Look better with camera tricks

Mon, 3 June 2013 - Sheylara 12 Comments

I have been feeling particularly ugly for a year or so now, what with my stupid hair being stupid and my skin feeling saggy because I’ve had to stop taking collagen supplements since moving to the UK (because they don’t have Meiji and Fancl here).

(Disclaimer: I don’t know that collagen supplements really work but I had taken them for years and felt okay about myself. Since coming to the UK, I have felt progressively older and uglier, although it could be due to the air being very dry here, or it could be just plain old aging, so I don’t know, lol.)

Women and beauty supplements

Last Saturday evening, while Piers and I were at a pub waiting for his friends to arrive, I decided to play around with my camera because I suddenly remembered it has a Soft Skin mode to “shoot more beautiful skin”.

Piers had bought me a Sony Cyber-shot (DSC-WX80) a few months ago to replace my iPhone camera (yes, I had been using my iPhone camera for nearly two years because my Lumix had sensor dust in it and I never got around to sending it back).

Sony DSC-WX80

I chose this model out of all the cameras in the store based on the merits of its compactness and pretty white looks, which shows how serious I am about photography.

So, while Piers was sipping his beer, and I was ignoring my Pimm’s cocktail in favour of camwhoring, I turned on Soft Skin mode, took a self-portrait and looked at the playback display.

Soft Skin mode

“Wow!” I said, “The soft skin mode has made me pretty again!”

I showed Piers the photo and he looked at me quizzically. “Hon, you look exactly like that in real life.”

I said, “No, no, the camera has smoothened out my face so I look much better!”

Piers rolled his eyes and said, “I think you have face dysmorphia.”

Yeah, sure, whatever.

The face of a person with face dysmorphia

I think Piers is quite blind. He can’t even tell whether I’ve got makeup on or not most of the time, which might make one think that he is just being sweet, trying to throw in a subtle compliment, but I think the truth is that he is genuinely blind.

I did look better on the camera playback because of the soft focus effect and the fact that playbacks are small in size (and I tend to look better when you can hardly see me).

I don’t think the photos look so nice after viewing them on my computer now. But they’re still better than usual.

I prefer my old Lumix’s beautiful skin mode though. Instead of making it a soft focus effect, it has some kind of special flash to make your skin glow. Kinda like this:

Glowy skin effect

Anyway, I made Piers take more photos of me before his friends finally arrived and I quite liked them. Maybe it was just a good day.

I usually have to take a hundred photos before I’m satisfied with one, but that day, I only had to take about 20 before I could find one I liked.

Haha.

One more for the road

The next day, I experimented some more. I tried Soft Skin mode and Background Defocus and couldn’t decide which I liked more.

Soft Skin:

Soft skin

Background Defocus:

Background defocus

So, basically, soft skin blurs out your face while background defocus blurs everything but. Lol, stupid camera tricks, although I have to admit it’s handy and saves you from having to photoshop your photos.

Well, okay, I definitely look better with Soft Skin cos who doesn’t? But background defocus photos look more professional so I like them better, even if they make me look ugly.

Anyway, I quickly got tired of looking at my stupid face so I stopped taking photos of myself. I was at Piers’ parents’ house for a barbeque to take advantage of the rare warm and sunny day and there were dogs and a baby, which were much better (although harder) subjects to photograph. But I will leave that for another day.

I will do more “camera experiments” (which are in fact nothing more than vanity posts in disguise) in the future so keep coming back and keep reading!

In the meantime, allow me to leave you with some sage advice:

Do not believe every photo you see on the Internet! Between makeup and camera tricks and photoshop, no one is what they look like anymore. So, caveat emptor and have a nice week!

8 Ways To Spot A Camwhore

Mon, 27 July 2009 - Sheylara 7 Comments

For the sake of simplicity, in this entry, I refer to “camwhores” as females but would like to state for the record that males can camwhore, too.

Now, camwhoring has evolved over the years to become the latest rage. There are many kinds of camwhores but they all have one purpose: To attract attention, mainly of the opposite gender.

In fact, camwhoring has evolved so that anyone can be a camwhore, anytime, anywhere. But can you recognise a camwhore when you see one? Read my guide and learn.

Camwhoring is fun

Sun, 23 November 2008Sat, 12 December 2009 - Sheylara 12 Comments

By camwhoring — and I have to explain since this word has been distorted beyond recognition — I mean taking photos of yourself yourself.

Like so.

It’s fun because you never know what’s going to develop in the photo.

For instance, you don’t normally expect a monkey to trespass your frame and make funny faces behind you.

Try camwhoring today.

Especially if you have bored and nutty friends.

Camwhoring in pajamas

Tue, 18 March 2008Wed, 9 December 2009 - Sheylara 27 Comments

There are now a zillion posts on the net about the Nuffnang Pajama Party, so there’s not much point in writing yet another one. But I did promise more posts about it, so I’m in kind of a dilemma now. Heh.

So my solution, of course, is to post camwhore pictures. I think that’s the number one blogger strategy, although no one will admit it.

Blogger Trick #1: “When in doubt, camwhore.”

Ok, pictures! LOADS OF PICTURES!!

Sheylara in Pajamas 1

Sheylara in Pajamas 2

Sheylara in Pajamas 3

Sheylara in Pajamas 4

Sheylara in Pajamas 5

Sheylara in Pajamas 6

Sheylara in Pajamas 7

You know, I don’t want to make this just about me, so here are more camwhoring pictures… with other people! *lol*

Sheylara and Estee
Me and Estee.

Ming and Sheylara
Me and Ming.

Sheylara and Nadnut
Me and Nadnut.

Jayden and Sheylara
Me and Jayden.

While I’m at it, I might as well show you more pictures of more other people!

The following photos were taken by the official Nuffnang Pajama Party photographer, which is why his watermark is on all the photos.

Dawn Yang and Xiaxue.

Dawn Yang and Cosplay Nuffies.

Japanese Schoolgirl and Nurse.

Malaysian Dreamgirls.

Japanese Schoolgirl, Policewoman, French Maid and Nurse.

Dawn Yang kissing a lucky startled blogger.

A whole bunch of people.

ALRIGHT!

I’m sure you’re all terribly tired of hearing about the pajama party already. So I will talk about something else tomorrow. Haha. What do you want to read first? A food post or a review of the new LG KS20?

Bloggers and models at LG KS20 launch

Fri, 14 March 2008Wed, 9 December 2009 - Sheylara 21 Comments

I love hanging out with bloggers because they do the most insane things.

Last night, the Most Insane Award went to Rinaz for performing the insane feat of conversing with herself over the phone.

(Incidentally, Rinaz also won an award I gave out last year, the Ping.sg Slackiest Latecomer Award. She’s a sly one, sweeping all my awards!)

A bunch of bloggers had been invited by Princess Sabrina to the LG KS20 (which is a mobile phone, in case you’ve been living in the sewers) launch event at Corduroy Cafe (VivoCity).

So, Rinaz was testing the phone by using it to call herself, and then actually having a conversation with herself. What a silly gal!

But I like!

I also liked the free food, the pretty long-legged models, the hanging out with bloggers and, of course, the LG KS20!

But I know you guys only want to see photos of the models, so here they are.

After a yummy buffet dinner, the girls were despatched to entice guests with the mobile phone. They went from table to table and allowed us to play with them (the phones, that is) while they stood by to answer questions.

Sometimes, a model was stuck at a particular table forever. As if the phone were that fascinating.

And then the video interviews started.

First, Rinaz video interviewed Claudia (and everyone else she could hijack) for feedback on the phone.

Then, Farinelli decided to get in on the act and starting hijacking people for video interviews, too. Nic was one of his willing victims, speaking at length about his first impressions of the KS20.

DK decided to be special and modelled the phone by reprising his famous face-on-table pose.

Original face-on-table photo by DK

I didn’t get the angle correct because I couldn’t remember what the original looked like.

All the bloggers were so thrilled that they made him stay in that position forever so they could take photo after photo. But he grew weary very soon and cheated by padding his head with his hand.

We were making such a big hooha that we attracted the official event photographer (behind DK), who came to take photos of this silliness.

And then came the highlight of the night, which, most of the time, is a lucky draw. Two phones were up for grabs, a KS20 and a KF600.

Pretty Estee won the KF600! What a lucky girl! The phone isn’t even launched in Singapore yet so she’s the very first person in Singapore to own that phone.