Wow. I definitely was not expecting the microscopic treatment here! I'm
humbled that you took this much time, thank you. Indeed, I shot this as
an environmental shot (ie. lady in her surroundings). The composition is
largely accidental, as I believe most street photography is (and much
the reason I do very little of it, if not for any other reason than I
simply try to compose most shots before firing...can't get rid of my
film tendencies). An emphasis on color here, there was a lot of
saturation tweaking of the RAW image in Lightroom to arrive at this
conclusion...I enjoyed working on these market images just as when you
purchase an antique from one of these places, the first thing you do
when you get home is shine it up to see what you really have...there's a
couple more in this series I'll put up in the coming galleries.
Thank you, Pini.
Pini Vollach wrote:
I decided to try making a review to only one picture.
I choose Trevor's Russian market vendor because I myself did many
images in places like this.
I looked at this photo and tried to analyse it not only for Trevor who
do seldom people shots but also for myself, in order to understand what
good and what bad and to learn for my future images.
When I first look at this image my attention is going to: 1.shirt of the
lady, 2.some bright objects on a vertical line close to the center of
the image, 3.Two beautiful illuminated transparent jars.
After those outstanding objects I see the lady face and some fish
baskets that she probably sell.
Farther look reveal two interesting but not outstanding things:
1. Smiley faces on posters at the upper left corner. Those faces can
"speak" with the lady face.
2. A (girl ?) hand with a bowl full of something look like garlic heads
at the bottom left corner. I'll come back to this part in a minute.
Now lets look on it technically:
Trevor told us about limited lighting and a variety of color. Both
things are true but I don't think he took or exhibit this image just for
those elements
The *focus* is on the lady's shirt although other parts are quite
sharp. *Exposure* - Trevor skillfully used a ray of light coming from
above to emphasize the main objects. The matrix system of his camera
made optimization for all parts of the frame but gave the biggest
importance, again, to the lady's shirt. Unfortunately the lady's face
lack a little.
So the exposure and focus both make the lady's shirt the most prominent
thing in the frame.
*Composition* - The main figure sit on the left third vertical. Her left
hand ( on the right side of the image) give a good "flow" toward the
illuminated jars and together make a "flow line" coming down from the
lady's high illuminated shoulder through her hand to the jars.
At the right side of the image we see a vertical bar that "close" the
image. This is not a good "close" and would be better if cropped or not
include in the frame.
This image is for sure not based on its composition and not need to.
Now - What is important in this image, or why Trevor took it ?
I think he wanted to show us the lady in her surround and the goods she
sell. In that manner it was better if she was looking at the fish
baskets but life is always more complicated and interesting!
Something is coming from the left outside of the frame - The (girl's)
hand and bowl - remember ? This something took the attention of the
lady ...and of me too!
I want to see more of this figure! Maybe not including the right side
bar could be enough for including more of this figure but I'm not sure.
I also want to see more brightly the poster faces from behind! This is
hard to achieve. Maybe +1/3 stop would do good to the lady face as well
to those behind faces.
Maybe Photoshop can help here too.
For summary: I feel that using a little bit wider lens which would widen
the frame to the bottom and to the left side (+ a little shift to the
left) could give more space around the lady showing us on what is she
sitting (hover in the space), more of the fish baskets and of course the
left side figure. I like the two jars so I wouldn't crop out more than
the vertical bar.
Thank you Trevor for sharing this photo and all other exhibitors as well.
Hope this help
Pini Vollach
