There are some people who are only their most attractive when animated. It’s the movement of the face and features, the expressions, the flash of the eyes–a photo rarely captures that. But once in a while you’re going to get a good one, so I’d have a problem believing she has no good photos. So either she has self-esteem issues, or else she’s so camera-phobic from prior bad photos that she doesn’t even let someone try to take a photo now.
Absolutely but I would think she would send the best one she had and warn you that she looks better in person. I am not photogenic. It isn’t just that I don’t take a good picture, photographs do not look much like me for some reason. Of course I have heard often enough in the on line dating world…*you look NOTHING like your picture… * to know that it isn’t simply my vanity that thinks this.
I would simply ask her to send the best one she has and be suspicious if she refuses even that. Maybe she intends to dazzle you with her personality and wants to have the chance to do that which a photo might prohibit.
It is tough out there.
I could be the poster child of insecurity. Yet I can still manage to find a good enough picture of myself to show online. I agree that a camera likes certain people more than others but not to the extent of being unable to find a decent picture of yourself.
Huge red flag for me.
I think I’m average looking. The last good photograph I was in was taken 10 years ago. I’ve been told that in real life, I don’t look anywhere near as ugly as I do in photographs, but the people who tell me that are likely to lie to me about such things.
I also tend to avoid cameras because I look really awful in pictures and have no desire to have pictures of ugly things.
Finding a picture to put online is difficult, I can put up hideous but recent or ok but so old that it’s no longer relevant.
I say cut your losses and move on. Since she won’t send you a photo she is either a) ugly or b) weirdly self-conscious either of which is a dealbreaker.
Even if she’s hot but not photogenic, do you really want everyone on Facebook thinking you are dating an ugly chick?
I wouldn’t waste any more time. Pictures are part of the process (or so I hear) and if a person doesn’t want to share a photo, what is the person-to-person meeting going to be like?
I’ve gotta echo and give jazz hands (by god that will catch on one day) to everyone that is saying “insecure.”
Do this: take a day and set your watch for every 90 minutes to take a break from whatever you are doing and saying to random girls “no honey I swear I think you are pretty. those pants do not make you look fat. yes, I promise I love you.” If that works for you, then go ahead and take this girl on a date with hopes of a long term relationship.
I gotta toss this out. Have you considered that the reason she doesn’t want to post a photo is because she is married and doesn’t want to be seen online? :eek:
Then one of those random girls will be a Doper and come on here posting about the random dude who told her he loved her.
See her if you’re interested in what she has to say. Attraction is about so much more than just being photogenic. It’s about the way she moves, her gestures, the way her hair falls across her eyes when she laughs and that cute unconscious way she brushes it away. It’s about the perfectly-balanced finger-tip pressure she uses when her hand is on yours when you’re talking across a table…
OK - overly poetic but I had a date with a very neat woman during this last dating phase. Her pictures didn’t do much for her - she photographed in a “severe” way, if you know what I mean. She was much prettier & attractive in person.
My own wife doesn’t pose well - usually she comes across kinda plastic in a photo if she knows it’s coming. (She’s got the same fixed smile, blank eyes, and head tilt in almost all the posed shots for our wedding.) Our candids & engagement photos (where we played a laughed a lot more) are much better.
Some people don’t photograph well but are lovely in person.
Well, I *was * getting my hopes up about that. I figured with no location listed for the OP I at least had a shot…
Yes, a person can be quite attractive and be terribly unphotogenic. I can’t say this without sounding vain, but I have always been very pretty, some have even said beautiful. (I"m 48 and overweight now, so perhaps I’m less attractive than I used to be.) I have taken maybe five halfway decent pictures in my entire adult life.
However, if I met someone online, I’d grin, bear it, and send the least objectionable picture I could. So, yes it sounds fishy.
But go on the date anyway. You may be pleasantly surprised. If not, you can always just say that the chemistry just wasn’t there for you in person.
She’s HUGE.
I’ve had more than one person tell me that I’m prettier IRL that I am in photos (and not because they were hitting on me, just because they thought I was) that I’m confident that some people just don’t photograph that well.
However, I always manage to come up with some sort of photo so that does seem sort of odd.
I guess it’s only dinner or coffee though - if you go and she’s just not your cup of tea you’re not obligated to marry he…erm…(checks location) to marry her or anything.
It seems more likely to me that she’s attractive but insecure or attractive but not photogenic than unattractive. An “unattractive” person often seems to know it and not be ashamed of it–how dare they!
In my opinion, photogenic has to do with “personality” coming through in pictures. I don’t know exactly how to explain it, but some people seem to exude more than their physical self in photographs.
Definitely, though I see more of the opposite (plain-looking people who look dead sexy on film or in photographs). Still, Photoshop and unflattering candids aside, a photo can only be so different from reality.
Also, I only ever look good in photos taken without flash, and only if I take off my glasses and dip one shoulder down. Then I look okay.
I hate to say this about my ex-wife, but she was gorgeous in person and terrible in a photo. I think a proper photo from a proper photographer would have shown her off better, but she never had a good one to show off.
Yes, I have a friend who is impossibly handsome in person and looks OK, but not up to his true beauty, in photos.