What kind of words are your pictures worth?

A picture is worth one thousand words. We hear this cliché regularly. While pondering its implications, I came to wonder what kinds of words my pictures were worth. I enjoy photography and often take portraits of friends for fun. I decided to execute the following experiment with a portrait I took of my friend Todd. I showed the picture of Todd to 10 friends and asked those friends to say the first 20 words that came to mind as they viewed the photo. I expected consensus of some sort in people’s responses. I witnessed some consensus, but less than I expected. Some people used simple, short words like “bro, ear, smile, tattoo and cross.” Others used more contemplative words such as "choices, potential, hope, vulnerable and misunderstood." And some used words describing the visual nature of the photograph: "faded, angular, grainy, contrast and bright." By using a creative method to assess viewers' reaction to my photography, I witnessed the highly varied ways that different people react to it. I will keep these results in mind in the future when I take pictures.