Home » Windows » Graphics » Image Manipulation

Improve your photos with Croppola: a free web service that can suggest better picture compositions

June 14, 2012 By 7 Comments

Do you think it’s possible to teach good taste to a computer?, or that a program can suggest better picture compositions? That is what free online service Croppola aspires to; it “provides automatic suggestions to obtain the best composition from pictures you have already shot”,

which, in English, means that it will suggest ways to crop your images that can potentially give you a better result and a better image.

Croppola is a free web service that lets you upload pictures in batch, suggests image crops for each, and will let you download the cropped files in one go as well.

Croppola Screenshot3

But does it work?  Judge for yourself. I tested 6 images in total; here are the before and afters. Note: Croppola-processed image is always on the RIGHT.

Here’s where I think the cropping worked: click on each set to preview

Image1 before and after CroppolaImage2 before and after CroppolaImage5 before and after CroppolaImage4 before and after croppolaImage3 pano before and after Croppola

Here’s where I think it didn’t: cropped is on the right; click to preview

Image6 before and after Croppola

The verdict: not a bad tool at all; however, it is handicapped considerably by the simple fact that you need to upload and download your image, and I cannot seriously see myself doing so for large image libraries. Best used for a handful of images that you would like an ‘opinion’ on, as it were.

Wish list: in our opinion, Croppola should have a downloadable option that can be run locally on your PC or device, which would circumvent the problem of having to upload your images.

[Thanks go to reader Panzer for the tip about this service].

Check out Croppola.


 
 
 
Samer Kurdi

Samer Kurdi

Has been reviewing software since 2006 when he started Freewaregenius.com
Samer Kurdi

@freewaregenius

June 14, 2012
Samer Kurdi
7
flattr this!
  • Toni

    Impressive. If you just look at the composition, even the last photo isn’t so bad. It is just that the device the boy is holding in his hands is essential information in the picture. I guess Croppola (Francis Ford..?) sees the device as a disturbing element.

  • http://carbonize.co.uk Carbonize

    I’m not that sure on this one myself. In the first picture with the girl you lose a bit form the right where as it really should centre her face. In fact looking at all of them it seems obsessed with cropping away most of the right side of a picture. It also seems obsessed with cropping to a corner and keeping the same aspect ratio.

  • Samer

    @ Toni: I agree that the seeing the device adds to the visual experience. But I also like the breathing space on the right in that picture (of my son).

    @ Carbonize: actually, all of these crops were performed under the ‘keep original aspect ratio’ setting. You can choose other aspect ratios if you like, it offers many.

    But I am not sure centering on the girl’s (my daughter’s) head is a good idea, or for that matter if centering in compositions in general is a good idea.

  • http://carbonize.co.uk Carbonize

    I wasn’t talking about all pictures just that one. As I said in my previous comment it just seems to find what it thinks is the subject of that image then chooses the nearest corner and crops to that corner cropping as close to the subject as possible. The image of the doorway and the one of the woman in the street being good examples.

    When it comes to cropping it is best done by a person and using the rule of thirds.
    http://digital-photography-school.com/rule-of-thirds
    http://www.cambridgeincolour.com/tutorials/rule-of-thirds.htm

  • http://www.sciencebase.com David Bradley

    I don’t like any of the photos used in their demo and the before and afters are actually just as bad as each other. So, it’s really hard to judge whether the tool is doing anything useful. Chopping off feet never makes for a good portrait nor does a sloping horizon make for a good scene…

  • Copil Rau

    irfanview is the best for this

  • http://carbonize.co.uk Carbonize

    @Copil Rau – Seems you totally missed the point of this product and this review. Did you not even read the title? This service automatically crops the picture to the what it sees as the best image.