Be yourself⌠Relax⌠Have fun.
If youâve ever been nervous about having your picture taken, you know that well-meaning friends and strangers love to share gratingly-ambiguous guidelines like these.
But what does it actually mean to âbe yourselfâ in this wildly unfamiliar situation? What if the real you is uptight and doesnât find a photo shoot fun at all!?
Enter: portrait photographer Peter Hurley.
Wielding concrete headshot posing tips for regular peopleâ including the now-famous âsquinchâ techniqueâ it should hardly come as a shock that his videos have gone viral.
Here is a headshot taken by Hurley, illustrating a proper âsquinchâ:
This specific technique is based on the theory that wide open eyes look fearful, vulnerable, and uncertain. Therefore, to look more confident, itâs a good idea to squint ever-so-gently in photos (as youâd do naturally in a genuine, relaxed smile).
Sure, the majority of Hurleyâs subjects do look better âsquinching.â But critics have speculated that squinching might not be as reliably photogenic as itâs made out to beâ making some people just look a bit disingenuous instead.
Thatâs why we decided to investigate our Photofeeler data to find out for certainâ does squinching reliably make a person look more confident?
The Experiment
To get to the bottom of this, we tagged hundreds of photos from our Photofeeler database based on whether the subjectâs eyes were: wide open, at rest, squinching, squinting, or closed.
Once we had curated a large batch of squinching photos, we used our advanced algorithm to eliminate potential bias caused by gender, environment, angle, dress, overall facial expression, and photo edits/filters.
Then we compared the average scores of squinching photos to the overall Photofeeler average.
The Results
Our hypothesis, based on photographer Peter Hurleyâs suggestion, was that the subjects in squinching photos would be perceived as more confident than average.
A more confident look, we decided, would result in higher Competence and Influence scores. (But not necessarily higher Likability scores, as a person can appear objectively confident to us whether or not we like them.)
As it turns out, this is what we saw in our research.
Squinching increased the subjectâs perceived Competence by an average of +0.33.
Squinching also increased the subjectâs perceived Influence by an average of +0.37.
These numbers may seem insignificant, but I assure you they are not. Since Photofeeler operates on a -5 to +5 scale, small increments hold quite a bit of meaning.
In conclusion, portrait and headshot photographer Peter Hurley was right. Squinching really is a small tweak that can reliably change the way your photos are perceived for the better.
Know for certain how youâre coming across in pictures with Photofeeler. Itâs free to use here. đ
