Though not expressly handsome, Ris has a quiet, nebulous charm that is hard to pinpoint. He is broad and quite tall by the Bajoran standards of the day, with a long face troubled by the occasional pockmark. Of late he's been wearing a mustache and goatee of wiry black hair which helps to break up a notion of being horse-faced. He keeps his hair long, at chin-length with his D'jarra earring well-concealed underneath.

In build there is no doubt that Ris is a workhorse. He was never a small person to begin with and has sweeping pecs, a thick core and a powerful back. All of it was birthed from his youth in a string of Cardassian labor camps before he escaped at the age of sixteen during a worker revolt.

His long hair was not an affectation- he used it to cover up his cauliflower ear for a long time. When he entered Starfleet Intelligence's service, it was surgically repaired to help offset the possibility of an "easy feature" to be identified by. He still feels somewhat odd about it all these years later. But now he can wear his earring on the correct ear.