Crop
I don’t crop, ever.
I use the Q3 43 and I’m aware of its cropping capabilities but I don’t use them. After two years of shooting with the 43, I can probably count on one hand the photographs I took with the crop integrated features.
So, why?
I used to own Nikon and Canon, with zoom lenses, and I was abusing what the zoom lens could offer to my eyes. Then, I switched to the Fuji X-E4 with fixed lenses and, while I was going out with 3 focus lengths in my pouch in the early days, I quickly landed on ”let’s take one and stick with it”. I ended up shooting more with one but which one is a question we will answer later in this essay.
Zooming in and out is one way of capturing the world. I had the iPhone Pro series with Ultra wide, Wide and Telephoto lenses and I ran an entire photo library check when I was considering the iPhone Air last year and its unique lens. I discovered (not too surprised though, I kinda knew it) that I was shooting 90%+ with the default wide angle, very rarely using the telephoto and using the ultra wide angle for macro mostly. So, the conclusion is, I don’t need a telephoto on my iPhone… I switched and never regretted my decision. The iPhone Air gives me the wide angle my other cameras don’t, and this is perfect for me… and I don’t crop it, ever.
Let’s go back to the X-E4 because I switched to a Leica D-Lux-8 before making an expensive leap of faith on the much more expensive Q3 43. This little toy of a camera has a zoom lens and I used it fully during my trip to Tokyo in 2024. So, yes, a zoom lens allows for compositions that you simply cannot capture with a fixed lens. So, now we could argue that we can with a 60 megapixels sensor on the Q3, just crop it. Well, it’s not the same, the photograph result is not the same and the experience is not the same.
1. The experience
For me, and this is probably totally subjective and personal, I am drowned to using the zoom if the camera has a zoom. I will wander around and see the world in different zoom “targets”. My brain sees this moment in a 75mm composition, and that moment in a 28mm composition. But something magical happens when I take a fixed lens ; I no longer see in multiples, I see a 35-43mm shot or I don’t. If something strikes my eyes, it either fits and rewards me with the photograph or I have to move to make it fit… or I just let it go.
Once you shot enough photographs with one photo length, you no longer think of the photos you missed, you simply see the world in that photo lens, it’s beautiful how the mind adapts to this limitation.
So, why 35-43mm? I again went back to all my photos and discovered that over the years, even when offered the possibility with the Nikon, the Canon, the iPhone Pro, the X-E4, I was largely shooting around 35mm, like 90% of the time. This is how I perceive my world, this is how I prefer my world. So, a Q3 28mm is not for me, it’s too wide, the M6 on 35mm is almost at times slightly too wide, and the 50mm is slightly too short, but the M6 has something else that is not the point of this essay. The Q3 43mm is the dream, it’s perfect, a 100% hit for me.
2. The photograph
Q3 43mm it is, simple, use the crop if ever you want a 60, 75 or 90mm photograph. We can argue all day about this but a cropped 90mm photograph from a 43mm lens will not render the same compression as if you shoot with a 90mm lens. One doesn’t compress distance as much as the other, this is how lenses work, these are the laws of physics. And when I look at a cropped 90mm photograph, I have this subtle feeling that something is not completely right to me. That feeling that I don’t get when I see a photograph on the same subject taken on a true 90mm lens. The subject isolation is not the same and this makes a whole difference.
I prioritize one composition because I see in that composition and that’s all good for me. I don’t ever crop because I don’t like the result. And at the same time, I rarely miss a real 90mm shot. Would I abuse it if I had an Hasselblad or a Leica SL with a zoom lens attached to the body? Maybe, probably, but I fear that I would land in the same 90-10 ratio.
So, I don’t crop, ever.