How to take professional looking self portraits on a cell phone

Since this cursed quarantine has started, I’ve struggled to figure out how to use my skills and knowledge to serve others. And so I slowly started creating self portraits to keep my hands busy and something interesting started happening – I started getting message after message from fellow friends and business owners asking me to create a tutorial on how to shoot great selfies at home with no professional equipment.

So here you have it folks!

The video at the bottom is 11 minutes of my best tips and tricks! But if you’re not into watching videos here are the tips listed in order:

1. Eye contact – make sure you look in the camera lens, not at yourself
2. Lighting – indirect flat window light is best, move around to find it (a side note, keep in mind how catch lights look like in your eyes)
3. Posing – lean towards camera, shoulders back, chin extended forward and down.
4. Accessories – I use a mini tripod ($18) that came with a remote, so good.
5. Clutter – mind the busy background, simple is better, you want to stand out.
6. Smile – it needs to feel natural so if you like smiling big, go for it, otherwise natural beats fake every time.
7. EDITING – use smart phone apps like AfterLight or Photoshop but stay away from face-modifying apps, its cringe-y when you overretouch yourself and people can TELL. HUMANS HAVE PORES OK?

Don’t forget this is supposed to be fun, inject your images with as much of your personality as possible. And hey, whatever doesn’t work you can always delete, ok?! LOVE YOU GUYS!