ERAS Photo / Hairstyles

[NewYorkDoctors]

Hello

My school wishes to upload a professionally done photograph of mine from a year ago. At that that I had long hair.

I am a male btw

Not long long. Not even shoulder length. 4 inch hair at best which I kept neatly trimmed on the sides and gelled back.

Currently I have short hair. Not short short but like around 1 inch of hair.

On close inspection both hairstyles are different, but the overall contour of my head remains the same.


Would it be fatal if I used the older photo and came in with a different hairstyle? (Keep in mind these are not drastically different hair styles)

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[aa1984]

That's cute.

 

[NotAProgDirector]

No one will care about this. At all.

 

[NewYorkDoctors]

oh good.

Because a fellow student (shark, no less) insisted this would be a fatal flaw.

Come to think of it, this student was the one who said I should cut my hair...


Though I ultimately cut my hair for other reasons...


the irony....


Close thread please.

 

[shan564]

On a similar note, does it matter if you're wearing a nice jacket in your picture? I know it's a minor point, but I'm on a remote placement right now and I don't have a jacket or sport coat here with me...

 

[NotAProgDirector]

Most pics are headshots -- i.e. neck up. You can hardly tell what someone is wearing.

Just make it professional appearing.

I have seen some apps with an "interesting" picture. That can work well too. One guy last year submitted a picture taken when he was hiking somewhere. It became a topic of discussion at his interview, in a good way.

Some photos look like they were taken with an iPhone with the background being your bathroom wall. That's not a good idea.

All in all, this is a very MINOR part of your application. The major purpose of the picture is so we can recognize you when you arrive for your interview.

 

[shan564]

I just thought of another really silly question.

Feel free to ignore it if you think it's dumb enough to not even warrant a response.

For most of my adult life, I've had some form of facial hair (usually a light/trim goatee). I've read in various places that you should be clean-shaven for you interviews, which is fine with me (although I'm sure it's probably not as big of a concern in psychiatry, which is where I'll be applying). But I've already taken the photo that I was planning to use for ERAS, which includes the goatee. Should I re-take the picture, just in case they say "I don't remember interviewing a brown guy with facial hair," or just trust that the interviewers will remember me well enough to actually recognize my face? I assume that they probably see a lot of generic average-looking guys of South Asian descent, so I want to make sure that my face doesn't get lost in the mix.

 

[NotAProgDirector]

I don't see a problem in interviewing with facial hair, as long as it's reasonably tasteful (which I understand is a very subjective measure). Long, unkempt, or weird facial hair is best avoided.

But, that's one person's opinion.

Regardless, no one will care if your facial hair in your pic is gone.

 

[Siverhideo1985]

Do you guys think I'll be ok with my facial hair like this?

 

[shan564]

If I were a PD, I'd give that guy a pre-match offer.

 

[gutonc]

Do you guys think I'll be ok with my facial hair like this?

I can actually think of at least two programs where I interviewed where you might be offered the job of Asst. PD right away.

 

[emboli]

Most pics are headshots -- i.e. neck up. You can hardly tell what someone is wearing.

Just make it professional appearing.

I have seen some apps with an "interesting" picture. That can work well too. One guy last year submitted a picture taken when he was hiking somewhere. It became a topic of discussion at his interview, in a good way.

Some photos look like they were taken with an iPhone with the background being your bathroom wall. That's not a good idea.

All in all, this is a very MINOR part of your application. The major purpose of the picture is so we can recognize you when you arrive for your interview.

iPhone cameras can take surprising high quality pictures. What if I did that with a nice gray wall as the background? I'm dressed up with shirt and tie chest up.

 

[Dissected]

iPhone cameras can take surprising high quality pictures. What if I did that with a nice gray wall as the background? I'm dressed up with shirt and tie chest up.

Post it. Anonymous SDN users will be the judge.

 

[bakanoisha]

Why don't you just take a new picture? Your average iPhone can give a decent photo to meet their 300px x 300 px guideline.

 

[Doctor Bagel]

One thing to worry about with your photo -- it might follow you around after you match. My program has a composite with all those photos for my class that they sent out to each place where we rotate as kind of a "get to know these people" type of deal. Not a huge deal but there.

 

[thecampuslegend]

I had talked to a few residents during my Sub-I and they had told me that it would be smart to have a professional head shot done. I hadn't even thought about looking into getting a new picture taken. I called my school to see what they were currently using as my picture and it turns out they were using this photo they took of us on the 11th day of medical school....meaning i was unshaven with messed up hair in the photo. I freaked out and started calling around for headshots and it turns out they are actually pretty expensive. Sears said the CD with my photo would cost $50 and then wallet sizes would be an additional $6. This was pretty much the average cost at multiple places.

I decided that was way too expensive. I had other friends who said that a passport photo would suffice, which was only like $8. Long story short, that didn't work for me either.

Last resort, I wore my suit, stood in front of a cream colored wall and had my girlfriend take a picture of me with my Sony Camera. I took the digital disk to a walmart to get wallet sized photos printed and the guy at the counter said he wouldn't print them off for me because "they were professional photos and copyrighted." After 5 minutes of telling him that my gf took the pictures, he finally said okay. It was a very weird experience. Anyways, the moral of the story is that a .40 cent wallet picture that is properly cropped and finished will equal a $50 headshot by a professional.

I don't know if i would necessarily go the iphone route, but honestly, as long as you look like a clean human being and meet all the requirements for the photo, you wont lose an interview offer.

 

[duckie99]

Anyways, the moral of the story is that a .40 cent wallet picture that is properly cropped and finished will equal a $50 headshot by a professional.

uh... no it does not. Professional photos are much higher quality with both lighting and picture quality. On mine I have never seen so many pixels in a camera photo. That being said, is it worth spending $50 for a photo you will use once? probably not as for the low quality residency apps photos likely any nice looking headshot will be OK.

 

[repsbrah]

take a picture at home next to any colored wall, make sure it is a clear and level face shot (using a tripod helps). load that picture into photoshop. crop as required. lasso around your face/body, erase using a soft brush so that you erase the wall color. finally, adjust levels as desired....and fix up any blemishes on that beautiful face of yours 😉

took me 15 mins total, cost nothing 🙂 hell you could do most of this in MS PAINT

 

[Law2Doc]

One thing to worry about with your photo -- it might follow you around after you match. My program has a composite with all those photos for my class....

yep. Particularly if they ask for it to be submitted digitally. I've seen folks well into residency stuck with these photos on the photo IDs they have to wear around the hospital, seen such photos put up on the department website, and on composites that continue to be circulated around the department year after year. You'd better love the photo or lose it because you will be stuck with it.

 

[kjamess]

take a picture at home next to any colored wall, make sure it is a clear and level face shot (using a tripod helps). load that picture into photoshop. crop as required. lasso around your face/body, erase using a soft brush so that you erase the wall color. finally, adjust levels as desired....and fix up any blemishes on that beautiful face of yours 😉

took me 15 mins total, cost nothing 🙂 hell you could do most of this in MS PAINT

thank you. I did the exact same thing. People who saw my photo asked how much it costed me to get a 'professional photo'.