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Oh that made me happy seeing y’all go out of your comfort zone and share your smiles be they silly or subtle!
We’re going to dig in a little more today into how to make peace with our smiles as there are really two different approaches we can take to smiling in a photo: posed or candid. Have you found you have a preference?
During your experimenting yesterday you may have noticed yourself cross over from posed to more natural or candid photos and back again. Today we are going to play around with that!
Posed
Just like we talked about yesterday, we may have our comfort zone with smiling, a way that we like to smile that feels comfortable, even if it isn’t our ‘natural’ smile!
I know it might be natural for many of us to think of posed smiles as not being ‘real’ but I encourage you to let yourself out of that myth. A posed smile is just us, in our comfort zone.
One trick I like to do (and you could try today) is to remember that we smile with so much more than just our lips. I have an activity in Be Your Own Beloved (which I won’t totally give away…keep it as a surprise for you in class) but in it we explore looking into the lens thinking of someone we love. What I find happens when we do this is that our eyes light up, our smile becomes softer and its as though you can see the love in our eyes. Try this today and I think you’ll see how smiling is about so much more than just how we position our lips, isn’t it!
Candid
Our ‘natural’ smiles on the other hand, are those kind that we probably don’t think about that much…that we just do!
I love starting my in person workshops asking the question “What is your favourite photo of yourself (be it a selfie or a photo of you)” and so often one of the favourite types of photos folks have is that one that someone captured of you in a moment of laughter at an important time in your life (like at a wedding or a family gathering).
But we can totally have our candid smiles in selfies too..and we’re going to explore that today!
I know for me, these kinds of smiles feel a lot more vulnerable and indeed we are going to dig into that further later this week as I have a feeling I’m not alone in that!
A few questions for you:
How do you feel about your candid smile vs your posed smile?
Are there any photos you’re getting that are surprising you?
Does one type of smile feel more vulnerable than the other?
So today let’s experiment with our candid smile (as it probably is the kind that is less common in our photos)!
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Take a Candid Smile Photo!
So how do we do this? Indeed, we are going to continue on with the playfulness we started with yesterday!
You might:
- Put on your favourite video…you know, the adorable animal ones that make you laugh or grin (my favourite this week is the one of the Golden Retriever totally failing an agility test in the best kind of way)! Keep your camera handy and capture some selfies as you find yourself cracking up or smiling.
- Or get someone in your life to make you laugh! Or look at someone who just makes you smile to be in the same room as them…and try capturing some selfies as you smile or laugh! You could look into the camera, or not…do whatever feels right to you!
- Or try looking right into the camera and okay…I know this is going to feel silly but make yourself laugh! I know that at first it feels fake but soon it can’t help but shift into real authentic laughter!
- Or try just looking into the camera and playing around with what feels like your authentic smile.
Share your favourite shot with us or you could even pair a posed and a candid shot together like today’s example photo (I used the App Pic Jointer to pair these two together)!
Come share your candid selfie with us today using the #beyourownbeloved hashtag or add your blog or Instagram link to the list below!
A smile is the light in the window of your face that tells people you’re at home.
-Author Unknown