Mr. Kramer

While I was flipping through the photo essay, “Remembering Hardware,” the second photograph really caught my attention. The photo captures Mr. Kramer, the main subject of the essay, in a close-up shot. The photo is a portrait shot of Mr. Kramer, and like all good portrait shots, the picture made me feel a personal and emotional connection to the man. I immediately got the sense that Mr. Kramer enjoys his job and I trust that he can remember every piece of hardware in the store. The image itself shows Mr. Kramer’s daily actions, but as I read the photographer’s descriptions of how important Mr. Kramer is to the hardware store, I felt a sense of admiration for him. There is something fantastic and slightly sad about Mr. Kramer. I can’t quite decide what exactly it is, but I know this picture made me feel slightly ambivalent about my own emotions. This is a man who loves the routine of his everyday life and does his simple job extremely well. For some reason, the emotion’s on Mr. Kramer’s face pull on my heart a little bit. Clearly, the photographer did a good job of manipulating my emotions and grabbing my attention.

Beyond the emotional aspect, this photo has many compositional elements that make it great. Although the photo is very close to Mr. Kramer’s face, it still follows the rule of third. His body is positioned more to the right of the frame and he is holding the phone up on the right side. Mr. Kramer does take up a majority of the frame, but all of the action takes place on the right side of the picture. This photo also makes a good use of balance and background. The background is heavily blurred out so that the eye focuses solely on Mr. Kramer, but there are still vague objects in the background that balance out the left side of the photo. The viewpoint of this photo is also great because the photographer shot the photo slightly from the side and up-close. I like the slight side angle of Mr. Kramer – it makes it seem as though we are seeing him in a very natural environment. I feel like this is just a snapshot of him having an uninterrupted conversation with a customer. Finally, this photo makes a good use of cropping. I’m not sure if this photo was originally taken at this distance or it the photographer later cropped it to show the subject’s face, but this photo makes good use of cropping either way. The photo is cropped so that Mr. Kramer’s face is easily the main focus of the picture, allowing us to analyze the details and emotions on his face.

This photo plays a large role in the photo essay. The closeness and sole focus on the subject allows the viewer to connect with the emotional side of Mr. Kramer’s story. The close-up shot literally made me feel physically closer to Mr. Kramer. I felt as though I understood his emotions by seeing the specific lines on his face and look in his eyes. Overall, this picture does a great job of showing a simple man who loves his job. I think this plays in very well with the overall story of Mr. Kramer – to me, his life is both happy and sad. But maybe that is just because I have a soft spot for older people. I sometimes find it difficult to describe the reasons why photographs evoke certain emotions – this photograph is no exception. Did this photograph make you feel a certain way when you first saw it? Or did you ever encounter a photograph that made you feel a way you weren’t able to describe?