News Flash: The Duck Face Has Been Replaced by the Fish Gape

What a time to be alive.

By Chelsea Peng

Oct 1, 2015

Lip, Cheek, Brown, Hairstyle, Skin, Chin, Forehead, Eyebrow, Eyelash, Style,

Getty, design by Katja Cho

Now that social media is no longer about sharing your authentic personality and experiences with people who authentically care about you, anybody can be a model starring in her own nonstop editorial. To deepen the illusion that life is just one big fashion spread, we've been trained to 1) smize, 2) duck face, 3) squinch, and now, 4) fish gape.

Following the Suzuki method, first, we shall observe the pros so we know what to copy.

Hair, Lip, Hairstyle, Skin, Chin, Shoulder, Eyebrow, Eyelash, Style, Eye shadow,

*the world's salmon population weeps, overcome by J.Lo's beauty*

Getty

Clothing, Hair, Lip, Hairstyle, Shoulder, Eyelash, Style, Beauty, Fashion model, Fashion,

*walleyed pikes bow down to Gigi Hadid*

Getty

Clothing, Hair, Face, Nose, Ear, Mouth, Lip, Cheek, Hairstyle, Chin,

*random fishes everywhere rejoice bc Keira Knightley*

Getty

Half derpy, half the expression one makes when examining an establishment's Seamless menu, the fish gape, as the Daily Mail has anointed it, is the Megazord of photo poses because it combines all its predecessors into one extra-flattering Super Face commonly seen in magazines that come with perfume samples. (More precisely, it is like the yellow Power Ranger because it refers specifically to the parted lips, but you can only give yourself the full RHW treatment, analyzed below, if your eyes and neck are in on the action.)

Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, a study in fish-gaping

Lip, Hairstyle, Skin, Chin, Eyelash, Eyebrow, Chest, Style, Beauty, Fashion accessory,

Getty, design by Katja Cho

Most of us would be Instagramming the living daylights out of a #selfie that turned out 40 percent as well as this, but duck face is dead, and RHW can do even better.

Nose, Lip, Hairstyle, Skin, Chin, Eyebrow, Eyelash, Style, Beauty, Amber,

Getty, design by Katja Cho

It's like a switch flipped, right? Here, she's added parted lips, slightly sucked-in cheeks, and a subtle chin tilt on top of her master squinch.

All it takes is some practice positioning your tongue against the back of your teeth/the roof of your mouth to get the proper slimming effect. Watch out, Rosie. We're gunning for you.