Face under water... looking like an alien...

[Cornelia]

Hey guys... I'm swimming since a time, but I never had a cam for underwater... so... this thing arrived and I was just shocked...:jawdrop:

I swam... I was smiling... I tried to look normal... to make a beauty face... to... oh my gosh... I just look like an alien... i cant tell why... my face seems to be crushed... the dimensions seem strange... not talking about my hair (when I'm swimming it looks like a dont have any...)

Does anyone of you know what the hell I'm doing wrong? Is it a good idea to move while shooting? I just dont know... :confused:

[AniaR]

water distorts light and shape. It's normal. Try getting a little mini tripod for your camera and taking photos that way.

[Cornelia]

Hmmm... I'll look for a tripod... hope it will help... do you think makeup can help too? I didn't wear any makeup just for testing..

[AniaR]

No, I don't think it'll make a difference. If the camera is too close to you and you're holding it, the shapes will distort

[Nausicaa]

I think that everybody has this problem when they first start filming, I know that I did. It was a hard lesson to understand that NOBODY looks the same underwater that they do on dry land just because of the distortion, some people look better, and some people look like Geoffrey Rush in the third Pirates of the Caribbean movie haha, it just can't be helped, it all comes down to preparing aesthetically with makeup and other things that look good underwater, and figuring out what that is for you personally, you just have to experiment. I really don't know what it will do to you, as everyone's face is different, but I think that wearing some makeup (especially around my eyes) helped me out a lot.

Raina definitely knows what she's talking about with the distortion that occurs when light refracts through the surface of the water, I think that as a professional mermaid she knows how to go about looking good underwater than most of us lol. And she's totally right about not trying to film or take pictures of yourself, I've been trying to take a good mermaid "selfie" for a while and I'm beginning to think that it just can't be done XD

Anyway though, here's my two cents;

When you put your face underwater, especially if it's any warmer or any colder than your body temperature (And I have yet to meet a pool/lake that's 98.6 degrees on the dot haha) it's a natural reaction to squint and scrunch your face up because your body thinks it needs to protect your eyes. I've been in the water for a good long while and I still do that at first pretty much every time. I didn't realize how bad that I was doing it until I finally got my first underwater camera and saw that while I was going for "beautiful and curious" I was actually making about the same expression of a gargoyle that had to poop....

Though I clicked on it mostly out of boredom, I think that this youtube video helped me out more than anything http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Aehqhr57cKw
It got me thinking about just how wide these girls are opening their eyes, and how much it relaxes and tightens the skin on their faces which looks really nice underwater. So I started practicing "my underwater face" which is just exaggerating a "relaxed face" so I open my eyes very wide, relax my mouth and try to blink very slowly and less often.

Unfortunately, while that works great for stills, when I start moving again I do squint my eyes and look about as lovely as a bull mastiff with it's head out the window of a moving car...so I just try not to zoom in on my face when I'm filming :)

[Ariadne]

while I was going for "beautiful and curious" I was actually making about the same expression of a gargoyle that had to poop....

Okay, thank you for making me spew water all over my laptop...I haven't laughed that hard all day!

[Mermaid Kelda]

Another difficulty with looking "normal" underwater is how our natural bouyancy can change our faces. It's not as noticeable on younger faces with tighter skin, but try putting a mirror on the floor and looking directly down into it - the skin on your face will fall forwards slightly, making you look different and (usually) worse than when you're upright. A similar thing goes on underwater - gravity's not pulling your face in the ways it normally would; instead, your skin seems pudgier, especially around the eyes I've noticed.

Aside from getting botox injections before every swim, there's not much you can do about it, so learning how to hold your face and what expressions look best on you underwater is important. Try taking a mirror into the water and pulling faces in front of it, or do what Raina said and invest in a little underwater tripod. I prefer a mirror because you can see what you're doing in real-time, but maybe a combination of both would work - camera in front of your face, mirror behind it and off the the side slightly so you can watch what your face is doing and film it at the same time for easier viewing later.

[halesloveswhales]

Okay here's my problem. When I'm underwater, I get the crazy eyes! Like, the whites of my eyes are too white. What do I do?! I am thinking that I could tilt my head up some so that my eyelids are more visible? That's all I can think of though. It's creepy. I am sadly just really not good at underwater modeling yet.
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[Mermaid Kelda]

Hard to say, Hales... You could try not opening your eyes quite so wide, but that might make it look like you're squinting. Or try smiling with your lips closed, if that doesn't feel too unnatural, because dayum your teeth are blinding xD I'm so envious of your beautiful whiteness!

[Nausicaa]

You know Hales, I had kind of the same thing going on,(I mean, BAD I looked drunk and lost haha) but like I said the makeup that I use really did help me with that. I started putting some waterproof eyeliner pencil into my lash line on both the top and bottom and it really helped define where my eyeball ended and my lids began. I do it pretty heavily and I think it makes me look MUCH less....um....wasted underwater :thumbs-up:

[halesloveswhales]

Hmm okay, I'll try the eyeliner idea.
Lyric, what kind of waterproof eyeliner do you use I just don't want to go through the trial-and-error of finding good waterproof make-up!

And Melaina, yeah my smile is pretty massive! It gets pretty Demi Lovato-esque when I'm not careful. :P I actually have never learned to smile without teeth though! I tried underwater once, and it looked like this. Bad...

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[Mermaid Syrena]

Hales, you're so candid. It's lovely. :)

[Mermaid Kelda]

How good is your underwater vision? As I mentioned up above, you could take a mirror down with you and try out different facial expressions, then learn which ones look best on your face. Though, photos tend to fail to capture the same images that mirrors do, so testing with a camera or video camera would probably be a good idea too :)

[Cornelia]

Ah... now I'm happy cause I'm not the only one having problems with the well looking under water ;)

The idea with the mirror is awesome as easy... ;) thanks... I'm gonna try... hope it helps... and Melaina... the comparative with botox is brilliant... thats really how some of my pics look like...

and Hales... your eyes are very wide - thats right, but your smile is like the sun :) love it...

[Echidna]

@hales,
I'm not sure what your problem is.
You look pretty and good on both pictures.

[Nausicaa]

Hmm okay, I'll try the eyeliner idea.
Lyric, what kind of waterproof eyeliner do you use I just don't want to go through the trial-and-error of finding good waterproof make-up

I use the makeup FOREVER aqua eyes eye liner pencil in the color mat black. I've only ever found it online and it is a bit pricey, but it's well worth the cost :D

[Thalassa]

I know Raina has a tutorial for her underwater makeup on her youtube, she goes over everything she uses there.

I second Makeup Forever's Aqua line, their liquid eyeliner is AWESOME. The rest of their eye makeup is great if you wear the Aqua Seal over it, too! Their lip pencils stay on great with the addition of Mermaid Minerals' lip seal. Makeup Forever can be found in some department stores and at Sephora.

As for the alien look underwater...I get it, too. The weirdest thing is my profile shots, my face looks elongated (although that may be due to the fact that I can't keep still underwater and my photographer may have been using a long shutter). As others have suggested, practice. Find a camera, make faces and take pictures, see what works.

[Ondine]

I think also part of the issue with underwater shots is that you're not necessarily used to posing while holding your breath? I found it really helpful to practice holding my breath while smiling in the mirror and even then I totally get pictures where it's really obvious I'm holding my breath. It definitely does something to the eyes and mouth! But maybe that would help?