When you realise you aren't as attractive as you thought you were

[Iguessthatswhytheycallittheblues]

Has anyone else had this? I've just had back some photos that were done professionally and I don't look hideous, but I don't look great either, my nose looks bigger, baggy eyes, lines and teeth look worse, and camera really does add 10lbs.
It's knocked my confidence a bit I have to say, I'm wondering if this is how I look to everyone. I'd slept well and actually thought I looked good that day.

Stop concentrating on the negative

Also your self esteem shouldn't come from how attractive you perceive yourself to be

Yes it sucks. I think it’s aging and photo-shock happens to lots of us over 30. You remember yourself as a younger you. I try to make myself feel better by thinking how in 5yrs time I’ll be looking back on these photos and thinking how great I looked. Do you think reminding yourself of that could help? Try to picture an older you looking back at how you look now.

FWIW I’ve seen some appallingly unflattering photos of people I consider very attractive IRL! Happens to everyone 🤷‍♀️

I don't look back at photos and think they look awful, in fact I think the days of the analogue film was more forgiving than what is now HD! Any photos I've not liked at all I did at one stage go through them and ripped them up.

However, I think when camera phones came out and have been getting better all the time, I often think they can make people feel awful. I've read that selfies make features look bigger. I don't particularly like photos taken with phones now, which they virtually all are.

Anytime I see a photo of myself I get a shock. Obviously I still think I look like I did 30 years ago but the camera tells me I do not

Hahaa every single time I catch myself in a shop window, car mirror or mirror at home. I look far better in my imagination (images of myself 20 years younger) so I just act with that confidence, rather than the lies of the evil reflections.

I look totally shattered in photo's - I mostly am. I rarely wear makeup and wear my hair in a bun. It's not great. I show my daughter photo's of me at 28 and she says "who is that?". Sigh......

In my head I still look like I did in my 20's then I catch myself in the mirror and see a 50 year old looking back.

I wish I'd appreciated how pretty I used to be, I always had lots of compliments but could never see it.

It is freeing to let go of thinking you look like model (who is caked in make up and has filters up the arse)
I am a tubby cunt and I have let go of hating myself in pictures and looking at the positives. Like hugging my grandkids, yes I am fat but look at how alive my face is when looking at those kids.

I think the younger people who have grown up with constant photos really have the knack of looking good in them. We, on the other hand don't present ourselves as well and end up looking..not great. But l have friends who look great in real life as their eyes light up when they chat and they are always smiling but l have seen awful pictures of them which looked nothing like l perceive them. I play golf and there is always pictures up of prize winners and sometimes l hardly recognise them as they look nothing like they do on the course when they are having fun. So l have learned to ignore my awful pictures.

Don't ever look at yourself at the self service till cameras (Co-op) Christ, it's terrifying! Modern cameras have a lot to answer for..

DP often takes photos of me without me knowing and even he's now started laughing with me about how shit I look in most of them. We've just agreed that I'm not very photogenic and that's our excuse and I'm sticking to it 😬

Yes
particularly awful when you think you’ve got a good outfit on and then you see a photograph and you want to throw it out and wonder why you ever bought it

I don't look at photos and think "I look awful" or even "I look great".

To me, photos are about capturing memories of time spent doing things I enjoy, and / or time spent with people I like spending time with.

When I look through an album, or a memory comes up on Facebook, my thoughts are "Oh, that was a great holiday / wedding / trip to wherever / party / walk / beach day / wherever it was taken"
or, sometimes "That was the day we had that nightmare journey back and were stuck on the motorway for 4 hours" or "About 20mins after that the cloud burst and sent us all running for cover" or whatever.

I don't see any point in staring at photos remembering I used to be 2 stone lighter or thinking I didn't have so many wrinkles or wishing my hair wasn't grey. I'd look pretty odd without those signs of ageing.

When I was a teenager. I had a rather high opinion of myself despite being fat, nerdy and already losing my hair at 16/17. A few crushing rejections soon put me right, and my piggy ego was duly deflated.

One photo, professional or otherwise, doesn't mean you are unattractive. It just means it's a bad photo.

So true!!! We don't. In the early 1990s I met an East European woman at uni for the first time - before the Internet and all TikToks, she knew how to pose for photos, one leg in front of the other (she was bow-legged), she only took photos with the camera positioned above her and I was really shocked when we were filming a project with a camcorder and she painted underneath her chin and sides of her face with what looked like brown eyeshadow - when we watched the tape, her face looked so much slimmer than in real life! Basically, she knew how to apply theatrical makeup. We truly don't know how to present ourselves, and I don't mean compared to teens, I mean compared to other nations.

I saw a photo of my aunt and thought ‘oh she won’t like that’, then realised it was me.

Somehow, in almost every photo ever taken of me, I look like I am mid-sneeze.

Most people assure me I am simply very expressive, and was caught at a bad moment.

But the brutally honest people in my life tell me I have a rubber face and am constantly gurning like Jim Carrey. 🫤

I actually think these ones are the most flattering!

I think a lot of people I know (myself included) don't photograph well. We look better in real life.

Yep, they are awful. Hollowed eyes like someone from a dickensian workhouse...

When I look in a mirror if think I look ok,but when I see a photo I’m like who the hell is that 🤣.I agree with the self checkout/cctv comment,I was at the counter at the local nisa store and they have a camera above you with a screen at the counter and I saw the back of my head and thought it must be the person behind me,their was no one behind me 🤪

Nooooo

as for putting on a load of make-up for a photo - no I don't want to do that. Lots of people look fine without doing that. I think knowing how to pose is important. Going to learn that at some stage. But often in photos, it's the face that comes out fine so I must be doing something right.

It's the mismatch in my head with body and clothing.

Yes, like you, when I had professional photos taken and also when I was getting my dental implants and veneers fitted and saw my giant face up on the dentist’s monitor.

Good lord, what a mousse I looked in both cases! I think it was age related; I’d lost the pointed chin and high, rounded cheekbones of my youth and instead, had a face the shape of a potato.