Composition #8

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A post shared by 木木 (@shis7) on Jul 6, 2017 at 9:20am PDT

I do not normally find most portraits interesting. I usually see the same poses, same angles, same styles. Instagram especially is filled with posts of attractive people, but the images themselves I always find lacking. There is hardly any story, or they rely totally on style. That’s totally fine, but it’s not my thing.

I have seen many shots with something obscuring the face of the model, such as leaves or flowers – and I have also seen many shots with a model glancing non-nonchalantly out a window (sometimes the window is covered with rain.. or neon signs reflected).

However, this photograph stuck out to me. I like how the model is actively engaging the camera. She is looking right at it.  Her gaze captivates me.

The shrubbery also points toward her and guides the eye to her gaze. Furthermore, the shrubbery is not impeding on her face but acts as a ‘frame within a frame’ as it just cuts off the outer portions of the portrait. The vertical divider also assists in this and divides the image up further. I think the vertical divider contributes to the image, as without it – I could easily see this being typical ‘place eye near rule of thirds marker’, but the vertical divider kind of masks this for me. It also allows my mind to crop within the image without actually cropping the image. I find it very interesting and I think the image is all the better for it.

I also really enjoy the colour palette, with the soft whites, pinks, and purples. The portions of green kind of stand out, but I do not find them too distracting. I am not sure if I’d prefer the entire shrubbery had been captured as these white-green leaves rather than the ‘strong’ green leaves on the left of the image.

shis7 captured a really interesting portrait, that borders on cliché with some of its elements but together it is so much more.