Hows Your Courage?

Because here's where you climb over the barbed wire and stand up.

We all take selfies. Even old-school shooters arrange the lights in the good old main/fill/hair pattern, attach the camera to a tripod, and attempt to take a good self portrait. It can be a wearing experience - trying to get most of the bald spots and wrinkled areas to agree with each other. ( Note: hair lights are for people with hair. Eventually they become superfluous...)

Then comes the problem of the smile. Older teeth can sometimes smile all by themselves, possibly while you are out getting a cup of tea. Even when you are operating them, the business of arranging your mouth to look attractive is a real exercise. Open? You look like an idiot. Closed? You look like George Washington. Half-way there is worst of all - you look as if you are the door-greeter at an institution. You can go for a cheerful smile or sudden laugh, but don't trry to tell yourself a joke to get the reaction - you already know the punchline.

Selfies for a definite identification purpose - like a passport - are required to be expressionless. The machinery that everyone hopes will make travel easier apparently cannot cope with personality or happiness. These days there's little chance of the latter in the airports. To be fair - the old days of fronting up to an immigration and customs desk at three in the morning after a 19+hour flight didn't make for much sparkle either - the passport picture could look like hell and you'd match it any way.

Selfies for business publications need to be better - showing a powerful face that can be trusted at the helm of business...and with the pension funds. You can sparkle somewhat as long as it is in a dark suit with good accessories. We laugh about the good old main/fill/hair on a neutral backdrop, but this is exactly what will get you that job and your hands on those funds - take it seriously. If you do it for clients, do it for yourself.

Net selfies are designed to make you look more fun than you really are. There is a certain latitude to what you can wear - though the onesie has been a little overdone during the lockdown - and you can be seen in a more colourful set. Relax a little more and set the camera on 10 seconds self-timer instead of two. Give yourself some wiggle room. Don't wiggle too far or you'll start to look like an 80's CD cover.

But here comes the courageous part. Modern cameras record video as well as still images. You are perfectly entitled to take video selfies as well as the other sort. The courage comes when you overcome the fear of looking like a fool and sit or stand there and record yourself. It can be a daunting moment - like reciting a speech in front of a mirror...except it is a mirror that remembers and tells you what it saw, over and over. Walt Disney's Snow White featured a magic mirror that flattered the viewer as it lied to them...your digital camera will tell the brutal truth. To be fair, it doesn't have a face and swirling mists but you'll still end up feeling like a wicked queen.

Next week we'll start you gazing into that mirror. Make sure you have an apple handy. Or an Apple, if you prefer.

Note: The Wicked Queen is Amanda and she is not wicked at all...