That horrible feeling when you went out feeling fabulous… and then saw a photo of yourself ☹️

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Just what the thread title said, really.

I know it’s silly but I’ve felt miserable all day.

I honestly thought I looked great when I went out for a friend’s 50th last night. Not saying I’m a supermodel but I really did think I looked nice. Had an outfit I’d spent time thinking about (I love clothes), my hair done, etc.

Saw the photos this morning as friends started to send them and I look awful. My outfit looked nothing like I thought, I was trying to channel minimalist sophistication but it just looked plain and made me look blobby. I looked much heavier and ‘bigger’ than I thought (I’m not remotely overweight but I definitely could tone up) and my hair looked awful.

I’m not usually critical of my appearance, I’m old enough to accept my bad points and work around them, and emphasise my good points. Which is what I thought I’d done.

I hadn’t. And now I feel really crap about myself, and silly for thinking I looked good. And wondering if I have the energy to start a new fitness/de-blobbing campaign. Which until this morning I didn’t think I was in quite such need of.

Just wondering if anyone else can relate?

BLOODY camera phones ☹️

I look awful when MiL takes my photo because she's 5ft and holds the camera at chest height, tilting upwards. I always hold the phone at eye level and tilt it down slightly. Voila, slightly better photos!

I was in a photo the other day with 3 workmates. They looked fab. I looked like a sweaty round thing with peas for eyes and I'm only a size 12.

See, there IS an iota of kindness in you!

There's a woman I used to work with, perfectly lovely lady, but quite ordinary looking. Nothing wrong with that. Her online photos are so good, I thought she must had had substantial work done since I left, but I met her recently and she's aged just like the rest of us, it must all be filters or some other wizardry.

My reply was to @RenoDakota. Stoopid quote thingy didn’t work.

Mirrors are a carefully designed item.
If a company sold mirrors that gave an accurate reflection they’d go out of business.
There is a big difference between what a camera and a mirror shows.

@ChampagneBlossom44 still chortling at the sweaty pack of ham

Not that I’m shallow but I’m seriously considering ditching my iPhone for my friend’s android which filters so I have no wrinkles and doesn’t expand my head into A female David Coultard

Totally empathise. We were visiting family over Fri/Sat and a photo was taken of us eating ice creams. It's been posted onto FB. Now, I don't spend a lot of time on FB but I did stumble across the bloody photo last night. It's horrendous and made so much worse by the ice cream scoffing.

On the flip side, I have a friend who looks stunning in every photo taken of her. She posts a lot on social media because all her photos are lovely. I don’t even think she poses or is selective, she is just naturally very photogenic.
In real life, she is a bit overweight and quite pretty but no more than most of our group. I think she just has strong features that look striking in photos.

Many years ago, when the world was young and I was a well-proportioned size 12, I decided to do internet dating.
I complained to a photographer friend that it was impossible to find a decent photo for my profile. Don’t worry, she said, I’ll sort you out.
So, one lunchtime we popped
out to a nearby place of historic interest and I posed among the ruins (look! I’m interested in history!)
My friend, who shoots portraits for glossy magazine, clicked away for ages, suggesting different angles and looking more and more baffled and frustrated.
Eventually, she conceded defeat: “Yeah, you’re right. You’re really, really unphotogenic.”

These threads make me laugh! Awhile back I started going back to my mirror at the end of the day or event to check what the reality of the situation was. Different mirrors tell different stories too, not just cameras. So i have my bathroom one, it loves me the most, then the full length one for clothes - it's on an angle that i assume must be a little flattering as i never look as big in it as i do in pics.

Good to see this thread, I spend way too much time thinking of this and am hideously unphotogenic.

I was away with family recently and lists of photos were being taken, I tried to slope away but no-one was having it so I attempted what I thought was an angle to minimise my jowls and wonky mouth, it actually kind of worked but I realised I had bit a flabby belly hanging out ffs!

I avoid cameras like the plague and want to cry if people send me pics. I read the thing about the mirror ‘flip’ and photos being more accurate, and now I’ve just accepted that I am actually ugly :(

I have this too. I particular occasion was going out for a posh meal and night out for a friend’s 40th a few years ago. I was about a stone overweight at the time but I’m curvy so carry weight well as it goes on equally everywhere and I stay well proportioned. I was pushing a small size 14 at the time. I wore a beautifully made 1950s style wiggle dress and the mirror showed my figure to look luscious and sexy. I did my make up and hair to match. I arrived and my friends all said how amazing I looked. In the photos I look like my lumps are made of overstuffed sausages, my figure looks like a barrel, I look like I’m wearing no make up and my hair looks insane. The puffiness in my face is horrible. I looked 2 sizes bigger than I was to top it off. Soul destroying.

Does anyone else get the disappearing make up thing on photos? I have friends who only wear a bit of mascara and lipstick when they go out and they look fully made up in pics. I can do a full face of make up and in photos I look bare face. I even experimented and went really heavy with it once - false eyelashes and everything. Still looked like I had no make up on in photos. Where does it go?? Is it because I’m really pale skinned?

This happens to me a lot. I look in the mirror and think ahh yes! Chunky but wearing it well! Outfit on point. Then I see a photo and I look like John Prescott in a wig.

😂

Can you and @Boomboom22 give @TheLongpigs and I some tips and links please?

There's a woman who lives near me takes fabulous selfies. She looks like Audrey Hepburn.

In person she's just, well, ordinary.

Strangely remember those photos we took as teens and hated at the time- they look pretty good now!

I saw a meme once that I think of every time this happens to me.

The mirror says: Dayum girl you're looking fine!
The camera says: HAHAHAHAHAHA. No.

I have a work friend who is drop dead gorgeous and utterly HOT. Everyone wants to be on his team, sit by him at meals, etc - people will ask me the next day ’who was that really good looking man’, he is known for it. In a photo however he looks really quite average. It’s so bizarre.

I empathise. I started my own thread about it a few months ago.

Something to add...it's the effort vs reward that also upsets me.
For example when I make an effort with cooking-time / money / reading the recipe and so on there's usually some decent food at the end. I can taste it.
In other areas, making an effort and trying hard does yield results.

When I apply the same effort on my appearance-time / money / reading S&B / watching YT videos on make up application -my 'reward' should be a decent photograph of me, that's all I want. There's no other way of knowing if the effort I have put into looking good has worked. However, the photo is always, always disappointing, I may as well not bother (and yet I still do).

Can't decide if I AM really that ugly or just don't photograph well. So on the whole, I avoid having photos taken. But sometimes you have to give in, like for ID cards, passports and the like. For these photos, I not only look ugly, but I look criminal too......

Really laughed at this. I'm the same. It's a joke with DH and DS how awful I look on holiday photos! I've a gorgeous friend who is all over Insta, size 8, blonde. She always asks waiters to take photos and puts them up immediately.

I'm your cousin!
I am weirdly photogenic but worse in real life!
It's odd and uncomfortable for things like dating apps /staff photo board at work

I refuse to believe I actually look like how I do in photos. It's completely different from the mirror. My eyes look wonky, huge nose, triple chin, massive inane grin. I don't believe it 😁😭

This is just a sidenote (because I understand your main point) but if you looked at who was sending what, invariably the person who sent it will look the best in that photo! Angles and lighting matter a lot and they'd all have chosen the pics that flatter themselves (and not you) most to send out.

Some phones definitely take better photos than others. I took a headshot photo for work the other day of someone good looking.

On my older iPhone there was distortion so he had a bigger nose, piggy eyes etc. On his own newer iPhone he looked accurate.

@SilverCatStripes So true. I identify with every one of the posts above - fat, short, ugly, thin hair, pitifully unphotogenic - so avoided photos.

One day I was trying to coax my then 9yo to let me take a photo and I said something about me having the memory to look back on. She then told me that it made her sad that she wouldn't have many photos of me to look at when I was gone and could I be in photos please. I've never avoided one since. Photos of yourself aren't just for you.

I still hate it and refuse to look at them but it's for my children not me.