IIIF crops and honest museum pixels

When a museum serves a vase through IIIF, the “object” in your browser is often a stack of tiles plus a default crop rectangle. That rectangle is an editorial choice—sometimes generous, sometimes tight enough to hide a hairline crack at the lip. Researchers who paste URLs into footnotes without naming region parameters are repeating an old habit from print catalogues: the hero photograph becomes the object, and the rest of the vessel becomes optional noise.

What we ask students to do

We teach readers to download or link with explicit region and rotation when comparing two collections, and to pair every crop with at least one full-vessel view when licensing allows. The habit pairs naturally with foot-ring discipline: if you will not show the base, say so in prose instead of implying it does not matter.

Why this sits beside typology

Typology depends on comparable silhouettes; silent cropping breaks comparability the way a mis-measured rim diameter does. Digitization was supposed to widen access, not narrow the evidence window to whatever fits a phone screen.