Cropping vs Resizing

[jgonzalez1980]

I know there's tons of information out there on this topic, so I don't know if I'm making it harder than it really is. However, it seems to be that the more I read on the topic the more confused I get. I just need to ask some questions to make sure I'm understanding this correctly. I have a nikon D60 10.2 mp, just for extra info.

If I would like a 5x7 print, I should use the preset 5x7 ratio and apply the crop to my liking and get a decent quality 5x7. I'm assuming that would apply to any size I wanted. Perhaps, I wanted an 8x12 instead of an 5x7, I would need to crop the image to an 8x12 ratio to get a decent quality photo? However, if the crop applied is tight, am I correct in thinking that some resolution and quality is lost? It would seem to me a tighter crop would result in a "stretching" of the pixels, thus a lower quality photo.

Is the purpose of resizing an image only to reduce the file size for web use? Or can use you resizing to get quality photos at any size?

What would be the reason to increase the pixels on an image?

[GadgetRick]

Cropping should not affect the quality of the image, just the composition.

Resizing the image will affect the quality of the image.

[teaking]

You seem to understand aspect ratio's and that different print sizes have different ratios.

So if you took a picture that was not the correct aspect ration and squashed it (resizing) to fit in that frame it would look odd wouldnt it?

If you cut away the edges to make it fit in the frame (cropping) it would loo pretty good right?

Resizing is done to usually to make images smaller as having a large image on the web takes longer to load and also more storage space its all down to the size the image will be viewed at.

To wrap up when shooting try to shoot for the crop, the aspect ration of the size the image you think will be printed.

[jgonzalez1980]

GagetRick> Thanks, Thats what I knew to be true. What started me doubting that thought was seeing some pictures that my mother had developed. They didn't look to sharp, in fact they looked pretty bad because they look very pixel-lated. But thinking about it now, I think what I did was crop then resized them which apparently is not a good idea. Why I did this to begin with you got me, but i know now to do it now.

teaking> Thanks. most of the time I really don't think about my composition. Its not until I upload them that I see what I orginally wanted, I guess I'm just shutter happy. The good thing thought is that now im staring to relize that I should worry about the compostion, so that I don't have to crop so much.

[teaking]

Sometimes you will have to crop so dont worry about trying to change a shot because of that. For example if your picturing a nice 8x10 print from your picture your going to have to purposley leave gaps on a 4x3 or 3x2 picture that may not look good but then you crop to get the correct aspect ratio and theres that great picture you were thinking of.