Can a person's body type look different in pictures than what it really looks like in real life?

So a lot of people say that bodies look the same in pictures than what they look like in real life, other say in pictures they look different than what they actually look like in real life, do you think this is true?


And what is the best way to see a person’s real figure, live and upfront or in pictures? or will it just look exactly the same in both.


To be more specific, the reason I ask this, is because it made me so confused and at the same time curious, the fact that my brother was talking to me about an attractive girl he knows from college, stating that she has, what he would say a “sexy body“ or “ curvy figure” with wide hips etc, so he asked me what I thought of her physically speaking, so he showed me pictures of her in different angles, and I just did not see a curvy body in the pictures, what I saw was more like a straight or rectangle body type, athletic.



So it got me confused and thinking on why I see these pictures any different than him, because he made a big emphasis in her having a curvy body, I just personally did not see it, and trust me, I have studied body shapes before in a college class, but since he knows her in person maybe she looks different from the pictures that he showed me.