Taking the Selfie to the Next Level

Getting creative with lighting.

I’ve been a professional photographer and vintage hair and makeup artist for 6 years now. Wow! Time really does fly when you’re having fun! Predominantly working on vintage, Pinup and boudoir photography, I set out on a mission to help women feel more confident in themselves. But I would often find myself feeling a little jealous after I’d given them a vintage styled makeover and posed them in front of the camera. So decided very early on to give it a go myself and take my very own self portraits, or advanced selfies if you will.

I find experimenting with taking selfies gives me the freedom to experiment and take some time trying out new things, which I can then perfect and use with my clients. Whether it be a new lighting set up or a new pose. Obviously it comes with a lot of trial and error, making sure the camera angle is right, that the lighting is flattering, and that my pose and facial expressions are good. Hopping back and forth between posing and checking the images over to make additional tweaks.

Whilst all of these images were taken using my DSLR camera, some with studio lighting, some with ambient lighting and some in natural daylight. Phone cameras these days are so well equipped that I see no reason why you can’t create some high impact self portraits for yourself, just using your phone. I challenge you all (and myself) to get inventive, and take some creative selfies. If you don’t own a tripod for your phone, try propping it up between some books, set the timer, and away you go. With the addition of a few tweaks using a photo app or two, and you can really see your art come to life.