Grumpy Matt

Meet Matt. Thankfully for us his mom scrawled his name on the back of this photograph (probably still a good idea even in our digital age to aid our non-digital memories). Here Matt is not happy. His mom doesn’t look too thrilled about this whole picture taking thing either but lets forget about her for a second. Anyone who has ever taken a picture of a child knows that they are not always willing subjects. Yet we tend to fuss and fight with them until we get a smile, often giving us a picture for posterity with an awkward, forced smile that we aren't proud of anyway. While it is certainly important to have photos of our smiling children don’t overlook the value of pictures of unhappy, or even grumpy, children. Imagine flipping through the album your parents made of pictures of you as a child and seeing a few with those ridiculous scowls only children can make adorable. That would be pretty cool, wouldn’t it?

In addition to clicking the shutter when something other than a smile is showing there are also technical reasons why this is a good portrait. First, look at the background behind the subjects. Wood grain, such as an unpainted wood fence or wall always provides a great backdrop for portraits. The grain in the wood is visually stimulating, providing a sense of texture and adding light shadows which add detail. The visually complex nature of the wood also helps the more “simple” nature of human skin stand out. What you might hear referred to as “pop.” In other words people in front of such a surface appear to “pop” out of the background. Because pictures are by nature flat (two dimensional), creating a sense of depth (three dimensionality) in a photograph is one of the most important things a photographer can achieve. Taking advantage of settings which by their nature help to create depth is a great way to make your pictures stand out.

Second, look at how the background is framed by the lens. The photographer here mixes the vertical wood wall with a horizontal section of the house (another trick which helps to add a sense of depth). Additionally, the turned over bucket, like the half-included bike in the earlier picture of Pete, gives the work a sense of the moment and place. Finally, this image is a great example of placing the subjects not quite in the center. With Matt in the lower right-hand section of the image the viewer’s mind is caught off guard. While certainly not backed by any scientific studies, I’ve noticed that when a picture looks “normal,” i.e. the person or persons smack in the center, it’s like seeing an Oreo package in the store. We don’t really examine the package because at a quick glance our mind already “knows” what it looks like. When I see a picture with the people in the center and nothing out of the ordinary I tend to spend less time looking at it. However, when off center and placed against a background with lots of little details, such as this picture of Matt, my mind is instantly engaged. I spend more time looking over the entire image and considering it. That’s what I want from my photographs. I want people to be interested and engaged with them, spending time looking at the details. Don’t you?

Pete

This is Pete. We don't know anything about Pete other than what can be seen in this photo. His life, his deeds, his accomplishments, his failings outside what can be seen in this instant of time are all gone. We are left only with what this anonymous photographer chose to capture of Pete in this single instant of time. So, what did the artist choose to show us?

With the sun to his back, Pete is dramatically backlit, yet the sun is placed just out of the frame to avoid completely silhouetting the subject. Composing the scene with the sun in the background, but not directly in view of the camera, gives Pete a sense of three dimensionality. Here it has also created a dramatic corona of light around the subject, provided solely by the sun and the angle of the shot, not Adobe Photoshop. This specular effect is what originally drew my eye to the photograph and reminds me of the way sunlight plays off our eyes as it begins to set each evening. To me, this effect gives me the sense that I am right there with Pete as my eyes are adjusting to the changing light of the day.

Pete is a smoker. The photographer could have zoomed in closer to catch the packaging on Pete's cigarettes to show us this, or simply shown him with a cigarette in his mouth. What makes this image more eye-catching is the smoke wafting from Pete's mouth slowly drifting into the sunlight. A painted portrait of Pete, even if it included him smoking, would never be able to depict the ethereal, transient nature this photograph shows. Nor would it have the "live-action" feel this photograph does. Looking at this photo one feels right there in the scene with Pete. The overturned bike, only half shown as it falls off the edge of the frame, also helps keep the photo from looking staged, like a portrait, and further contributes to the sense of the moment created in this shot.

While Pete is certainly no longer roaming this world with each glimpse at this photo, with its inherent sense of the moment and dramatic lighting, Pete feels like he is still with us here today. If only one photo survives of myself in the future I sure hope I look and feel just as alive as Pete does here.