Poses for pictures alone: 12 solo poses and phone setups

The easiest poses for pictures alone are ones where something holds you in place: your back to a wall with a hand on your hip, hands on a ledge behind you, a railing lean or a seat on a step. Prop the phone upright at the middle of the shot, use the 10-second timer, and change one thing between frames.

Below are twelve solo poses, each with where the phone goes, which lens, how far away, and how to fire the shutter. They’re grouped by what holds you up, because when nobody is behind the camera, support is what keeps a pose from looking stiff.

The setup behind every pose here

Each pose below lists its own phone position, but four things stay the same:

• The phone stands upright, not tilted. Put the lens at the height of the middle of what’s in the frame: your hips for head to toe, your chest for thighs-up, your seated chest height for sitting poses. One pose (number 10) breaks this rule on purpose.
• 1x is the default lens. It keeps proportions natural. Use 0.5x only when the room is too small, and keep yourself in the middle of the frame if you do.
• Mark your spot and lock it. Put a shoe or your bag where your feet will go, then touch and hold it on screen until AE/AF Lock appears, so the camera doesn’t refocus on the background while you walk in.
• Shoot in rounds. Several countdowns per pose, with a small change each time. The exact timer and burst steps for the built-in Camera are in how to use the iPhone timer and Burst, and the full propping method is in how to take pictures of yourself.

All twelve come from Onpose’s library. In the app, the reference sits semi-transparent over your live camera, so before you walk into the shot you can move the phone until the pose stands where you’re about to stand, at the size you want.

The twelve poses at a glance

#	Pose	Phone height	Lens and distance	Shutter
1	Back to the wall, hand on hip	Hip	1x, 7–8 ft (2–2.5 m)	10 s timer
2	Hands on a ledge behind you, eyes away	Hip	1x, about 8 ft (2.5 m)	10 s timer
3	One arm out to the side of a doorway	Hip	1x, 9–10 ft (2.7–3 m)	10 s timer
4	Walking away, looking back	Waist	1x, start 6 ft (2 m) away and walk	Remote, or repeated timer rounds
5	Back to the camera, glance over the shoulder	Waist	1x, about 5 ft (1.5 m)	10 s timer
6	Leaning back on a railing, ankles crossed	Chest	1x, 8–10 ft (2.5–3 m)	10 s timer
7	Palms on a low wall, sunset behind	Waist	1x, about 5 ft (1.5 m)	10 s timer
8	On the stairs, chin on your fist	Seated chest	1x, 4–5 ft (1.2–1.5 m)	5 or 10 s timer
9	On a bench, one arm behind your head	Seated chest	1x, 4–5 ft (1.2–1.5 m)	5 or 10 s timer
10	Crouched by a wall, hand at your cheek	Standing chest, tilted down	1x, about 4 ft (1.2 m)	5 s timer
11	Night lean on a lit wall, hand in your hair	Hip, braced	1x, about 7 ft (2 m)	10 s timer
12	Hand in your hair at dusk, with flash	Chest	1x, about 5 ft (1.5 m)	10 s timer, flash on

Against a wall

A wall is the best friend of the solo photo. It decides how far you stand from the phone, so you land in the frame you set up.

1. Back to the wall, hand on hip

Lean your shoulders lightly against a plain wall. Put one hand on your hip with the elbow pointing back and out, so the arm frames your waist, and let the other arm hang with your bag on that shoulder. Face the lens and tip your head slightly.

Phone: hip height, straight on, 1x, 7–8 ft (2–2.5 m), with the wall parallel to the phone. This is the pose to start with: there’s nothing to time, and it shows a whole outfit. It’s in the outfit poses.

2. Hands on a ledge behind you, eyes away

Stand in front of a window ledge or low sill, rest a hand on it at each side with your arms straight, keep your feet close together, and turn your head to look off to one side.

Phone: hip height, 1x, about 8 ft (2.5 m), centered so the window frames you evenly. Because you’re looking away, there’s no moment to catch: any frame from the round can be the one.

3. One arm out to the side of a doorway

Stand on the threshold of a doorway, reach one arm straight out to the side wall with your palm flat, and let your body tilt toward it. The other hand holds a drink at your waist, and your eyes go down.

Phone: hip height, 1x, 9–10 ft (2.7–3 m), centered on the door so the whole frame and the step fit. Check the door’s edges against the grid lines: a doorway shows every bit of tilt.

Moving

Movement is the hardest thing to shoot alone, because a countdown gives you one moment. Treat these as several rounds, or use a remote.

4. Walking away, looking back

Walk away from the phone along a pavement or path at an easy pace, bag on your shoulder, free hand near your back pocket, and look back over your shoulder mid-stride.

Phone: waist height, 1x, with the path running away from the lens. Start about 6 ft (2 m) from the phone and begin walking a beat before the countdown ends. A remote, such as the Camera Remote app on Apple Watch (turn off its default 3-second timer first), lets you fire several times in one walk instead of resetting the timer for each.

5. Back to the camera, glance over the shoulder

Turn your back mostly to the phone, let one hand rest behind you at the hip, and turn your head over your shoulder toward the lens. The reference is a beach at sunset, framed from the thighs up.

Phone: waist height, 1x, about 5 ft (1.5 m) for thighs-up. Put the low sun off to the side you turn toward, so it lights your face as you look back. The turn itself, in three steps, is in the over-the-shoulder pose.

Leaning on a rail or a ledge

6. Leaning back on a railing, ankles crossed

Stand with your back to a balcony railing, one hand gripping the rail beside you, the other arm loose at your side, ankles crossed. Never sit on a railing or lean far back over a drop.

Phone: chest height, 1x, 8–10 ft (2.5–3 m), straight on, full length. At chest height the horizon crosses behind your upper body rather than your neck, which keeps the sea or skyline in the picture. More railing grips, and the safety rules, are in railing poses.

7. Palms on a low wall, sunset behind

Back against a low wall, arms spread with both palms flat on top, chin level, eyes to the lens. The reference is framed from the thighs up, with the sun setting over water behind.

Phone: waist height, 1x, about 5 ft (1.5 m). With the light behind you, the camera wants to expose for the sky and leave your face dark, so before you start the timer, brighten the shot a little with the Exposure slider in the camera controls.

Sitting and low

Seated poses are the most forgiving alone: you can’t drift out of your spot.

8. On the stairs, chin on your fist

Sit on a step with your knees together, rest your chin on a loose fist with that elbow on your knee, and lay the other forearm across your knees. Eyes to the lens. Put your bag on the step beside you.

Phone: on a lower step, at about your seated chest height, 1x, 4–5 ft (1.2–1.5 m), straight on. Seated poses change a lot with small changes in phone height, so the sitting on stairs poses go through it for four variations.

9. On a bench, one arm behind your head

Sit toward one end of a bench, lift one hand behind your head with the elbow up, and rest the other arm back along the seat. Tip your head slightly and face a low sun.

Phone: seated chest height, 1x, 4–5 ft (1.2–1.5 m), framed from the thighs up. Keep the raised elbow pointing up and back so it doesn’t come between your face and the lens.

10. Crouched by a wall, hand at your cheek

Crouch low beside a wall, knees together. Rest one elbow on your knee with your cheek in that hand, and drape the other arm forward over your knees. Sunglasses pushed up on your head give the pose its casual look.

Phone: this is the one pose where tilting is the point. The reference looks down from standing height, which keeps your face large and your shoes in the frame. Prop the phone at chest height, on a window sill or a ledge, about 4 ft (1.2 m) away, angled down at you.

After dark

At night the camera needs you, and the phone, to hold still. Brace the phone on something solid and use poses where something supports your weight.

11. Night lean on a lit wall, hand in your hair

Lean your back and shoulder against a warmly lit wall beside a door. Lift one hand into your hair at the side of your head, let the other arm hang, and cross one leg in front of the other.

Phone: hip height, braced on a ledge or bin, 1x, about 7 ft (2 m). Stand where the light falls on your face, not just on the wall, and hold the pose through the whole round. How far to stand from the wall is in leaning against wall poses, and more low-light poses are in the going-out poses.

12. Hand in your hair at dusk, with flash

Face the lens with one hand lifted into your hair by your ear, the other arm relaxed, head tipped slightly. The reference is on a beach after sunset: you’re bright, and the sky behind stays deep orange.

Phone: chest height, 1x, about 5 ft (1.5 m), framed from the thighs up. Set the flash to On. Where the elbow should point is in the hand in hair pose. The flash lights you while the sky keeps its color, a look you can’t get without it once the sun has gone.

Poses that are hard to do alone

Jumps, twirls and walking toward the camera all depend on one exact moment, and a single countdown rarely lands on it. Do them with a remote and many tries, or save them for when a friend is shooting with Burst. The posing basics that make every one of the twelve work, from weight on the back leg to space between your arms and your body, are in how to pose for pictures. If your hands are what look stiff, see what to do with your hands in photos.

Common mistakes when posing alone

What you see	Cause	Fix
Feet cut off	The frame was set without a marker	Put a shoe on your spot and leave floor visible below it
You’re smaller or bigger than you planned	You stood behind or in front of your marker	Stand on the marker, or move it, then reframe
Face is dark	Light behind you	Turn to face the light, or tap your face to expose for it
Every frame looks the same	Holding one pose for the whole round	Change one thing per countdown: weight, chin, hand or gaze
The background is sharp, you’re soft	The camera refocused while you walked in	Lock AE/AF on your marker before starting the timer