About

This shoot was taken in my garden and uses a mirror in order to show how the queen, in both chess and cards, is reflected in real life. I had my friend wear a red dress in order to stand out against the background when I lower the exposure of my images to stick with the theme across all my shoots. The red also helps to link her together with the card, showcasing the connection between the two.

This shoot was heavily inspired by Claude Chaun as she is well known for creating portraits that often reflect some kind of meaning in them, mainly how gender is stereotyped. In my case, I aim to reflect how we seek to gain power in games in order to win, for example in chess the queen is the most powerful piece in the game.

Images

Edits

Best photos

I chose this image as one of my best since the muted tones really help to draw attention not only to the redness of the dress but also the playing piece in the center. I also think that the droplets of water on the mirror help act as lines which draw our attention back to the queen piece. The mirror also being framed by the grass helps to create a sense of texture to the image, making it more interesting and pleasing to look at.

With this image, I toned down the vibrancy of the colours in order to make the photo feel more dramatic which, in turn, draws the viewers attention to it. I additionally think that the composition of the image was done successfully, I mainly like how we can see hesitation in her body language through the use of her hand getting ready to grab the piece, linking to how we hesitate and think through our moves before acting during games.

Here I once again really like the composition and layout of the photo, the hedge background making the image seem more dramatic and potentially linking to chess in the way that they are sometimes used to block paths the same way we use pawns to block our opponents move. I once again kept the colours muted and the contrast high which in my opinion worked really well here.

I selected this as one of my best images as I am fond of the simplicity of it. The crack in the wall helps to symbolize a sense of vulnerability or weakness and when paired with the chess piece in her hand we can infer that she may be on the brink of losing. I also like how the white background makes her the main focus of the image with nothing else to distract us.

Lastly, I really like how we are able to see a lot of detail in this image, from the way the water on the mirror ripples to the contrast in black and white tones. I also think that having the image in gray scale works really well for this image as it helps to highlight the mirror in the grass as well as the model herself, making them the key focus points.