What is it with leaning into selfies? You’d think people would be experts in self-imaging with all the practice as our absorption with personal photos grows exponentially through social media intensification.
You’d think more of us would be experts by now. If you do anything long enough, you get better at it. Do something enough and practice improvement and you can become an expert. Why not selfies?
It’s seems logical that if you took enough selfies, there’d be more good photos we’re seeing. But elongated foreheads and bigger-than-expected noses abound. For some reason, many us continue to distort the screen and post less-than-good shots for others to scan.
A bid of an aside: Before talking selfies, you must know how to actually use your mobile phone accurately. That took a bit of learning. Years ago, probably four or more (?), I was in a hallway at our home in Texas, stretching my arm as far as possible to try and take a photo of me for some strange reason. My wife or younger daughter (again, not full memory here), asked, “What the heck are you doing?”
“Taking a selfie. Why?”
“You don’t have to put your arm that far out. Just flip the screen on your cell.”
“Huh?” They gave me a quick tutorial on hitting the top right button to switch the phone over to selfie mode. WHOA! A new world opens.
I’m not a big selfie guy, but yeah, occasionally take one. If you see those posts, you see the failure in photo accuracy that applies to the amateur league.
There’s the Mild-Lean-In Shot: As soon as you gander at these photos, you notice how oddly everyone is standing, like forcing themselves forward to make sure they get in the picture, cramping how it looks and making it seem off-balance.
Then you have the All-In: Everyone scrambles to make sure they fit. It’s like the screen is exploding with humans and invariably someone is looking at the moon or grimacing like they are in the middle of a constipated bowel movement.
You also have the Squat Shot: “Hey everyone, squat down here so we can get you all in this photo and Mount Rushmore in the back. Smile.” Click. Somehow you miss a few heads or devalue the spectacular background scenery.
Finally, you have the Big-Lean-In: This one is where you almost expected it’s going to turn out crappy. Everyone is major league over-zealous like they have to be the best face in the crowd, smiling clowning, doing something that overly demonstrates their love of being in the selfie.
The selfie is an odd element of our current social climate. It shows more and more absorption of self and a presumption that others care about every little thing you’re doing your life. I hugely respect those people who completely avoid selfies. I doubt the WWII generation holds much appreciation for the indulgence.
But you also have to respect those selfie-taking experts, who flawlessly pose and it looks like someone else is holding the camera and asking you to say, “Cheese.” A scenic photo, with superior clarity and color, catching some important event is always worth it. A good photo worth 1,000 words, and all that.
You’d think more of us would be experts by now. If you do anything long enough, you get better at it. Do something enough and practice improvement and you can become an expert. Why not selfies?
It’s seems logical that if you took enough selfies, there’d be more good photos we’re seeing. But elongated foreheads and bigger-than-expected noses abound. For some reason, many us continue to distort the screen and post less-than-good shots for others to scan.
A bid of an aside: Before talking selfies, you must know how to actually use your mobile phone accurately. That took a bit of learning. Years ago, probably four or more (?), I was in a hallway at our home in Texas, stretching my arm as far as possible to try and take a photo of me for some strange reason. My wife or younger daughter (again, not full memory here), asked, “What the heck are you doing?”
“Taking a selfie. Why?”
“You don’t have to put your arm that far out. Just flip the screen on your cell.”
“Huh?” They gave me a quick tutorial on hitting the top right button to switch the phone over to selfie mode. WHOA! A new world opens.
I’m not a big selfie guy, but yeah, occasionally take one. If you see those posts, you see the failure in photo accuracy that applies to the amateur league.
There’s the Mild-Lean-In Shot: As soon as you gander at these photos, you notice how oddly everyone is standing, like forcing themselves forward to make sure they get in the picture, cramping how it looks and making it seem off-balance.
Then you have the All-In: Everyone scrambles to make sure they fit. It’s like the screen is exploding with humans and invariably someone is looking at the moon or grimacing like they are in the middle of a constipated bowel movement.
You also have the Squat Shot: “Hey everyone, squat down here so we can get you all in this photo and Mount Rushmore in the back. Smile.” Click. Somehow you miss a few heads or devalue the spectacular background scenery.
Finally, you have the Big-Lean-In: This one is where you almost expected it’s going to turn out crappy. Everyone is major league over-zealous like they have to be the best face in the crowd, smiling clowning, doing something that overly demonstrates their love of being in the selfie.
The selfie is an odd element of our current social climate. It shows more and more absorption of self and a presumption that others care about every little thing you’re doing your life. I hugely respect those people who completely avoid selfies. I doubt the WWII generation holds much appreciation for the indulgence.
But you also have to respect those selfie-taking experts, who flawlessly pose and it looks like someone else is holding the camera and asking you to say, “Cheese.” A scenic photo, with superior clarity and color, catching some important event is always worth it. A good photo worth 1,000 words, and all that.