Cropping Tips?

[bnkrecords]

i am always hearing people talk about crop this out of the pic, crop that out, and I was wondering if anyone can give some tips.

im still very new to the whole photography thing and was wondering if people can give some tips on cropping.

Please give some critique on my cropping, i dont know if i did it correctly, so i will post the original and the final. Any constructive criticism is welcome. thank you..

Before:

After:

 

[bnkrecords]

sorry if i sounded like i was repeating myself, i just realized it. lol

 

[The_Traveler]

I would do more like this.
Keep the other figure in as balance but lens blur the background to keep the main figure dominant.

I have a bunch of guidelines that I follow. (yah I know some of these conflict.)

1) crop to a standard dimension - people are used to seeing standard size pictures and slightly off-size pix are slightly disturbing. (this is less important in panoramic images) - also much cheaper to print and frame.

2) include only the things that make picture have a meaning beyond the frame - crop to the image.

3) take out stuff that is extra and/or takes away from the chosen meaning.

 

[bnkrecords]

wow, i like that one alot better.. im glad i found this page.

 

[The_Traveler]

I changed three things.
--cropped to a standard dimension (I like 4 x 5) - leaving in space at the left for the hero to look into and kep the little boy looking away with his head down
--cropped off the stuff behind the little boy - it let eyes wander away
--lens blurred the background

This seemed to create the elements of a potential story - why is he unhappy?
why is the boy in the background facing away?
why is his head down?

The answers are irrelevant - it is collecting the elements and eliminating the rest that makes the picture - I think.

 

[Weaving Wax]

I think they're both good, to be honest.