Last week JamesD posted two very nice pictures of some Canadian Geese (and turtles). The first is in Landscape mode and the second one is in Portrait Mode.
So which one did our readers prefer? Before giving the results, I received an email from JamesD who pointed out that these were two pictures (not the same pictured recropped). You can see this best by looking at the turtle on the back right – in the Landscape picture you can see its head is extended, but not in the Portrait mode. However I don’t really think the minor differences changed the images that much.
If you’ve been a regular contributor to these exercises before, you won’t be surprised to hear that it was an even split. Half the respondents said they just like Landscape mode better for most pictures (I’m one of them). Although the vast majority of images we see nowadays are from phones, which tend to be Portrait mode, those of us from the “pre-smart phone” era and shot images in 35mm are more comfortable viewing images in Landscape mode. None of the people who preferred the Landscape version of the picture didn’t give any other reasons for their preference.
There were more comments about the Portrait mode made – some positive and some negative. Those expressing their preference for the Portrait mode stated that they liked that more of the reflection was included and that the shot was “less confusing”. Somebody said the stick on the right (particularly its reflection) was more prominent, taking away the viewers’ eyes from the bird and turtle subjects.
Someone else said that there was more reflection than birds, which they viewed as a negative and I have to agree with them. By extending the frame down to capture the full reflection of the goose, almost half of the image is the water and reflection, taking away from the geese and turtles sunning themselves. In this case I don’t think it was worth trying to capture the reflection.
JamesD, who submitted the two pics to begin with, said he liked the Landscape mode best for this image. So we’ll let him tip the scale and say the Landscape mode won.
Do you enjoy exercises like this? I know I do – perhaps someone can submit two more Landscape/Portrait pics and we’ll take a careful look at them to see which we like better.
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