For several years, the Phoblographer hasn’t believed in pixel-peeping images. And to be very honest with you, I still don’t. I think looking at details at 100% is pretty asinine and throws out the idea of how a photograph can be art. Instead, pixel peeping lends itself to all the technical details that completely disregard the human aspect of photography. But it still has a bit of importance. In fact, I’d say that it needs a fundamental rebrand of what it is — and I’ve come to this conclusion after a decade and a half of testing cameras and publishing lots of photos.
Pixel Peeping is Important for Cropping
What no one ever stated in the years that we’ve all talked about pixel peeping is cropability. Many photographers state that they don’t want to crop their images and instead get them right in camera. But truthfully, lots of images could be made better by cropping them instead.
Let’s talk about an example in real life.
The image above was shot with the Fujifilm GF 500mm f5.6 lens and the GFX 100s. 100MP on the sensor mean that there’s a lot of room for me to crop. But I never cropped this image. Instead, that’s how it was more or less when it came out of the camera. Pixel peeping would have us look at the image at 100% — and that isn’t logical for what’s important for our portfolio. However, cropping the image and still having something that looks good on a screen with high resolution does matter instead.
When I showed this photo to many people on my phone, they constantly wanted to zoom in to see more details. But they weren’t really zooming in at 100%. Instead, they were cropping the image.
Here’s what the photo would look like if I cropped it to a point where someone wouldn’t need to zoom in. That’s important, for sure!
Anyone who says that the value of lower resolution and lower megapixel cameras perhaps has lots of great lenses that can render the details they need. And often, they don’t need to crop their photographs or don’t need the resolution. Most of us, however, really might need it. In fact, I think birding and wildlife photographers really need it.
Cropability is insanely important to making a better photograph — but it doesn’t need to be going in to 100%.
Most importantly, who cares if something is slightly out of focus these days?
We Shouldn’t Look at Images at 100%
Pixel peeping is the idea that we can look at an image at 100% and see lots of great details. This depends on several factors though including sufficient lighting, flash, image stabilization, lens resolving power, and sensor resolving power. Your lenses and sensors work together in this case.
But going to 100% isn’t practical because of the balance between camera resolution and screen resolution of devices.
Instead, if we need to find a half-way point compromise. A camera and lens should still be able to give you the details you want when you’re cropping the photograph. Lots of those details can be added in post-production with sharpness, clarity, etc. But I’ve also never seen really good upsizing done. And trust me, I’ve really tried to find them.
The Rebrand
Pixel peeping truly should die the death that it deserves. It’s an impractical method of evaluating cameras and doesn’t at all lend itself to practicality. Sure, retouchers like more pixels, but cameras can do more than enough. Additionally, many people shoot with their phones and then send things to retouchers. The resolution is often enough.
Instead, we need to consider how cropping can help us all make better images.