A picture is said to be worth a thousand words and this picture taken from Tye Baruffaldi’s photo essay “What brought me to USC” is no exception to that old saying. In this photo taken a few months ago, a group of friends are gathered together at night in front of the California Dreaming Restaurant in Columbia, South Carolina. The main thing about this picture is that the people in this picture are incoming freshmen at their freshmen orientation for the University of South Carolina as the audience is able to tell by their shirts, meaning they have not known each other for too long and they are probably not from the same area considering the average college experience. So when analyzing the color, the position, and the people of this photo, one can figure out that college can bring out the best in people, therefore creating friends in the process in the strange transition from high school to college.

The colors in this photo represent a common bond amongst friends because they all go to the same college and are wearing clothing of either the school colors, which are garnet and black or actual school clothing with either the mascot, football team name, or the college name on it. This common bond is the fact that they all hold something in common, which is they all go to the same college. This photo was taken even before the university had started school for the fall semester, which shows how a common bond is able to push friendship, especially since most students think of the high school to college transition as an awkward transition. Considering that that the students in this picture are probably not from the same areas as each other, the fact that all of them are almost color coordinated is kind of astonishing, which can show that there was a good line of communication between all of them, which suggests openness and furthers the point that college can bring out the best in people, or it could just be coincidence. Some of the colors in this photo, which are garnet, black, grey and red are able to tell the audience that all of the people in this picture all go to the same university, which so happens to be the University of South Carolina; therefore, they all share some sort of common bond and camaraderie between one another since they are relatively new friends attending the same university. Since this picture takes place during a freshman orientation, the fact that they all go to the same university cannot be the only reason why they became friends so quickly meaning that there has to be some sort of emotional connection between them all.

The positioning of the students in the photo is symbolic because most of them have their arms around the person next to them’s shoulder, which can show how college can make people friendlier and more open due to the awkward circumstances.  Another thing to note about the positioning of the people is that the front line of people is curved inwards towards the center, which causes the audience’s eye to focus on the center of the created half circle, which one may think is out of the ordinary to focus on the person in the middle of the front line of people, but in reality it makes the audience focus on the whole group of people and shows a comfort amongst the whole group because the sort of half circle makes the eye consider the rest of the line of people and the people behind the middle of the front line. This suggests that the group was trying to include everyone into the picture instead of it just focusing on one person because they’re all friends and they draw attention to the fact that all of them are wearing something that relates to the university as well, and since the audience is able to recognize the writing on some of the t-shirts means that most of them are showing openness, a quality not usually shown within a group of people that just recently met. The group is also compacted pretty tightly together, which shows closeness and comfort. Also the angle in which the photographer took the picture was a little bit off kilter from the center of the whole group of people. This angle includes the lamp into the picture which introduces more light to the picture, which in turn adds more light to the faces of the people of the group that are standing in the background by the door of California Dreaming Restaurant.

When looking at the people in this photo, one can tell how almost everyone in the photo is content in the photo except the kid on the far right because everyone is smiling in the picture. This is telling to an audience because it signifies how the people in this photo are all content with one another. This suggests that there has been some sort of emotional connection drawn between all of them, which in turn shows how this picture is able to show how college brings out the best in people. That being said, every person’s body language also says that all of them are content with at least the person next to them, which is basically the same as what the smiles are telling the audience. Considering the body language, everyone is holding the person next to them by the shoulder and everyone is standing abreast to each other and no one really has their arms crossed. This shows kinship and openness, which are generally not expressed by many people in a similar situation. When people have their arms closed, it shows the person is trying to block themselves off from outside elements and shyness,but since there isn’t a person with their arms crossed in the picture, that adds to the assumption that all of them are comfortable with one another again proving that college can bring out the best in people because most people do not act like this around people that make them feel uncomfortable in any type of way. The same thing goes for the way they are standing abreast, everyone is trying to open themselves up in some way.

The people are also all evenly defined in the picture, meaning that no one in general is out of focus in the photograph which also shows that there is some sort of equality that is held within this friend group, which again became a reality only a short while before this photo was taken. This is significant because there could have been a couple of retakes of the photo to make sure that everyone was in focus, which was most definitely the aim of the photo. The definition of the people is also a similar argument to the audience focusing on the middle of the front line because it is curved inward because it makes the audience think that there is some sort of equality amongst the group and no one is an “outsider” meaning the audience does not notice them in the picture. 

These friends seemed to have had a good night as they were all together mostly smiling and took a nice picture in the process; one thing that the audience can take away from this is that these people are good friends and according to the date that this picture was taken, they became friends quite quickly because the university had not started the fall semester of the year, they probably didn’t know each other as soon as they finished high school, and they were not from the same area. Through analyzing the color, the position, and the people in this picture one is able to clarify that these people are all friends and that the university that they were all attending helped make a quick transition to the current state of their friendship that is seen in the picture. 
