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Getting Your Look Down

Most seniors want a mixture of happy/smiling and non-smiling looks in their senior pictures but few seniors give more than a few seconds thought about how they want to look when they aren’t smiling. If you are one of these seniors, you don’t want the first time you think about your non-smiling look to be when you are in front of the camera. You won’t be able to see how you look and you won’t be as comfortable exploring different expressions while you’re in the spotlight. The key to quicking rocking those killer non-smiling looks is a little bit of preparation on your part and some tricks we have learned over the years that we can teach you.  So here we go…

Practice in the Mirror
This may sound like the duh!-est advice in the world, but amazingly few seniors do it before their shoot and try to rock their first looks in front of a camera where they can’t see themselves and in front of a photographer they usually don’t know that well and fear is judging them. Now that we’ve put it that way, a mirror sounds like a better place to start prcticing, doesn’t it?

Find Inspiration For Your Look
Search Google or Pinterest for seniors or models who have a look you would like to emulate and try out these look when you are practicing in the mirror. If you’re looking for inspiration – try some of these Pinterest Boards:

Think of Words that Describe Your Personality
Genuine, confident, clever, determined, funny, approachable are words seniors often think about themselves. It is important to think about the few words or combinations of words that you would use to describe yourself or describe how you aspire to look in your pictures. Does the look you are  practicing describe you in these terms? If the mirror says you look nervous, uncomfortable, mean or whatever, keep working on it. Practice will pay off.

Relax Your Mouth
It’s natural to clench your jaw when practicing your look. It’s kind of a natural reaction to trying comething new, but it can get in the way of more relaxed, comfortable looks you desire. Two tricks to help with this: First, stretch out your mouth. Open it wide open like you are yawning and stretch out your jaw muscles. When you are done stretching, let your mouth close, but try to keep your jaw relaxed. Avoid clenching your teeth and pursing your lips. Sometimes breating through your mouth will help force you to keep your lips separated just a little.

Confident and Approachable
These two words usually best describe how most seniors want to look when they are not grinning from ear to ear. If that is how you want to look, there will be lots of inspiration out there because that is how most actors, actresses and models want to look in their pictures. Celebrities know how to rock this look so look to their professional headshots and magazine covers for ideas to help you prepare. Our next two ideas will help you with this.

Squint
If you look at most leading men and women on the covers of magazines, they all have one thing in common. They squint. Just a little. Not like you’re being blinded by the sun, but more like a look of curious skepticism, confidence. Raising your upper cheeks and bring your eye brows together just a little. It is the key to looking confident and the best cure for that surprised deer-in-the-headlights look that nobody wants in their pictures. It’s so important that we have an entire pinterest board dedicated just to squinting so you can see for yourself how true this is.
[ visit our Squint board ].

Smile Just a Little
While squinting helps with confidence, squinting alone can lead you to look uncomfortable, annoyed, or downright mad and you need to add approachability into the mix – by doing something with your mouth. For most people smiling just a little is the answer. The amount is up to you. You can rock a half smile for a going-confidently-in-the-direction-of-my-dreams-without-getting-too-excited look or try a quarter smile just to avoid looking uncomfortable or mad. Smiling doesn’t always to be big and grand and cheesy. Play with different levels of smiling or just try doing different things with your mouth to find what works best for you.

Eyebrows
After getting comfortable with your eyes (squinting) and mouth (approachability) start playing with your eyebrows. These are the only other things you can move on your face to change your expression and are best used to convey your sense of humor. You can use them to look funny, clever, or show what a character you are and how fun you are to be around.

Pouting
Senior girls are often showing us pouty pictures of models on their senior picture Pinterest boards from beautiful editorial photos. Not pouty like someone just took your favorite toy away, but that beautiful, non smiling, full lips look usually with your teeth showing just a little. We call it the Pouty European Supermodel Look and if you want to rock this look – here are some ideas to help.

  1. Do bring the corners of your mouth together. This will make your lips fuller.
  2. Don’t press your lips together. This makes your lips look smaller and makes you look uncomfortable.
  3. Breather through your mouth. This will force your mouth to stay open and show off a few pearly whites.
  4. If you’re having trouble try saying “Prunes” slowly. I think heard Tyra Banks suggest this once. It will help naturally get your lips full, mouth open and teeth showing.

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