Coaching

Most of us don’t like the way we look on camera. There are several reasons for this, and one of them is simply that the camera makes you look as if you have put on weight. This is not out of spite, it’s something the camera can’t help doing. Consider a camera’s job. What it does is take three-dimensional reality and compress it into a two-dimensional image – flattening image depth, as it were. This is why we will always look, well, broader on screen. There’s a saying in Hollywood that the camera always adds ten pounds, and sometimes even more.

The good news is that you have an ally in coping with this, and that’s the cameraman. His job is to make a camera image as realistic as possible, and that means fighting the camera’s tendency to flatten things and people. One way he does that is by looking for settings that give an image depth or by setting his lights so that your face stands out in relief. You can help him. If you are a man, always button your suit jacket. This will make the lapels converge, letting you appear thinner. A suit will usually make you look better than a blazer combination, and a necktie is yet another vertical accent that will give your image more height and less width. Ladies might want to consider wearing patterns with lengthwise stripes or lines. The inconvenient truth for both sexes, however, is that you really cannot be too thin, and this is especially so on camera.