UNFILTERED

In my previous post I gave quite a broad overview of what it is to be a model. I thought for my second post I would go a bit more personal, a bit more relatable.

 

 

So I mentioned previously how models take the most amazing photos, but to be honest taking beautiful photos has become quite a trend. Social media has given us a platform to showcase our lives in a way that is so appealing, even when it’s not.

Let’s be real for a moment. Everyone knows that social media is a small window into our lives. It’s a small window into each others’ worlds that really doesn’t cover the reality of it. Social media has made a platform to showcase a perfect lifestyle, which nobody can possibly have. Yes you can travel the world and see beautiful places, have the adventure of a life time and be around beautiful people. But reality is we don’t always enjoy the experience, we don’t always look that amazing and we definitely don’t always get that photo with over a 1000 likes the first try or without filtering, editing or enhancing the image until it looks too good to be true (which it probably is).

I know this is probably not the first time you read about this. And maybe you are thinking ‘ok I get it, not another preach please.’ But I have just realized in the past couple of months how much of an influence social media has on people and our own lives. Sometimes we don’t even realize.

How often do we go on social media with a specific goal in mind?

It becomes a habit to just ‘quickly’ go on and scroll. Maybe check out funny videos if they pop up, maybe you see a friend or acquaintance that got engaged or married or having a baby, you go check out their profile to see how it happened, then you start judging or comparing your life situation. Maybe you see that person that is travelling on holiday again. You like the photos maybe comment on some but actually you are thinking ‘why do they get to go there so often?’, ‘why can’t I do stuff like that’… Maybe you compare your life and wonder why they have something you don’t. Whatever it is we have all judged or compared our lives or ourselves with someone that we follow on social media. It sucks to admit it but I definitely have and it made me feel less than or ungrateful for what I do have, most of the time without even realizing.

Let’s step it up a notch. Let’s go fully transparent. (Surely everyone knows this but,) Almost every photo that gets posted on your page wasn’t a one shot wonder. You took your phone or camera and you tried to get the best light, perfect background, changed your face or body angle like at least 50 times. Then after you think you have gotten the shot, you go through the images and if you’re not happy you’ll redo the previous steps. Once you have gotten the photo you feel will speak most to your audience, you open up your photo editing app/ apps and start doing that magic to make the photo look absolutely perfect, but still natural of course. Then you get the perfect caption for the image (which also takes up to 10mins sometimes) and finally you post it. Then the game only actually begins… Ok, so I know there are people that really don’t care for this and that’s amazing, good on you. But for most of us, we all know we care about the ‘likes’. We care about those little numbers at the bottom of our images to say whether what we have put out there is actually accepted by the public. And if you don’t get as many or more likes on your latest image you wonder what you have done wrong for people not to like it as much as the other ones.

 

 

Now let me share something really scary about the modelling world. I have met up with several international clients and agencies that ask about your Instagram profile. They want to know how many followers you have and how many likes you generally get on your photos. If you have less than 10k followers they’re not interested, or they don’t see you as an asset to their brand or company. And the so called ‘instagram-model’ is becoming more and more popular in the advertising industry because brands are looking for people with ‘influence’ (a big following) to represent their brands. If you are a model with not such a big following your opportunity for work is getting less and less as social media is making more of an impact on people. This has pushed people and models to buy a following so that they can still keep their platform. And even though it’s fake they are giving the clients and public what they want. Don’t get me wrong, I am definitely not saying that everyone with a big following has bought it, but I do know that it is a reality and there are people that feel like it’s necessary to buy their following in order to make it in this industry.

I am not saying social media is a bad thing, but I do know people get caught up in it sometimes, and they allow it run their reality. People start chasing a lifestyle that is unreachable, and they compare everything about themselves and their life to what they see through the small social media window.

 

 

About a year or two ago I started realizing how ‘important’ it is in my job as a model to have a big following and that the photos I post can’t just be random, they have to showcase my ‘brand’, not that I think I have one (monkey covering eyes emoji). But once my mind was opened to that I started looking at other models’ profiles, seeing how many followers they have and looking at their pages to see what I should do differently. I started posting photos trying to structure my page in a way that looks professional and showcase my work and who I am. I started realizing on certain images I got more likes and my following started growing a bit. If you follow me on instagram you would know that I don’t have a big following, so when I started comparing my page to other models I started questioning if I am actually good at my job.

 ‘Maybe I am not as good as I thought’ ,‘Maybe I am not a pretty as her’ , ‘Her body is obviously way better than mine, that’s why she has so many likes’.

I started seeing myself as fat. I started looking at myself and just seeing everything I would like to change about my face and body. I would look at fitness videos and start training more like that and when I couldn’t do what they showed or I struggled to finish the exercise I would think to myself that is probably the reason why my body doesn’t look like hers because I can’t even do this, I can’t push myself like she can.

I know this is super vulnerable and open. But I know for a fact everyone has gone through a stage similar to this or you might be in it right now. So I’ll just say it straight… Comparison is a B… It’s a lie that will keep stealing your joy and contentment, but only if you allow it to. I think we forget sometimes that the social media platform only captures a small part of someone’s life. We forget that our value isn’t attached to the amount of followers or likes we have. We forget that we don’t need other people’s approval to be successful.

Coming to the end of this year I have realized once again how important it is to just be still sometimes. We constantly want to share and be connected, so much so that it’s becoming ok to sit around the dinner table or out with a friend for coffee constantly on your phone. I have been on so many shoots where I can’t even speak to my co-model because he/she runs to their phone the minute they don’t need to be on set anymore. It’s becoming more and more impossible to actually build a normal friendship with someone because we are constantly in our own bubble. We would rather spend more time trying to take the perfect photo than actually enjoy the event or experience.

I know it’s great to capture memories. But it should be better making them and just being in those moments. I am not saying never to take any photos because let’s be real going back to those oldies can make one cry-laugh sometimes. But maybe we should try to be more aware of what we have without looking through the screen of a phone/camera. Maybe you are sometimes placed in an awkward situation because that is your opportunity to make a new friend or build your character in some way, or maybe just have a moment to yourself where you can observe people or nature or whatever. I know the festive season has ‘please take a photo’ written all over it. But let’s try to still be present and connect face to face with friends and family as much as we can. Maybe take a few snaps and then put your ibaby/android-baby away. It will survive not seeing your face for a few hours.

 

 

Photos : Scout Cashmere   https://www.scoutcashmere.com/

https://www.instagram.com/scoutcashmere/

Jeff Bergen  https://www.instagram.com/jeffbergen/