Photographer Tells People They’re Beautiful, Captures Delightful Reactions

As Amy Schumer famously pointed out, women aren't great at accepting compliments. But in the video below, one precocious teenager shows just how a compliment can change someone's day. Shea Glover, 18, went around her high school asking teachers and students to pose for a project. "I'm taking pictures of things I find beautiful," she says to both friends and strangers. The reactions are priceless. Many people break out in wide grins — before becoming embarrassed.

Others are adorably overwhelmed. "This has been such a great day," the woman below says.

"What’s funny is I didn't think of this as a social experiment, but that’s what it turned into," Shea Glover told Refinery29. "I was just filming beauty for the sake of art, and halfway through I realized the reactions were very interesting and very varied."

Glover, who says she was filming people for a senior art project, didn't expect the video to go viral — or some of the reactions she got, like anger. One woman, when she heard of the reason behind the compliment, warned Glover, "I'll cut you in the face."

"We were friends of friends and she’s a very sweet intelligent woman and very confident and not superficial," Glover said, "but I guess that day she was really taken off guard and it made her vulnerable. She didn’t really get upset at me, but she seemed more upset at the statement." The majority of people she filmed, however, either thanked her, or thought she was joking.

If the artist wasn't a young woman, though the reactions might've been very different. "I didn't think about that until I read the comments," Glover said. "Some of the commenters were like, 'If I did this, that would be called harassment,' but I'm like, no it's because you’re on the street and doing it at night and following them, you fucking weirdo."

Glover also points to how she tried to connect with her subjects. "I made an effort to make them feel comfortable," she said, "and if you’re doing that correctly, it doesn’t really matter if you have a vagina or a cock."

Watch all of the reactions below — and keep an eye out at the 2:30 minute mark for an epic hair flip.