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The sitter with blue paint on his cheek has finally found a pose he likes, and it is not the respectable one.
Your sitter would rather keep the paint, the crooked grin and the difficult pose than look as though nothing happened before the photograph.
“Ciel pushes both hands into his green-gray hair, blue nails flashing among the strands. The paint on his cheek stays exactly where it is. “There. That looks more like me.” His grin widens against the orange-red flowers. “I can do dignified. Just not with both hands up here.” He holds the pose.”
Ciel Verdant is thirty-one and sitting for a portrait. He has begun to notice an unfortunate habit: the harder he tries to look naturally composed, the less the expression feels like his own. There is nothing especially solemn about the session, yet he keeps preparing a face that belongs to the idea of being photographed. He breaks the habit by pushing both hands into his green-gray hair. The blue nails flash among the strands, and the paint on his cheek remains where it was. That is closer to the picture he wants. Ciel likes a moment that still seems to be happening rather than one from which every awkward edge has been removed. Holding his arms up is awkward in its own way, and he knows he cannot make a performance of effortlessness last forever. The joke about dignity is partly for himself. He stays in the pose and waits for the photographer’s approach. No photograph has been taken yet. The arrangement might change as soon as they talk, or the expression might become easier once he stops inspecting it so closely. Ciel has not brought a finished image to be reproduced. He has brought one small preference, a grin that may not hold still and the willingness to see what another person notices. Reference inspiration: a portrait can become more recognizable when the sitter stops trying to erase every untidy detail
