Selfie Style

I am my own photographer.  Most of the time I’m not holding my phone inches away from my face to capture myself at the perfect angle, but in a way I’m perpetuating selfie culture - a culture I once derided as self-absorbed and vacuous - by not calling on other photographers to do most of my social media shoots.  I like having complete creative control over the content I post and how I style each shoot.  Having a full-time job also makes it difficult to schedule shoots - it’s something I don’t even think about because I have the only camera and photo editing tools I need in my own hands.

Selfie naysayers point to bands of narcissists whose shameless self-promotion has earned them legions of fans.  In a weird way, selfie culture is a direct descendent of the D.I.Y. ethos.  Creativity is now democratized and with a few good outfits and editing tools, we’re each on our way to becoming the next social media superstar.

Mark Cho of The Armoury brings a strong selfie game thanks to his superb outfits.

At our core, we’re all a tad narcissistic anyway, in our highest moments at least.  Many people like looking at photos or reflections of themselves.  Some do get carried away with it, but a healthy dose of selfie shots never hurt.  For some it’s their introduction to photography; learning how to compose a photo of yourself makes shooting scenes, objects and people much easier.  For others it’s a way to make an impact in a world where they are digitally connected but isolated in everyday life.  The communities we form through social media reinforce these images with likes and positive comments and provide an ego boost that’s otherwise missing for some.

Does propping an iPhone against a flat surface and shooting a series of photos count as a selfie?  I think of it more as portrait photography, but in the truest essence of the word, yes.  Does that make me a narcissist?  No, it means I want to create something in a convenient manner and that I can share with the world soon after it’s shot.  There is something brilliant in capturing the ordinary moments in everyday life and making them look extraordinary, and to think of a selfie as an entry in a visual diary gives more power to its creator and treats them as an artist working in the most modern medium of self-expression.