Cropping photos on iOS with feedback from Seeing AI

By OldBear, 23 June, 2025

Forum
iOS and iPadOS

Unless there's some setting I don't know about, the iOS Photos app gives no direct feedback when cropping images in the Edit>Crop and Rotate function. I assume the image is on the screen, but it isn't described by VO. Instead, there are "Handles" at the edges and corners of the image, which are spoken by VO, and activated by a tap and hold, then slide. You can check the Info tab to find out if the pixel counts have changed, assuming the app has updated them after you are done editing. Sometimes it doesn't show the change until you leave the photo and return.
Over on Seeing AI, in the tab for describing photos, there is an option to explore by touch. So I have been getting an idea of where the subject I want to crop around is located on the screen. I go through the Seeing AI app to do this because my phone gets stuck if I try to explore by touch in a image I have recognized with Seeing AI through the Share Sheet.
I get the sense that the image on the cropping screen is smaller than the one on the Seeing AI screen, however I can get an idea that I might need to move the left handle a lot toward the center if the subject is all on the right side of the screen etc.
From there I switch between the Photos app and Seeing AI, having it reanalyze the image each time after saving the edit. Asking Seeing AI questions about the location of the subject is also helpful. Unfortunately, the whole process does require asking a sighted person if the picture looks all right. It usually needs a little more work, but I did get one picture done without any need for further edits.
Working with the handles is something I'm starting to get a feel for. I haven't yet needed to use the corner handles, which I think tilt the image. Over cropping is easy to catch, even with the VO description in the Photos app, but the tiny adjustments required to get something reasonably centered can take several cycles through the process, including the sighted feedback. Still, after just a couple of days experimenting, I think I will be doing this regularly for my photos.

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