Closer (UK)

‘Being honest about how you look is better for people’s self-esteem’

-

Former glamour model Nicola McLean, 39, says those who airbrush their pictures to look “unrecognis­able” are “deluded”.

She tells Closer, “Retouching your pictures here and there is fine, but you have to be transparen­t about it. Until two weeks ago, my Instagram bio had a disclaimer for three years that read, ‘I’m not perfect, I like to filter my picture to make me look perfect.’ I filter all my pictures, but I don’t airbrush them or use the FaceTune app, and I’m honest about it. I had to take the disclaimer off because the rest of what I wanted to say couldn’t fit in but it’ll go back on at some point.

“Khloé looks great in her natural pictures – it’s just a bad light. I’ve been a model for 15 years and, back then, there was no retouching. I know how to pose for a picture; I know good lighting and I know my angles, so I don’t really need to retouch anything. When you’ve heavily filtered a picture, you can’t moan about it when you get caught out. It’s better to accept what you really look like. It’s not the pap’s fault; it’s not a picture that’s caught you off-guard – it’s your own fault for lying. Some people become really deluded and start to think they look like their airbrushed pictures, which is unhealthy. Being honest is better for everyone’s peace of mind and their self-esteem.

“The problem with going so extreme is that people no longer look like themselves. I like to think I look in reality how I look in a picture. I don’t want people coming up to me in the street for a selfie and saying, ‘You don’t look like that.’ You can’t moan about an unfiltered picture if you’ve filtered the s**t out of one to look unrecognis­able.”

 ??  ??

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from United Kingdom