Swedes' snap wins 'most awkward ever' family pic

The first prize in a worldwide competition to find the most awkward family photos, recently awarded by a British newspaper, went to a Swedish couple in northern Sweden, whose take on a pregnancy snap has raised a few eyebrows.

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“We wanted to have an original pregnancy picture and for us the image means happiness and expectation,” Anna Olsson said to local newspaper HelaHälsingland.

“But, I have understood that this can be interpreted in another way,”

The couple, Olsson and her partner Olof Joners, wanted to try something a little different, and decided to have the unborn baby feature in the picture in more detail than just a baby bump.

They enlisted the help of a friend to paint the unborn child onto the woman’s stomach, in watercolour, complete with facial features and umbilical cord, and had the photo snapped in autumn.

The photo shows the pair, both in their underwear, smiling lovingly at the watercolour baby.

The couple didn’t realize that the picture had been shared online, and heard from a friend that it was making the rounds in Brazil. While not certain, the pair have their suspicions how the image spread.

“I only uploaded it on Facebook and a modeling page,” Olsson said.

“It was probably taken from my Facebook site.”

Soon, it was on the homepage of Awkward Family Photos website, a page that specializes in shedding light on “spreading the awkwardness” and displays a collection of cringeworthy family snaps.

The photo even made the website’s hall of fame, and has been shared almost 42,000 times on Facebook.

By the time British tabloid newspaper The Daily Mail ran the picture with the headline “Is this the most awkward family photo ever?” on Wednesday, the photo had gone well and truly viral.

"It was weird that the picture made it to Sweden. I had hoped it would stay on the other side of the continent,” Joners told daily Aftonbladet.

The couple were not prepared for international fame but are not letting the hullabaloo worry them too much.

“I wouldn’t want to have the same old pregnancy photos as everyone else anyway,” Olsson said to the paper.