How To ‘Selfie’

There’s an art to creating the perfect selfie, a simple point and press won’t do, just ask Kim K, the queen of the selfie and all round mirror lover. Kim recently revealed her selfie secrets to online publisher The Daily Mail.

Kim’s number one tip was to get in front of a mirror, there’s no leaving it to chance! Some of her most famous selfies, including that bootalicious ‘belfie’ shot was taken in front of a mirror, so she can see exactly what she’s gonna be capturing. Almost as important on the ‘how-to selfie’ list is lighting. Switching to black and white is a sure fine way to get rid of shadows and one trick that Kim uses regularly, when the lighting isn’t quite right.

As much as we appreciate Kim Kardashian giving us selfie tips, we have a feeling that if you have a face like that, it’s gonna be pretty hard to take a bad photo. So we’re gonna give you the low down on how to take the perfect selfie in your everyday situations, minus perfect LA lighting, yachts and celebrity BFF’s…

Scoopshooter: Érika Rocha

The ‘Classic’ Selfie

The classic selfie is your go-to which you can adapt for all your selfie needs. The first tip is to avoid all cliché selfie poses i.e., duck face, throwback myspace shots and taking yourself too seriously, all provide rather cringeworthy pics. Find your angle. It may take five or six attempts to find which side is your best but it’s a lesson worth learning.

Consider your background, making it either very interesting or very simple — middle ground is not so good. A la Kim K, good lighting can make your skin and hair look amaaaze-balls, so get outside or near a window to make the most of natural lighting. And finally, to contradict everything, don’t try too hard, or rather don’t look like you’ve tried too hard. A try-hard selfie is obvious, so have fun with it and if in doubt filters are your friends.

Scoopshooter: Mmatthias Allain

The ‘Beach’ Selfie

Angle your camera to your good side, the first step to any successful selfie. Show plenty of sand/sea action so we all know you’re having an amazing time on vacation. Sunglasses are your BFF, especially if you want to cover that ever so slightly red and sweaty holiday face, just make sure they’re not crazy reflective! An extension of the ‘beach’ selfie is the ‘hotdog legs’ a photo of your legs extending from the shot with hotdog like tendencies. A surprisingly popular shot, just make sure to shoot wide to make your legs look longer and prevent them from looking detached from your body.

The ‘Landmark’ Selfie

Make sure the landmark is actually in shot. No point taking a selfie in front of an impressive piece of architecture if you’re going to block half of it out with your head. Also, go easy on the cliché pushing over the leaning tower of Pisa, pinching the top of the Eiffel Tower etc., these are rarely executed well and have been done to death.

Scoopshooter: Elijah Judah

The ‘Food’ Selfie

You’ve gone somewhere a little bit fancy for lunch and can’t miss the photo opportunities that it presents! First check there’s no hidden food morsels stuck in your teeth, that’s one sure way to kill the romantic food vibe. Alternatively, cover your mouth with the menu and only show your eyes, this rules out the food-in-teeth issue and also allows you to capture the mood of the room (if your arm can stretch that far). Don’t be afraid to take a snap of you enjoying your food, biting in to a sandwich or sipping on a glass of wine is perfectly acceptable, but be careful not to capture yourself mid-chew or with an overly full mouth, that’s not so appealing.

Scoopshooter: Anon

Scoopshooter: Anu Varghese

The ‘Group’ Selfie

Made famous by Ellen DeGeneres at the 2014 Oscars, where she managed to create the most famous selfie of all time by squeezing 11 A-list celebs into one shot, courtesy of Bradley Cooper’s long arms. The group selfie is the perfect opportunity to show off that you have friends and that you’re not totally incapable of sharing the spotlight.

Scoopshooter: Brian Yauger

So now we’ve summed up your daily selfie needs and requirements, get smiling and make sure you submit your selfies to the Scoopshot app with #selfie and show us what you’ve got!