They say “every picture tells a story” and that “a picture is worth a thousand words.” But what happens when that picture doesn’t tell the full story? Well that’s easy, you write the story.
After doing portrait photography for about a year now, I have captured over 50 different and unique faces. But that’s where the story usually stops. The pictures get taken, posted to social media, and life goes on. But what about the stories that go along with those faces? The famous book and Instagram page Humans of New York has left a unique mark on the world by adding written stores to its photos. So I want to add an extra element to my photography by telling the story behind the faces in my photos.
But who to start with???
Let me introduce to Sy. I first saw a photo of her come across my timeline at the beginning of the year from a photographer name Dylan (@hi_its_dylan). Over the next few months she continued to work with some great photographers that I know and those photos would make their way across my timeline. Finally after seeing her kill it at a photography meetup, I reached out to her about collaborating together. Lucky enough for me, I was able to team up with my friend Katherine (@Katherine.levano_photography) as we he did a photo shoot with Sy and her fried Cam.
One thing that immediately stood out about Sy is her ability to mix her light hearted personality with a professional drive to be successful. She keeps a smile on face while constantly staying engage and working to get the next shot. Sy has always competed in pageants growing up but it was only at the beginning of 2019 that she took modeling seriously. But she didn’t just jump into modeling haphazardly.
Sy is the gold standard when it comes to starting out as a model. She fully understands that photography is an art form that takes time, money, and sacrifice to get better at. She is building her portfolio by paying experienced photographers for their work and that has paid off for her greatly. She has quickly amassed an ever growing body of work and has more and more photographers reaching out wanting to shoot with her.
But the big question I had for her was “why?” Why get into modeling? For Sy, stepping in front of a camera is her way of building confidence within her own skin. In an industry that’s filled with toxicity when it comes to body image, she has used the camera as a way to be content and comfortable with the skin that she is in.
So what’s next for her???
Sy’s ultimate goal is to grow her platform and build a brand. She wants to use that platform to help others grow their confidence. In an industry that can be plagued with selfishness, Sy wants to prove that there is room at the table for others. She wants to build a community of models and photographers that openly share knowledge, advice, tips and tricks and she is definitely doing that in Winston Salem. She is working with more and more local photographers and freely offering up advice to other models.
For any photographer looking to work with her, bring your A game. She’s easy to work with and open to learn. She comes to each shoot looking to take knowledge and direction from each photographer.
All in all Sy is definitely someone you want to add to your portfolio. I’m sure that we will all be seeing her on a bigger platform in the near future, especially with the work ethic she has. Check her out on Instagram at @syannealyssaa.
