Why do I look so different in pictures than I do in person or in the mirror?

Anonymous
Well, for some reason, I always look fatter or my face looks different or straight out weird in pictures, but in the mirror or in person, I look a lot better. I know I'm not the only one who sees this difference, because I've been told a lot of times by people who met me after having first seen my pictures that I'm way prettier in person and that my pictures don't do me any justice. Even when my close friends take my picture, they always say that I never photograph well and they don't get how I look the way I do in person and yet take such bad pictures. They say even in the pictures that I take myself (which look much better than when other people take them), I still look slightly different in them (example: my nose looks a little wider than it does in person, or I'm slightly washed out looking...). I've also been told by people that I look the same way to them as I do in the mirror, and I noticed the same thing with a lot of people as well, so I don't really get the whole "the mirror is a reversed image of yourself" thing "and it's different from how people see you". So what gives? O.o
Why do I look so different in pictures than I do in person or in the mirror?
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