do you want to take my picture?
I’ve never been 100% comfortable with having my photograph taken – despite trying to make myself accustomed to it through regular outfit photos. I have a relatively realistic viewpoint on how I look in pictures, but sometimes I am still shocked out of that viewpoint by what is either a “bad” photo or a “bad” angle.
I still have a ways to go in my personal fat acceptance journey. I am always challenging myself and trying to become comfortable with my body and how it is portrayed. One tiny challenge I set myself was not to detag any “unflattering” photographs on Facebook that friends have put up. Instead, I’ve tried to remember the fun I had, what I was doing, who I was with and see that the photographs represent the whole me, not the carefully edited me.
This is going to be a bigger challenge this Friday. I’ve become involved in a project a friend is doing and it involves being photographed by a professional photographer and filmed. I’ve already had two sessions with them and they were both pretty awesome – I started out exceptionally nervous and very conscious of my body, my face and everything involved with that, but as I relaxed and became less self-conscious, I realised it was sort of freeing. I like the honesty involved in the documentary-style photographs. I like how the pictures tell a story and how different it is to just clicking on the self-timer and racing to a spot to pose for the camera.
I saw the photographs from the second session and was, again, a little taken aback at how I looked. I didn’t necessarily think I looked “bad”, but the image of me in my head didn’t completely match the image portrayed on the screen. On a purely shallow note, I didn’t realise I was that pale for starters! I stopped myself from picking myself apart after that, but it was a definite struggle.
Friday, my sister with Downs syndrome is joining me in a shopping expedition. I’ve talked about how she loves fashion and clothing and loves dressing up and my friend and the photographer were both interested in taking photographs of the both of us looking at clothing and shopping together. I’ve been in pictures with her before, obviously, but not really since she started getting into fashion and I started buying (awesome) clothing for her. It will be an experience. I don’t know if she will make be bolder in photographs, or more reserved. I’m looking forward to finding out.
