Stops at craft shops and factories rarely produce expressive photographs for me, but this busy fellow at work in a lacquerware shop proved to be an exception. By using a slow shutter speed, I was able to blur his hands, arms and machine to create the illusion of a hectic pace, a sharp contrast to his matter of fact expression. I posted this picture in color in my Myanmar travel article posted on worldisround.com at: http://www.worldisround.com/articles/139134/photo70.html

You will note that the color brings an edge of reality to it that works quite well. The warmth of the woven matte on the wall behind him complements the color of his skin, and his blue sarong identifies him as Burmese. It makes an effective expressive travel image.

This black and white version neutralizes the advantages of the color image. Instead, it presents an array of its own advantages. The abstracted black and white image allows the machine to seem to move even faster because it now has less to compete with it.
The black and white image is all about the blur, the invisible arm that is moving too fast to photograph, and his casual expression. It now has nothing at all to do with complexion or wall materials, or national dress. He now shows us that he does what he does so well that he need not even look at what he is doing. All of this was present in the color version as well, but it blended into the reality of the scene itself as documented by the presence of color. Take the color out and the image accelerates before our very eyes!