I met with my bookclub gals last night and I got an abdominal workout- and I mean the equivalent of about five-hundred crunches in an eight minute span. No, it was not from P90x.
From laughing.
Side-splitting, tear-inducing, I-need-to-run-to-the-bathroom-before-I-pee-myself, I-can’t-breathe, stomach-cramping, cracking-up … laughing.
The culprit? The most hilarious photo ever.
The camera came out and a few pictures were taken. Looking through the snapshots, we came across one photo, where the dimensions just looked off on one particular gal. We pinkie swore that we would never reveal the shrunken-head-clown-birth photo (this is what this normally GORGEOUS and Goddess-like woman resembled in the photo) but we laughed about it for eight minutes straight… hence the abs of steel.
It’s hilarious because these ladies are stunning… Hollywood actresses who are some of the most photogenic women I’ve ever met- and they have a great sense of humor. The fact a bad photo exists, is what makes this whole thing even more amusing.
It made me think of all the hours of America’s Next Top Model (another secret indulgence) I’ve watched, and how many lessons Tyra Banks has taught the ingenue models over the years. From ‘smizing’ to ‘booty-tooching’, she has down all the right ways to take a picture.
After seeing our hilarious shrunken head photo, I am now taking the directly opposite approach from Tyra. I now know exactly what you should do to take an awful, unflattering photo of yourself. Here are eight posing tips to completely f up your photo.
Eight Ways to Make Yourself Look Awful in a Photo
1) Scrunch in your neck.
Do the opposite of elongating it. Scrunch your head in so it looks like you have no neck. You may even be able to create a double or triple chin out of the deal. And look terrible.
2) Make your head the farthest part of your body from the camera lens.
Put anything up front other than your face- knees, legs, gut, etc. moving head back. This will give the glorious illusion of a shrunken head and huge appendages. Always a look to go for.
3) Press your arm into your body.
There are two phenomenal outcomes when you press your own arm against your body:
– ‘Vagina Armpit’: where your arm is pressed up against your side, thus creating the faux-vagina effect. This happens to skinny arms, fat arms, times when your bra is too small and your tank top is too tight.
– ‘Fat arm’: again, can happen to the best of us… you’re in a group photo, one of the bookends maybe, and you forget to extend your arm away, the relaxing muscle and/or ‘softness’ presses up against your side, thus creating surface area effect. Fat arm is not discriminatory and can happen even to the slimmest arm at rest.
Either is 100% avoidable. But why would you want to do that?
4) Face your body head on.
Most the time this isn’t that bad, people actually look fine face on. A 3/4 turn or side turn many times will make you look slimmer in a photo. Or an interesting angle. The photo above shows how you could make a photo more interesting and appealing. We’re trying to be unflattering here, not interesting! As we learned from #3 more surface area in a photo, the more unflattering it is.
5) Slouch so much so that your chin hits your chest.
This result is the same as #1 and #2 combined. Your face is no longer in the forefront, and your neck is squished. Double whammy.
6) Look down at the photographer.
Who doesn’t like feeling (and looking like) a giant? Here’s how to do it. Have the photographer below you. It will guarantee the skinniest girl ever to have a double chin. That’s how you can get back at your frenemy- tell them you want a pic, then drop to your knees. I think the tree in this pic only accentuates this couple’s gigantism. Sweet.
7) Smile too hard.
Natural smiles are overrated. Show the peeps out there that life is fun dammit!!! Press your teeth so hard together they may either stick together for eternity or shatter into a million little pieces. Everyone will know you are happy.
8) Lean back
Again, this photo ain’t half bad, but the girl on the left has a quadruple whammy going for her- which is what happens in the lean back. When you lean back, your face becomes scrunched (see #1), becomes the smallest thing on you- and in this case, puts her arm in the forefront (see #2), and she is pressing her arm up (see #3) since she’s the bookend.
8) Do all of these at once.
So, what if you want a good pic? Do the opposite of everything I just said. That should give you a good, gorgeous pic to stand the test of time.
Life, Love and Yoga 
very funny. arm vagina. never thought of it that way. even on super slim women like jennifer aniston, it’s a creepy look, that little niche betwixt the arm and the body.