Since AFP opened a bureau in Pyongyang in September, Seoul-based photographer Ed Jones has been thinking of ways to try to change the stereotypical images that are normally associated with North Korea -- a military parade, or a fleeting photo captured surreptitiously from the window of a bus.

"The idea of a portrait series seemed a good solution that would involve the subjects themselves – a difficult proposition in North Korea where there is an inherent suspicion of foreign media," he writes.