Pandemic made a huge impact on everyone’s life. It changed almost everything — how we value life, how we take care of ourselves, our everyday routine, and almost everything about our work. When the pandemic started, a lot has moved to work from home scenario — everything is online including meetings.
One of the applications that raised into popularity when the new normal started is Zoom. It is a platform that allows you to conduct virtual meetings, conferences, webinars, live-chat, screen sharing — basically, a tool to communicate with people.
Most of the offices opted to use this platform to do virtual meetings, even schools started using this application for online classes since we became restricted to go out and be with people. With that, it also created some problems among the users including zoom fatigue, and the lack of actual human interaction that can easily cause burnout.
This has also become a big adjustment for people who are not used to seeing themselves on camera — some are just not used to it, and some are not confident enough about how they look on camera. Now, in this post, we aim to help those who aren’t confident enough to build more of their self-esteem by sharing some tips on how you can look better on zoom.
Find good lighting
This may seem not important and people often take this for granted. However, lighting is the key to having a better result on camera. You will really see a big difference when you have proper lighting and when you don’t.
There are several lighting available online — like for instance, a ring light. This is often used by photographers, but now, it has become more popular because of video bloggers who use a ring light when they are shooting their content. You can buy a ring light online if you feel like your home doesn’t have great lighting. But if you have available natural light at home, then it is better. Natural light is always better. The only problem with it is that it changes depending on the sun, of course. So, it is best to find a spot in your house where the lighting is consistent.
Put on some makeup
Working from home does not mean that we will forget about fixing ourselves. Most especially when we virtual meetings. We still need to look put together even when we are in the comfort of our homes.
Putting some color on your face will be really helpful in looking much better on Zoom calls. For the reason that your face will be wash out by the brightness of your lighting — especially when it’s an artificial light. You don’t need to put on full-face makeup, you can just enhance your features. You can put on some light eyeshadow, or just put mascara on your lashes to define your eyes. Then put on some blush, and lipstick then you are good to go.
Find a good camera angle
There are times that our face may look bigger or rounder when we are on virtual meetings, and sometimes it’s just because our cameras are not on the angle where it’s flattering on our face.
A lower angle is not usually ideal because it would just enhance our chin area — and we don’t want our double chins to show off. The ideal angle would be a camera is pointing straight to your face, in that way your features would be enhanced. However, for someone like me who has a rounder face, the best angle for me would be slightly higher than my face. It’s better for my features because my face would look slimmer and will surely not have my double chins showing off.
Find a good background
You wouldn’t want your background to be distracting because it’s not going to be good for meetings. However, you also have to make sure that your background is nice and won’t give anyone an eyesore. A messy background is distracting, so is a background that has a lot going on.
Many people opted to use a plain white background because it is easier to look at. However, this may also come off as boring. What you can do is find a spot in your house where you can find a wall that has neutral colors on it aside from white. Or you can opt for a more natural background like having plants and flowers. Avoid those spots that have a lot of things going on or walls that have distractive patterns. Go for a simple yet classy look — that never goes out of style.
In the end, you only have to be confident
With everything that is going on in the world right now, as we are in the midst of a pandemic, we really have to learn how to adjust to the new normal that we have gotten into. The work-from-home scenario is new for almost everyone. And even though it’s been a year already since the pandemic started, some of us are still not used to the kind of setup that we now have. Some are still in the adjustment period, some are already dealing with different technical problems.
Hopefully, with these four tips, your work from home experience would be a lot better. Remember that these are only tips that might help you. Looking better and knowing that you are already good-looking is still something that only you can help yourself with. Be confident with your own skin. Remember, even without these tips, you are beautiful.
