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"  It&amp;#039;s Cannes 2013, which means that the red carpet has been flooded with some of the most famous, most beautiful and most talented women in the film industry. But how do they COPE having a gazillion camera lenses pointed at them, snapping away at every single hair flick, sashay, stumble and pout?! Seriously? It literally sounds like my worst nightmare. Ever. So, obviously, it made sense that, in my bid to boost my self-confidence, I threw myself in front of an all-seeing camera lens and let the machinery do its stuff.  And who better to take me through my journey than the innovative Diana Patient, who prides herself on using her camera to explore not who people are, but who they want to be? Just check out her pretty dreamy promise to all of her clients to get an idea of what I mean: &amp;quot;Who can we be? I explore this with my camera. Photography has a way of letting us play as adults and fully commit to another character, maybe one that has been there all along and is simply another aspect of you. I believe part of confidence comes from freedom to express yourself letting go of who we must be and asking who can we be?&amp;quot; CHECK OUT THE BEST CONFIDENCE TIPS In homage to my inner cinephile, I decided to unleash my inner Audrey Hepburn. Yes, fine - totally predictable. But who else sums up being confident more than Miss Breakfast At Tiffany&amp;#039;s herself, eh? Just check out this quote on how to be beautiful: &amp;quot;The beauty of a woman is not in the clothes she wears, the figure that she carries, or the way she combs her hair. The beauty of a woman must be seen from in her eyes, because that is the doorway to her heart, the place where love resides.&amp;quot; I can get on board with that! Diana was friendly and insanely enthusiastic about the photoshoot, asking me to meet her aroung 6.30am in the middle of Central London. Yup, rush hour. Commuters everywhere. People everywhere. EYES EVERYWHERE! But I played it cool, arrived in a black dress - as requested - and let her get on with the makeup, hair and props (think hat and sunnies!). Things didn&amp;#039;t begin well. I was incredibly sleepy, hardly feeling in a mood to be photographed and painfully aware that, amongst all the rushing commuters, I was the only one in costume. Unsurprisingly, the first few shots looked horribly awkward - a little forced, a little cringe and a little disheartening. But I hadn&amp;#039;t banked on Diana&amp;#039;s persistence. A model and dancer herself, she knows a LOT about helping people relax into their &amp;quot;performance&amp;quot; and, after having me in fits of giggles, shouting words of encouragement from across the street and skipping about me like a fairy godmother on rollerblades, we were off. And things began to feel... well, pretty good to be honest. TRY OUT THESE SUPER ESTEEM BOOSTERS Did I feel confident as we went along? Not really. Not at first. But, if you read through the interviews given by the rich &amp;#039;n&amp;#039; famous, nobody ever feels that confident in front of the camera. Isla Fisher herself, who&amp;#039;s starring alongside Leonardo DiCaprio and Carey mulligan in The Great Gatsby, has revealed her secret to feeling good on camera: fake it! &amp;quot;You know that phrase, fake it till you make it? That&amp;#039;s what I did. I hid my fears and pretended that I belonged on set with Leonardo DiCaprio - not in the catering truck, helping myself to a sandwich.&amp;quot; Excellent advice Isla! I began to build up a persona, a sort of backstory, to help me deal with being photographed in front of so many people. Sure, in real life I&amp;#039;m Kayleigh Dray, writer, but, in this world, I was Kayleigh Dray, the next big thing of the silver screen - and, as I continued to focus on that idea, I began to feel it was true. And, as I pretended to be confident, I acted more confident. People respond to confidence well. If you walk along with your head down, looking as if you wished you&amp;#039;d rather be anywhere else, that&amp;#039;s what people will assume. If you walk, head held high, hips sashaying gently, people think you&amp;#039;re a fun fearless female (natch!) and that&amp;#039;s kind of a contagious feeling - because you start to believe it yourself.  People were looking, but I sort of became glad that they were looking - and, as my head swelled to twice its natural size under my Audrey hat, I began to feel more and more confident. Someone asked us if we were shooting a film. Others wanted to know if the shots were for a new ad campaign. Almost everyone was intrigued - and, in a bid to keep the mystery, we revealed very little indeed. Oh yeah, being enigmatic is fun. I highly recommend it. Diana and I worked our way across London, beginning in Soho and ending up in South Kensington - smack bang inside the Natural History Museum. They have diamonds there, you see - and no Audrey Hepburn shoot would be complete without a shot of several glittering diamonds. The finished result looked (in my eyes, anyway) amazing - I&amp;#039;d never felt it would be possible to strut through the middle of London, during rush hour, dressed as Audrey Hepburn AND feel good at the end of it all. I really didn&amp;#039;t. Diana did though - and it was her vision, her encouragement and her self-belief (&amp;quot;I don&amp;#039;t take bad photographs!&amp;quot;) that made this all possible.  The thing about Diana is that she doesn&amp;#039;t just take photographs, like so many with a camera do; she tells stories. I&amp;#039;ve seen her at work and she can transform people into whoever they want to be; from Audrey Hepburn to Mad Men&amp;#039;s Joan, a 1920s flapper girl to Audrey Tatou&amp;#039;s Amelie, Diana will take whatever you&amp;#039;re dreaming of and make it a reality. She does all the work herself, too - think makeup, hair, props, location, prints and consultations. She&amp;#039;s a one woman photo army! My conclusion? If you feel in need of a confidence boost, or know someone else who is, then you need to get in touch with Diana immediately. Average prices for a creative portraiture start at around \u00A3250. Visit her website or send an email to info@dianapatient.co.uk to find out more. Join Kayleigh next week as she meets with a therapist to discuss her self-esteem issues... Missed Kayleigh&amp;#039;s last blog on why you should give poledancing a spin? Check it out here. Follow Kayleigh Dray on twitter at @KayDee28 "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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