Video calls compress your image, flatten your colors, and apply automatic brightness adjustments that wash out subtle eye colors. A lens that looks striking across a conference table can look barely visible on a Zoom screen. Here is how to adapt.
Choose Lenses One Shade Lighter Than Your Real-Life Preference
Laptop webcams apply automatic exposure correction that brightens your entire face, including your eyes. A subtle grey lens that looks sophisticated in person may be brightened into near-invisibility on camera. Choose a lens one shade lighter or more saturated than you would pick for in-person wear. Grey becomes light grey. Hazel becomes honey. Blue becomes visible blue rather than a question mark.
Lighting Is Everything on Camera
Position a light source — a window, a ring light, a desk lamp — directly in front of your face, not overhead. Overhead lighting creates shadows in your eye sockets that hide your lens color. Front-facing light illuminates your iris and renders the lens color accurately. A thirty-dollar ring light positioned behind your laptop makes a bigger difference to how your lenses look on camera than any lens color choice.
Frame Your Eyes Prominently
Position your camera at eye level or slightly above. A camera angled upward from below your face emphasizes your chin and hides your eyes. A camera at eye level puts your iris front and center. Sit close enough to the camera that your eyes are visible in the frame — not just your face in general, but your eyes specifically. At standard video call distance, colored contacts need to be within two to three feet of a typical laptop webcam to register clearly.
Our Berry Grey and Nova Blue are the most camera-friendly lenses in Yilala’s lineup because of their high light reflectivity. Browse lenses for the screen.