ing.” When you smile at a person, they smile back, and when you
frown at a person, they immediately frown back. People will mirror
the expression that you, as the photographer, have on your face.
Our attitudes and outlooks on life set our expressions, and
sometimes this gets in the way of making our clients look their best.
We had one photographer with us a few years back who smiled all
the time. He was great at getting clients to smile, but he would frus-
trate clients when it came to creating nonsmiling poses. He would
tell the client to have a relaxed expression (nonsmiling), while he
still had a huge grin on his face. Many clients would get mad and ask
how they were supposed to be serious while they were looking at his
big goofy smile.
A photographer we had before that couldn’t smile to save his
life. He would look at the client with a deadpan expression and, with
a monotone voice, say, “Okay, smile big now.” As you can imagine,
the clients’ expressions suffered as a result.
Mirroring isn’t just about visual cues like your expression, it also
involves the way you speak. When you are looking at the client with
SIX THINGS YOU SHOULD NEVER DO 21Subjects will mirror your expression, so if you want a natural smile on your client’s face, you need
to have one on yours.