Smile ... you are on camera
Smiling seems to be inappropriate for photos these days. I think it may have more to do with the times that we live in than anything else. I could be wrong, but given the daily pressure of life and living for most of us, it is easy for us to develop the frown lines, and once our facial skin is creased up it may not be so easy to press out. Smiling hard may not even force the muscles to exert enough stretch to smooth out the skin, so you can really be smiling your butt off and you still appear frowning. As the young people does say these days "this is some serious s**t".
I am not going to get into any discussion on the why frowning seems to be the accepted facial expression now-a-days, and if you are one of the unfortunate persons who still can smile, please be careful, because it is a fact that some people in the "non-smiling community" does take offence with those who can, and some grievous bodily harm could result in extreme cases. I do not think that would apply to our Caribbean people, but then we seem to copy and emulate all that we should not, so in our virgin territory we also need to heed the warning to be "cautious when smiling", and to be "careful with whom you smile" ... hahaha .... this is a joke, and I am not laughing, but never for a moment underestimate the reality.
I am treated to many photos every day, but the vast majority of them do not show "smiling" people. I am not now talking about a posed group shot after a photo excursion, where we blow off to celebrate the event's success, and pose for the camera. I see people posing for camera, but they do not seem to me to be enjoying the pose nor the session, given the facial expression and the look is some of their eyes. It is no way that your facial muscles can relax and reach into a smile with some of the contortions that today's photographers try to get their subjects and models to adopt. I have the greatest of respect for the photographers of the world who seek to capture from the "ultimate beautiful" down to the "extreme @#$%^&*" with a great variety of hardware devices in an attempt to prove they are worthy to be wear the title of photographer.
Within two days I had the opportunity to look at well over a thousand faces and I can recall only one person with a 100% smiling face. I attended a Saturday wedding of my children's friends. That was a joyous occasion and there was the occasional broad smile from people which is usually triggered by eye contact. And of course the Bride and Groom have to smile, irrespectively. After the wedding party exited the church and paused on the church steps for a posed wedding party group shot I recognized that one bridesmaid was smiling. A couple minutes later she was still smiling, so I took time off to 'stare' at her ... and for real, she had a genuine smile on her face, looked pleasant and happy. The official photographer's "cheese" was not for her.
The day before, Friday, there was a religious youth event down town Basseterre and it was then it struck me that the only people smiling were some of the performers and the church's Pastor and event announcer. But you can't judge that from a religious event because if the "spirit" have you under conviction, you will not be smiling, until after you are "released".
There are some people on the street who will smile when they see a camera in their face, but when I am shooting from across the Boulevard with a 300mm Canon telephoto lens I am almost invisible but they are full screen with me, and they are certainly not smiling. This also apply to the visiting videographer who makes our tourism promotion videos, but I think that our people are somehow aware of the "foreign" presence and wear their smile, just in case. I am local so frowning is reserved for me. Guess I need an "expat" to carry my camera bags from now ....
When I first visited Barbados in 1970 I was rather taken aback because everyone seemed so friendly and were always smiling. So I had to investigate that. I will not tell you what I discovered, but it is apparent that SKB needs to find that solution which can help to place a National smile on the Faces of our people. Nothing is impossible but given the misguidedness of some people in our community we may not wish to walk that particular path, which can positively impact our Tourism Product. It is like some of us want to swim in Tourism but don't want to get wet while swimming, they don't even want the Tourism scuba suit to get wet either.
The frowning faces could follow into photography, and I have to check with local photographers whether or not that is the reason why almost every young lady's photo now-a-days is a victim of, or is subject to Photoshop. Then again with the convenient Photoshop cure, the young ladies may no longer need to take their beauty and health seriously, because they much prefer the look of the digitized skin. I believe that somewhere on planet Earth there are young ladies who still hold true to the traditions of beauty and health to derive the ultimate experience from their modeling and photography.
I think I will get a Tee shirt that says " smile ... you are on this camera" to wear when walking about ... but somehow, I don't feel that it will work, but I have to try something.
Within two days I had the opportunity to look at well over a thousand faces and I can recall only one person with a 100% smiling face. I attended a Saturday wedding of my children's friends. That was a joyous occasion and there was the occasional broad smile from people which is usually triggered by eye contact. And of course the Bride and Groom have to smile, irrespectively. After the wedding party exited the church and paused on the church steps for a posed wedding party group shot I recognized that one bridesmaid was smiling. A couple minutes later she was still smiling, so I took time off to 'stare' at her ... and for real, she had a genuine smile on her face, looked pleasant and happy. The official photographer's "cheese" was not for her.
The day before, Friday, there was a religious youth event down town Basseterre and it was then it struck me that the only people smiling were some of the performers and the church's Pastor and event announcer. But you can't judge that from a religious event because if the "spirit" have you under conviction, you will not be smiling, until after you are "released".
There are some people on the street who will smile when they see a camera in their face, but when I am shooting from across the Boulevard with a 300mm Canon telephoto lens I am almost invisible but they are full screen with me, and they are certainly not smiling. This also apply to the visiting videographer who makes our tourism promotion videos, but I think that our people are somehow aware of the "foreign" presence and wear their smile, just in case. I am local so frowning is reserved for me. Guess I need an "expat" to carry my camera bags from now ....
When I first visited Barbados in 1970 I was rather taken aback because everyone seemed so friendly and were always smiling. So I had to investigate that. I will not tell you what I discovered, but it is apparent that SKB needs to find that solution which can help to place a National smile on the Faces of our people. Nothing is impossible but given the misguidedness of some people in our community we may not wish to walk that particular path, which can positively impact our Tourism Product. It is like some of us want to swim in Tourism but don't want to get wet while swimming, they don't even want the Tourism scuba suit to get wet either.
The frowning faces could follow into photography, and I have to check with local photographers whether or not that is the reason why almost every young lady's photo now-a-days is a victim of, or is subject to Photoshop. Then again with the convenient Photoshop cure, the young ladies may no longer need to take their beauty and health seriously, because they much prefer the look of the digitized skin. I believe that somewhere on planet Earth there are young ladies who still hold true to the traditions of beauty and health to derive the ultimate experience from their modeling and photography.
I think I will get a Tee shirt that says " smile ... you are on this camera" to wear when walking about ... but somehow, I don't feel that it will work, but I have to try something.
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