I just paid £17 to have my passport photo taken and it is NOT MY FACE

[HarrietKettle]

I mean, I suppose it must be.

I look like I've just been arrested for drink driving offences, under the influence, and it's 4am in a downtown NY drunk-tank.

This is going on my ZSL pass for my charges and I to visit the zoo (I'm a nanny) so not ideal.

I applied make up. I brushed my hair. I wore a jaunty shade. I skipped along to Snappy-Fucking-Snaps on Charlotte Steet, London as I thought they'd take a nicer photo than my local one in Acton.

The lady asked me which one I wanted, they were all shite but one didn't make me want to cut my head off, I said that one please, she robbed me of my £17.99 and I said I'd pop back in half an hour.

I SWEAR TO GOD SHE SWITCHED THEM to the worst photo of my face I e ever seen. I look awful, I have never looked so awful, and if that is honestly my face I'm cancelling the extortionate wedding photographer we've selected and having my one year old nephew take the pics, at least he's likely to chop out my head.

I now have to present a picture of me looking like a criminal with addiction problems to my new boss for the ZSL card, and I'll have 7 monstrosities left that will never see the light of any day.

I looked fine in the mirror beforehand. Fine.

My fiancé says I'm like a slightly less Chanel-ed version of Natalie Portman (we've had his eyes tested and they're grand but I know he's slightly biased) so WHAT THE FUCK happened. The image is seared on to my brain forever. And the godforsaken ZSL card.

Anyone else look shite when they thought they looked ok?

DISCLAIMER LIGHTHEARTED I know I'm lucky to have a face etc etc

My photos always like I either am on drugs, or need to be on drugs.

I got good passport photo's they even commented on them when I applied for a passport (these ones are nice! You rarely get nice photos now, where did you get these?!)

Was NOT snappysnaps, but a professional photographer who takes wedding pics, family portraits but also passport pics. Was £20, cheap price for my vanity

Find a local REAL photographer who does passport pics too, is my advice!

I'm crying. Criminal potato, eaten the moon twice, oh my god I'm only on page one but I am off to get a cuppa, this is gold.

I’m pissing myself at your description OP DD is looking at me like I’ve gone utterly insane! But I know the feeling well. My previous passport, photo taken at 32 showed me smooth faced and appealing. Current one taken at 42 shows old, fat, mass murderer. Am just missing the numbers underneath. Luckily I never go anywhere so no one ever sees the bastard thing.

My brother took his with one eyebrow raised and now he has to pull the same face every time he goes through passport control

To be fair, on my last Snappysnaps, I looked like a Russian assassin (one eyebrow slightly raised, like Putin, and one corner of my mouth all the way down, like the ad for recognising a stroke victim ), so something had to be done....

Mine's horrendous also. I look like the matriarch of a drug gang. I was only 25 when I had it taken too!

Basically went to one of those booths that you pay £5 and you get to take a picture and retake it until you get the one you want. Dh came with me and kept kicking me under the curtain, like the fucking 30 year old child he is! He kept making me laugh so I had to retake it 3 times. After that I showed him the current image which was horrendous and made me look like the matriarch. He only went and fucking pressed accept didn't he. He said he didn't have all day to wait for me. The bastard!

Delta
I've always been very pleased with myself for having dark hair/eyes and pale skin.
Turns out it was nothing to be vain about, my Passport photo looks like it's a poster for the latest Japanese horror film. It looks like a dead ringer for Samsara, the girl out of The Ring.
I've been fake tanned and blushed ever since.

Went through passport control in Greece years ago and the cheeky sod actually said, "you've certainly improved since that was taken"!

like the ad for recognising a stroke victim

Have got a really bad cold and am now struggling to breath I have been laughing so much at this thread.

The massive kneck / neck also keeps setting me off.

I take a very bad photo always - in my DL photo I look like a poor mans Aileen Wuornos.

I know I'm lucky to have a face

Indeed you are!

The moral of this story is Snappysnaps is Snappysnaps, whether it is in W1 or Acton.

I go to the photobooth in Sainsburys. It's £6 and I come out looking better than I do in RL. They seem to put a soft focus on it. Is that just me.

Literally just pissed myself a bit laughing at this thread.

The problem I have with photo booths is that I get in and sit down, position myself perfectly but then when I lean forward to press the button to take the photo I lose the pose and can't replicate it in the split second before the shutter clicks.

My husbands passport photo is lovingly referred to the poo photo, he looks likes he’s been forced to smell the worst turd in the world..

Omg I'm crying laughing at this thread.

Especially an elderly crone found decaying at the bottom of a swimming pool

I used to take photos for drivers license renewals and learned a trick for those awful close-ups. We all tend to tilt our heads BACK, and thus expose the ample flesh under the chin. From a front and slightly underside angle, even a very young chin is not a pretty sight. So, when you "pose" and think you're ready, pause just long enough to drop your chin a notch or two, so you're straight on. It helps, honest.

If the camera doesn't lie then I have to face up to the fact that I am as ugly as fuck.

My features are all out of proportion - my 'average size' nose is actually huge, my rather thin top lip is actually non existent, and what I thought were my defining features - my gorgeous large blue eyes - look like protruding bug eyes in photos and are too large for my face, which is also lop-sided. And I have jowls.

I always thought I was rather attractive - but photographs tell me I have been deluding myself for years. Which is why I no longer have my photo taken. As soon as someone gets a camera out I'm gone!

I'd rather live in self-delusion than face up to the fact I am one ugly mofo.

My expired passport had a photo I thought made me look a famous female mass murderer who is many decades older than me. I went through passport control and the officer behind the counter asked me if she was a relation!

I look like a Soviet prison guard in my passport photo, and DH looks like someone who shouldn't be trusted with sharp objects. Hells bells, DS looks dodgy as fuck in his, and he's two!

There's some malevolent force at play when it comes to passport photos, you mark my words 🤔

I've never had a decent photo taken in my life, I pull a 'special' face 😀

I expressed disappointment with mine and the photographer said, "Why, do you think you look better than that then?" - with a mocking sneer.

it's the pale background and the no shadow on the face (in theory) thing.
a good photographer can help a bit with posture and lighting.
also lifting your cheeks (the face ones) to just-before-smiling point.

When we had

I was on an agency nursing shift once. One of the ward staff nurses looked at my ID pic and said
“ you look quite good on there, what happened?”, when I replied I couldn’t believe she had said that, she rolled her eyes and said
“ oh come on, I didn’t mean it like that”. So, what did you mean ?

I'm always pleased if a photo of me only has two chins. It has been much worse. a thumb
My programmer mathematician husband looks like the worst sort of thug for hire.

Fucking things.