Selfies Distort Facial Features - Research

Researchers at the University of Texas have found that taking selfies from a short distance distorts facial features:

 

LINK --- --- Selfies distort your face and make your nose look LARGER, study finds | Daily Mail Online

 

Perhaps they should just have asked photographers, who have known this for at least 150 years.

Not to worry, I'm sure they'll solve it in software.

 

 

While I fully support learning from first principles, this generation (get me, I'm not even 40!) seems to have an indefatigable need to reinvent everything.

this generation (get me, I'm not even 40!) seems to have an indefatigable need to reinvent everything.

Watch out. The next generation will claim that the faces that are distortions of the selfies!

Edited April 1, 2022 by samstevens

Watch out. The next generation will claim that the faces that are distortions of the selfies!

 

Funny you should say that. I seem to recall a news item where a young lady had her picture taken in a studio, and then complained to the photographer that it didn't look like her, because she was so accustomed to seeing herself "selfie style".

We've gone from sad to sadder in this thread. I'm afraid we haven't seen saddest, yet.

I wonder if selfies exaggerate egos even more than noses.

Researchers at the University of Texas have found that taking selfies from a short distance distorts facial features:

 

LINK --- --- Selfies distort your face and make your nose look LARGER, study finds | Daily Mail Online

 

Perhaps they should just have asked photographers, who have known this for at least 150 years.

They probably received research money of half a million to research this thoroughly. ;)

The same things happen with those video cameras that sit on your computer. Close distance and wide-angle lens. It makes most people look really ugly. Of course, if someone wants to give me half a million, I'd be glad to research this thoroughly.

What I’ve noticed in my many pandemic zoom get togethers is that lighting more than lenses makes the difference on how people look. I spent some time early on positioning myself so I got a combination of filtered window light with some artificial lamp light thrown in and I’m not horrified when I see myself, at least no more than when I look in a mirror! There are those whose lighting puts them in ugly shadows or is harsh enough to exaggerate or create flaws and those whose lighting flatters them quite nicely, whether accidentally or by design.

The same things happen with those video cameras that sit on your computer. Close distance and wide-angle lens. It makes most people look really ugly. Of course, if someone wants to give me half a million, I'd be glad to research this thoroughly.

Window reflections tend to make me look fat.

Window reflections tend to make me look fat.

So does noshing! :)

Is that a fact?

Is that a fact?

Let's call it a virtual fact! :)

If you wear a mask it hides the effect.

Edited April 3, 2022 by Glenn McCreery

When I bought my (then new) Nikon FM so many years ago, someone suggested the AI 43-86 lens to go with it, as 86mm was close to the 90mm for portraits.

 

But since I don't really do portraits, I went for the AI 35/2.0 instead.

 

So, I have known for years, though not quite 150, that portraits need the right distance.

 

I am not sure I would actually be able to tell, though.

+1 for @John Seaman's post and the above comments. What I find most disturbing are reports that youngsters are requesting cosmetic surgery so that they look more like their (filtered, blemish-removed, ideal) selfie images taken on smartphones.

Worst time to take a selfie is when you first wake up in the morning...

Not a selfie but a revealing reflection.

We've gone from sad to sadder in this thread. I'm afraid we haven't seen saddest, yet.

What I find most disturbing are reports that youngsters are requesting cosmetic surgery so that they look more like their (filtered, blemish-removed, ideal) selfie images taken on smartphones.

What?

Things look bigger closer, while further away things look smaller? And the closer you get the more exaggerated the effect?

Incredible!

Maybe someone should have mentioned it to all those old master artists in the renaissance. They could have given it a name like "perspective"..... Oh wait! They did.

What is incredible that some have plastic surgery to look better in a selfie rather than ask someone to take their picture from a longer distance and a longer focal length to solve the issue. Edited April 14, 2022 by ilkka_nissila

Selfies because that the only type of photography allowed. If you take pictures of someone from a distance you have to ask for permission otherwise you're in trouble. Even if the law allows you to do so people are still mad at you for doing so. Their pictures should only be taken via selfies.

Well thank goodness for $$$ and research, eh? And here I thought the fact of facial distortion in sh*tty phone cameras was “selfie evident”? :D

And here I thought the fact of facial distortion in sh*tty phone cameras was “selfie evident”?

The phone camera is only as sh*tty as its user allows it to be. Fit a 15mm and barely-rectilinear lens to a Leica, shove it 6 inches from someone's face in crappy and dim lighting and voila - you have a recipe for a sh*tty picture.

Use the same camera and lens on a well-composed landscape during the 'golden hour' and you might have a totally beautiful result.

facial distortion

Don't knock it 'til you try it, lol ...

 

Edited April 17, 2022 by samstevens