There is one thing I hear over and over again from the bright, beautiful, women I work with. That is, “I don’t think I look good in photographs.” This has been weighing heavily on my mind, so I’ve decided to put together a series of blog posts on tips and ideas to help you look your best in front of the camera. I will post a couple tips every week, and leave them up on the blog so that you can peruse them at your leisure.

Now, let me say one thing: I think you are all beautiful and I believe that comes through in my images. Honestly, I don’t worry at all about any of my clients not looking good in our photos. First, we try to relax and have fun during our photo shoots, and that goes a long way towards making beautiful images. If you are smiling naturally, you’re gonna look pretty good. Second, most women put a lot of effort into looking good for your photo shoot – we’re not doing this at midnight after a few drinks or before your coffee in the morning! Third, our job as photographers is to work with lighting, camera angles, and timing, to capture compelling images. When you hire somebody to come shoot your wedding, take portraits, etc., we become obsessive about finding flattering angles and beautiful light.

But, I think there are things that you can do that may help you feel less anxiety about your wedding or portrait photography.

Tip #1: Show your photographer a couple examples of photos of yourself – 1 that you like, and 1 that you don’t.

Not all photographers may appreciate this, but I think this is a great way to start a conversation. For me, I want to hear what you like about yourself – do you think you have a good side? Do you like to show off a certain tattoo? Are you self-conscious about anything? Let’s hear it! But also, I think this should be a confidence-building activity. When you start to go through photos of yourself and ask yourself what you like about them, you may start to realize that you like more than you don’t.

I’ll show you a couple of my own photos as an example. A word of warning, these are two photos from a recent vacation, so we have no fancy lighting, no posing, not even makeup. What can I say, I tend not to wear much makeup on vacation.

First: DON’T LIKE

What can I say? I think this one was before the morning coffee. At least it looks that way. And the lighting and angle make my face look totally mushy. Yuck. There are a lot of unflattering things I could say about this photo…. but I’ll let you make your own judgement. 😛 Let’s just say that the lighting makes my face look wider, which it doesn’t need, and the angle kind of highlights the ugly chin. Yuck

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

LIKE:

 

I understand that I was have a questionable hair day… but there’s something very compelling about this photo to me. The light was coming in very softly under this big old tree, which made Kamran very excited. Imagine, here we were, in the middle of an outdoor museum, and Kamran’s very excited about making me stand under a tree to capture some gorgeous lighting. We are nerds. Anyway, I find the soft lighting to be flattering – evening out imperfections and creating subtle depth. I like the way my shoulders were turned sightly away from the camera with my head facing the camera to make the image more dynamic. And even though my expression is a little goofy, I feel like I recognize it – like, yeah, that’s pretty honest to me.

So what can I learn from this image? Find good light, be yourself, turning your shoulders away from the camera helps you look a bit slimmer. But mostly, at least I have one photo of myself that I don’t dislike!

 

 

 

BONUS!

This photo isn’t particularly flattering, but I think it’s hilarious. Totally worth the $1 I paid this guy to borrow his chicken.