How does she get her pictures to look like that? (Picture examples included)?

In the photos her skin and clothes are all brightened to the point that she almost looks deathly white. It makes the colors pop and the backgrounds are all dark. I don't think its from using her flash. She has no fancy equipment but her canon rebel something and a standard lense. Almost all her photos are like that, even on facebook.

Some examples on her flickr.

How can I make my portraits so crisp clear and bright like that? I have a Nikon d3100, and gimp/picnik.

Thanks in advance.

Added (1). When i take a photo of myself with flash, it looks way different.everything on my face is highlighted and looks bad. It doesn't appear the same. I don't think it's just her flash.

It's just the on camera flash. Notice the harsh shadows? Hand your Nikon to a friend and have her take a photo of you and you will have a better picture than this.

Looks like she uses the pop up flash and is taking her own portrait by holding the camera out in front of her face. She's using a DSLR. The lens is probably a kit lens set to wide angle.

It's definitely just the popup flash on the camera. She might have set it to a lower power level, so there's some ambient light from the background coming through in the first shot.

She gets her pics to look like that because of her poor photography skills.

Sorry but all these images are truly awful. It's not a look any decent photographer would go for - hand held self pics are best avoided at all costs. Flash at such close range looks terrible - flattens faces, burns out detail, and causes harsh unflattering shadows. Taking self pics with a wide angle lens is also a big no no. The last one shows quite an extreme amount of wide angle lens distortion.

This is not the way to take photos of yourself if you want them to look good.