Suggestions for cropping

[srmoment]

I have processed this using Elements and On1.  I am not sure how best to crop it and would sure appreciated suggestions.  Please feel free to download if you wish.

[cats4jan]

I don’t know if any crop would improve it. It’s really nice as is.

Maybe I’d take a little off the bottom, but then again, I like the way the water flows downward. I usually don’t like focus on things being centered, but that’s not a problem either.

Are you trying to achieve a specific size?

[hmca]

Let me start by saying that this is a beautiful image, Pat. Just for fun I fiddled with it a little in Camera Raw......scaling and rotating a bit. I then extended the canvas size and merged the images.
I'm not proposing this is better than your original crop....just something a different being you asked. As I've said before, cropping is something I struggle with as well so it will be fun following this thread. Thanks for sharing your image with us!

[billbee]

Hi srmoment,

Your image is very nice as is.  The only "improvement" I can suggest re cropping would be something like this below.  

Your original has a little too much distracting space along the left edge and across the bottom for my taste.  This crop I feel emphasises the cascading water on the waterfall and then flowing on in the stream filling out the bottom of the frame.

Just my 2c worth and hopefully some food for thought.  Thank you for sharing 

[srmoment]

Thanks Helen. I had not rotated the image because the bridge at the top is on a slope; however, I should have noticed that the falls themselves should be straight. ...and the shadow of the trees should have been a clue.
I'm living up to my user name!

[hmca]

It will be interesting to see what others suggest, Pat. That bridge at the top is hard to know how to handle.

[srmoment]

Okay, I am perplexed. I went back and straightened the bridge; however, it really is on a downhill slope and if I go by the shadow of the trees above it to straighten the image, the bridge is still slanted, which means the line of the waterfall is slanted. Is that even possible?

Hopefully, our knowledgeable members can help with this perspective puzzle........

[pontiac1940]

Nice photo Pat. 
Gosh I don't think there is a way to tell if the image is slanted either way. Parts look down to the left and parts down to the right. But that is the nature of the scene. 
I visualized several cropping options and don't think any are improvements over the original.  

[kdcintx]

I agree. Don't know of a crop that would improve the original photo as posted.

[BuckSkin]

I hesitate to offer anything as the original is pretty good.

The one thing I will note is, vertical elements that we know would be vertical need to appear vertical.

The only known vertical in the image is the bridge post and I would rotate it to vertical and see if that improves the overall image, and it may or may not.

Horizontals are a different story altogether and things that are horizontal will not always photograph horizontal, such as the laterals of the bridge.

Whenever I have a barn, house, or fence in a picture, I ignore the horizontals and choose the most prominent vertical to make vertical, whether it be the corner of the building, a window or door frame, or whatever.

Also, in many images, things will appear to lean inwards toward the center; in which case, I will use DxO to make two outside verticals be parallel to one another; DxO will also make them vertical in the process.

Rotating will crop away some image information to keep the image square and plumb; other than that necessary automatic cropping, I don't know that I would crop any further.

[tonyw]

Lovely picture but I had to try a crop and agree with BuckSkin that vertical elements should be made to appear vertical - so in this case the falls and the bridge posts. I'm also a great believer in the rule of thirds and in this case would give the bottom 1/3 of the image to the water and put the falls on a horizontal 1/3 so would finish up with something like this:



Tony