Smiling at Machines

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Priceless. Baby Archie looking at Prince Harry, his father.

Kids love the camera. That’s why we spoil it with the instruction: SMILE. They move their lips to show teeth, but it’s not the same sunlit smile that emerges when sisters come home from school.

A smile is personal, confidential and copyrighted. It is circumstantial. That’s why we cry through our smiles. Very strange, but that’s how nature works. Not kids. Tears are for problems period. Most smiles are found at home, but we miss them because we want to be somewhere else exciting, where there are cameras, galore.

Smiling at machines changes the mechanics. The smile is for the destination. The camera will transport it to the whole world, but we smile for friends and enemies, for how they’ll interpret the smile. Cameramen know our intention that’s why they issue instructions. Turn left. Turn right. Give her a kiss. Famous people will never admit it, but the longer the photo shoot, the less fun it becomes. It becomes work, because smiles are not meant to be engineered. Come to think of it, sometimes, it is a condition for employment. Actresses must project a certain image for work to keep coming. Yes, it only happens to women. Men don’t show a single tooth in public events. It’s called suave. It oozes confidence.

Smiling at machines removes a very important component. Reception. Kids, small as they are ‘pose’ and try to smile. It comes out wooden because there is no recipient on the other side. A smile is a smile because it is received by someone, a live human being. That’s why kids cry when it is rejected because we are on our phones.

“Daddy’s busy. Go out and play.” Daddy prefers the smile of the woman, that is smiling at daddy, through the camera.

Nonqaba waka Msimang

Executive Blogger 

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