Jacque Jordão – Untitled (2016)

As best as I can tell, Jordão is a Brazilian model with a killer fashion sense with an impressively varied range of projects in her portfolio.

Her Tumblr usually credits other photographers–there this is likely a self-portrait.

Technically, this makes a number of ‘mistakes’. For example: the reason that so many photographers and image makers prefer to work with seamless backdrops is so that the location becomes less of a consideration that the subject. (Also, you can light the subject in any fashion you choose with much less effort than working in an actual real-life environment with light shifting over time, physical obstacles getting in the way, etc.)

This notes he contrast of the bright white wall and the less brilliant white mortar and dark bricks as an astute backdrop for a monochrome image.

This is actually underexposed–likely a feature of this almost certainly being taken with a kit zoom lens, wherein the fixed aperture limits exposure adjustments to ISO and shutter speed. (This is almost certainly a lower ISO–as there really is very little noise.)

I haven’t actually opened this in Photoshop to check the histogram, but my gut says there’s probably 2/3 of a stop before the highlights well and truly blow–and you can usually pull them back just enough in post so they aren’t pure white.

Objectively, it likely would’ve been preferable to figure out what you’d need to set the shutter speed at to show detail in her hair, then split the difference between that and the settings which produced this image.

Yet… I can’t really fault things too much–because although the choices that went into producing this are arguably less than pristine, they do actually work. For example, I’d usually complain about the failure to align verticals with the left and right frame edges. Here, I can’t.

The downward tilt of the camera suggests that the viewer is roughly the same height as the model but is looking down in a submissive fashion. There is–fundamentally within the image at the level of visual grammar: a sense that the subject is intimidating.

In tandem with the way Jacque is standing in the shadow of the potted fern, with her hair swooping low over her right eye–there’s an added layer of enigma in the way her expression and even whether or not she’s looking at the camera remain inscrutable.