This photo for snapshot day was taken in the evening on the stoop of my house. I had been sitting there, keeping an eye on my young niece who playing around in our empty driveway. She came and sat next to me when she tired herself out, and she pointed to all the things her little eyes could focus on. “Mare Mare, who lives in that house? Who lives in that house? Why is that tree so big? That light is so orange why is that lamp outside?” On and on, her questions went and it made me think about how intently she was taking in her surroundings, and how long it had been since I had done the same. There she was, pointing at the same houses I wondered who lived in, the same tree I stared up at, the same street lamp I stared at during snowstorms, and so on. I took out my camera and snapped a photo of the street that I had grown up looking at but hardly ever taking in. This is a photo that fills me with the nostalgia of really looking at the street I lived in, instead of merely glancing at it all- a habit I would have been stuck in were it not for the eyes of a five year old to remind me what that is like.
I took this picture with the rule of third in mind. I made sure that the tree was placed off center and to the right of the frame. In addition, I made sure that the row of houses in the background were slightly diagonal; were they shot on a perfectly flat, horizontal line, the image would not have been as appealing. When focusing on the street, I ensured that there would be a visual path to be followed, as I angled it to give something traveling along it room to move across the street. This does not count the car on the right, though; it has no room to “move” but that is because it was not in motion; it was parked and so I did not know if it needed a visual “path” to move across.
-Mary Yanez
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