An Old, Old Trick

[poliphilo]

Press photographers are routinely accommodated immediately below the podia from which politicians deliver their speeches- and have no option but to look up- as if in adoration- and produce pictures that make their subjects look dominant and commanding. It's an old, old trick; they- and we- are being manipulated- and it irks me that picture editors persist in going along with it.

There's a typical podium picture in this morning's Guardian- which, if one didn't know better, would lead one to think that the increasingly frail and flummoxed Joe Biden was made of granite.

Comments

[shewhomust]

Why, then, does being photographed from this angle simply give me a double chin? (or, if you will, emphasise the dounle chin I actually have)?

[poliphilo]

I guess you have to co-operate with the camera. If you're deeply into a political oration with arm flung wide and a visionary expression on your face people aren't going to notice the double chin.