Camera Phones are Cameras: Using the Cropping Tool

Articles: Camera Phones are Cameras: Using the Cropping Tool

Contributor

Saxon Holt

Topics: Inspired Gardens and Design, PH Photo Tips

Pacific Horticulture’s monthly photo series by renowned garden photographer and Pacific Horticulture Board Member, Saxon Holt of PhotoBotanic and Summer-Dry

Summer 2025

One of the biggest frustrations with garden photography is getting close enough to the subject to get a nice tight composition. Whether it’s a high-end camera or a camera phone, too many photos are not cropped tight enough.

It is especially common with a camera phone because too often we grab a photo in a rushed moment, dashing through the garden; then end up with wasted space in the composition. Crop tool to the rescue.

On an iPhone there is a suite of tools built into the Photos app and every photo has access to the Adjust tools. In the image below, we see that clicking the Adjust slider reveals the crop tool at the bottom of the screen (left) and once it opens (center) we see tools to straighten the image. If we click the crop button again the third screen opens (right)

Here we see several options for cropping and in the example image above I wanted to keep the exact proportion (circled in red) as the original, so it would seem the photo was shot this way to start with. I tweak a lot of my photos this way even with my professional camera, often cropping just a little bit to make the image stronger, as in the example above to bring more emphasis to the urn and a little less wasted space on the pathway.

Let’s look at three examples where the crop tool can really help: simply getting closer to the subject; getting the subject more centered in the composition and then using the crop tool to create close-up photos.

A frequent problem with camera phone photography is grabbing a shot too quickly. We see a beautiful garden and snap a photo as soon as we can. Maybe we are on a tour and don’t have time to stop and wander into the garden, or maybe where we really want to go is restricted and we simply can’t get closer.

This photo of The Desert Garden at The Huntington Library is typical of a grab shot in need of help: the garden is stunning, but the quick photo includes the road and distracting sky highlights in the distance.

Using the crop tool, locked into the original proportion, allows me to carefully compose what I really saw. There are certainly times when I don’t crop in the exact original proportion, perhaps wanting to make something a little bit more horizontal, but after a lifetime of looking through a camera and composing full frame images in exactly this proportion, I’m much more comfortable keeping the original proportions.

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April 22, 2026 – May 4, 2026

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This next example is an example of a photograph that I thought I had carefully composed in the viewfinder originally but decided I should crop to bring more emphasis on the lily (Lilium leucanthum). In the original composition, I was careful to compose the various shapes and negative spaces, the dark areas and light areas becoming a pleasing jigsaw puzzle.

However, the intention of the photo, and the original story here, was the lily and I felt it was a little bit lost, so I used the crop tool to tighten it up. Even looking at this now, I wonder if I’ve cropped too much and may try adjusting it again at some point.

This is really the fun part of digital tools, having so much control to manipulate images. It’s easy to get distracted and lost in many tiny decisions but that is often the difference between a decent photo and a good one.

Another great use of the crop tool is creating close-up photos. Camera phones are definitely getting better but still have a difficult time getting really close up flower and bug photos. Knowing you have the crop tool going into taking a picture allows you to pre-visualize what a macro photo might look like.

I am a big fan of camellias, and the yellow anthers at the end of the sinuous stamens on this pink Camellia ‘Sunny Side’ make a fascinating study. I knew I would be able to crop in later.

A word of caution though. If you make such a radical crop, duplicate the original before you crop it, or save the new photo as a separate file; you don’t want to lose the original. Also cropping the photograph reduces the file size and accents imperfections a lot. Reducing the file size is not a big issue if you only intend to use photos for social media, because the original files are much bigger on camera phones than you might realize, but If there are any blurry parts, cropping tight will make faults more plain.

A crop tool comes with every camera phone, and you really should get comfortable in using it. At the end of the day, as you review your pictures, it is usually pretty obvious what the best ones are, the ones you want to share. Take a few moments to look at those closely with the app that came with the phone and be sure the composition is as tight as you imagined.

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About the Series

I began Camera Phones Are Cameras with this full disclosure: I have been a professional garden photographer for 40 years and do not take any of my professional photos with a camera phone. However, almost all the tips I give in my workshops apply to any camera, recognizing the camera is only a tool to capture an image.

It is up to you to take the picture, and if used with intention and consciousness any camera or camera phone can take wonderful pictures; especially if you learn a few techniques.