into
cropping his or her images. Scanning and image editing programs allow
digital photographers to take control!
Cropping is the word for trimming photos. Images are cropped to
remove unwanted elements or to improve the composition. With
scanners, you can crop before or after you scan the image. With
digital cameras, you crop the image in the image editing software on
the computer. There are a wide variety of image editing programs
available. Often your camera or scanner comes packaged with software
to edit the pictures. Almost all image programs allow you to crop
your images. Some examples of image editing programs include: Adobe
Photoshop, Adobe Elements, Adobe Photo Deluxe, Picture It, MGI
PhotoSuite, PaintShop Pro, and PhotoStudio. To crop
images before scanning:
Most scanners allow you to Prescan an image. This shows a "rough
draft" of the image. Use the selection tool to draw a box around the
part of the image you want to keep.
In this example, the selection tool is the the left most tool above
the image. The selection is usually surrounded by dotted lines.
When the scan button is clicked, only the portion of the image
inside the dotted lines will be scanned for the final image -
resulting in a cropped picture. To crop images after
scanning:
Most image editing programs allow you to crop. Exactly how you
execute the process varies from program to program. In most
programs, you must draw a box with the crop tool (just like in the
scanning example). This box is usually surrounded with the dotted
lines and designates the part of the picture you would like to
keep. Once you've marked the area you usually click on the crop
tool again to complete the trimming. In some programs, the crop tool
is found in the menu rather than on the toolbar.
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