Every pose hides something. Choose what

Poses usually get chosen for how they feel: relaxed, confident, editorial. That is the right question, but it should come second. The first question is what the pose puts in front of the product. A model's body is the largest object in the frame, and every position of the arms, hands and torso covers something. When it covers the thing you are selling, the photo is a good picture of the wrong subject.

Name the part that has to read

Start with the product, not the model. What must a shopper see to decide? For a necklace it is the pendant against the skin. For a watch it is the face and the strap on a wrist. For a dress it is the whole length and how it falls. For a trainer it is the side profile and the sole. Write that down in a few words before you look at a single pose, because it is the test every pose has to pass.

Then rule poses out

Once you have named that part, most of the choice makes itself. Some poses that look natural are exactly wrong for particular products:

• Arms crossed covers the chest and both wrists. It rules out necklaces, pendants, front prints, watches and bracelets, which is most of what people put on a model.
• Hands in pockets hides rings and bracelets. A watch reads only if the sleeve is rolled.
• Hands behind the back hides both hands and wrists entirely. Never use it for rings, watches or bracelets.
• Over the shoulder turns away the front of the garment and any necklace. It is the pose for the back of a jacket, for earrings and for hair.
• Profile hides everything on the far side, and the front of the garment. It suits silhouettes, outerwear and footwear.
• Seated and floor poses fold the front of a garment and let a skirt pool. Kneeling creases trousers, but tops and jewellery still read.
• Walking and turning blur anything small. They suit fabric with drape, and hair, not a ring that must read sharp.

Some poses exist for one kind of product. Wrist presented shows almost nothing but the wrist and hand, which is exactly what a watch or bracelet needs. Neck long with the head turned is for necklaces and earrings. One foot up on a wall shows nothing above the knee, so it is a footwear pose. Holding the product at chest height covers nothing that is worn, so it suits skincare, tech and packaging.

Watch the hands

Hands cause most of the trouble, because they are the part of a pose people add without thinking. A hand on the hip hides that wrist, so the watch or bracelet goes on the other arm. A hand gripping a lapel or a hem draws the eye to the grip, so the grip has to land away from any print or logo. If a shot is about jewellery on the hands, decide where both hands go before anything else.

When the plain pose is the right one

A few poses hide almost nothing: a relaxed contrapposto, a squared front-on stance, sitting on the floor with the legs wide. They are less dramatic, and that is what they are for. In the first image of a listing, the shopper is still deciding whether this is the thing they wanted. A pose that shows the whole product plainly usually does that job better than one that performs. Save the expressive poses for frames where the product has already been seen.

A set of poses should show different things

If you are shooting several frames of one product, give each pose a job. Use one pose that shows everything, one that turns to show the side or the back, and one close-up for the detail a full-length frame cannot hold. Three poses that all show the front are one photo taken three times. The earlier post "a listing is a sequence, not a gallery" makes the same argument for the slots in a listing, and it applies to on-model frames too.

How Nitaris handles it

In Model Studio you pick a pose from a grid rather than describing it in a sentence. There are 48 poses in five families: standing, seated, motion, lying and half body. Each tile says in plain words what that pose hides. If your product has been analysed and a pose you pick covers that kind of product, the picker tells you before you generate. That warning is a keyword match on the product type, so treat it as a prompt to check, not a guarantee. Pick two or more poses and they become a set, with one frame per pose, delivered in the order you picked. If none of them fits, you can describe your own pose instead.

The short version

Before you choose a pose, write down the part of the product a shopper must see. Rule out every pose that covers it: crossed arms for necklaces, pockets and hands behind the back for rings and watches, profile and over the shoulder for the front of a garment. Put the plain pose first and the expressive ones later. In a set, make each pose show something the others do not.