"What Color is Your Parachute?"

The title of this image refers to the book the woman is holding in her hands. This book is of use to individuals looking to make a career change or to re-enter the job market. I tried to convey this situation in my digital manipulation of the image background. The idea is that a person making a career change or looking for a job no longer "fits in" to society in the way that they would when they are absorbed with pursuing an established career, raising a family, etc. The stylized unreal background is meant to suggest how someone, currently an "outsider" in terms of their economic and professional situation, might view the world about them, a world in which they have yet to find a suitible "niche" for themselves.

See my explanatory comment.

The photo seems like a snapshot and the effect doesn't add to it

Your comment about this being a "snapshot" is valid. The subject in this picture was my girlfriend, and I was dropping her off at the airport for her flight home. So my knowledge of her job situation and attitude is based on

the personal relationship that I had with her, and not on the visual cues provided by the image (the expression on her face, the book she is carrying, etc.) That was why I was unsure as to whether other viewers would see a connection between her "state of mind" and what is being visually depicted in the image. Judging by the feedback, one viewer has but most other viewers have not.

pictures like this make baby Jesus cry.