UPDATE: Check out the images below. Did you recognise Demi Moore in the ad on the left? She’s appeared (heavily airbrushed) in a campaign for Helena Rubinstein. From news.com.au: “The heavily airbrushed photographs of Moore erase any signs of stress the star has been feeling. Gone are the scary cheek bones, the tired eyes, the bad skin and heavy lines.”
Demi Moore
Editor of the Australian Women’s Weekly Helen McCabe said Photoshopping models was good business, but her magazine tried to do it a little less than others.
But where do editors draw the line between ‘mild’ touch-ups and completely distorting the reality of a photoshoot?
Writing in the Sunday Telegraph, McCabe said said it was about using the tool responsibly:
Sarah Murdoch without Photoshop
“It has never been easy to be a teenage girl. But it has never been harder than it is today.
Young women have always felt insecure about the way they look and their place in the world. But when you throw modern-day pressures into the mix – 10-year-olds pouting on the cover of Vogue, perverts stalking Facebook, simulated sex on video clips – you have a generation desperately needing understanding, support and guidance from its elders.
Never before have girls been sexualised so young. Toddlers are being paraded in beauty pageants. Sexy clothes are being marketed to “tweens”. Teenagers are saving up to have breast implants, liposuction, nose jobs. Girls are shaving all their pubic hair off in year seven. Sending nude pictures is the new flirting for kids as young as 12. Boys are getting their sex education from online porn.
Weekly editor Helen McCabe
These aren’t easy issues to address. We need smart education, strong parenting – and we need to set good examples.
One of the things that most worries young women is their body image. A Mission Australia survey of people aged 11 to 24 found girls were more concerned about the way they look than anything else.
As adults, we forget how crippling this insecurity can be. The older you get, the more you understand that it’s impossible to look like a stick-figure on a fashion magazine cover, and the less you want to anyway. You realise you’re lucky if your body is healthy, even if you would still like to lose 5 kilos.”
If you needed a refresher on how Photoshopping works and the effect it has, check this out:
McCabe recognised this fact but still maintained Photoshop, and how it was applied to images, was the silver bullet that would fix these ongoing problems.
Firstly, many celebrities insist on having their photographs retouched. Some will not allow their pictures to be used without it. Many photographers insist, understandably, on carrying out their own retouching. Since I have been at The Weekly, only two have embraced the idea of no retouching. In one case Sarah Murdoch she was then criticised.
Sarah Murdoch with her front cover, unretouched
Mia Freedman was the other. But it’s impossible to find a picture of an overseas celebrity that hasn’t been retouched.
Secondly, while women might ask for honest photographs, they buy beautiful ones.
On a stand full of international magazines, we compete with Vanity Fair, Italian Vogue and dozens of others. They all use Photoshop. People want to buy magazines with dazzling covers.
Magazines are often in the firing line on photoshop, but they are not the only culprits. Advertisers do it. Film and television do it. Newspaper photos are often adjusted to make the colours more dramatic.
News and lifestyle websites use retouched images, often without knowing, because they have bought them from a photo agency.
The technology is so accessible, any of us can air brush our own photographs.
The genie is out of the bottle when it comes to photoshop and some argue where do you draw the line? Why not ban makeup, soft lighting, Botox and boob jobs as well?
But I believe there is a case for using the technology more responsibly.
At the Weekly when we retouch photographs we do it lightly. Whenever we alter an image, we declare it on the page, and we encourage celebrities to accept lightly touched images.
I know that’s not going far enough for some people. But magazines (like fashion) are a business.”
But it’s not just mag editors who are doing the tweaking and fudging. As Mia Freedman wrote in the Sunday Telegraph, it comes from the photographers too:
Look at the length from waist to knee. Stretched?
“I didn’t win myself any friends among my former magazine colleagues this week when I published a post on Mamamia about the latest Photoshop trick being used to deceive us all when we look at many magazine images and advertisements: stretching. Now, even models who are already way taller than the average woman are being elongated with Photoshop to appear many, many centimeters taller. And slimmer. Stretched.
Mag editors came out swinging, insisting they do NOT stretch models but if you look at the proportions of many of the models in these fashion images between ankle and knee, knee and waist or ankle and waist, there’s certainly SOMETHING abnormal going on. Unless we’ve suddenly been invaded by 7 foot model aliens.
In their defence, it’s true that editors and magazines aren’t necessarily doing the stretching themselves. It’s the photographers. All successful fashion photographers now insist on doing their own ‘digital post-production’ ie: Photoshopping. As pure aesthetes who see no problem with using a computer to create an impossible and fake portrayal of women (usually models who are already deemed among the most genetically gifted in the world), photographers have no problem stretching, smoothing, carving and recreating the female form.
And since magazines compete ferociously with each other for the services of the ‘best’ fashion photographers, these men (and a few women) wield extreme power and influence to do what the hell they like with their images after a magazine shoot. This is very bad news for women. At the very least, Photoshopping should be declared, next to the name of the photographer credit. And editors should start saying no.
Imagine if we were surrounded by images of naked men and they’d all been ‘stretched’? You can bet there would be a law against it before you could say “unfair comparison”.
Kate Middleton on the cover of Australian Grazia (left) and UK Grazia (right)Kourtney Kardashian's post-baby belly was photoshopped on the cover of OK WeeklyDemi Moore is missing a chunk of her thigh on this W magazine coverL'Oréal was forced to pull this ad starring Julia Roberts due to complaints that it was misleading.L'Oréal (owner of Maybelline) admitted to digitally retouching this ad starring Christy Turlington - it has also been pulled.Britney Spears released these side-by-side photographs of her before and after retouching for a Candies ad campaign.Madonna before and after photoshop in a Dolce and Gabbana adMadonna before and after photoshop in a Dolce and Gabbana adModel Filippa Hamilton appeared heavily retouched in a Ralph Lauren campaign in 2008This before and after shows how photoshop is used in a Nordstrom catalog to give the model unrealistic proportions.Maroon 5's Adam Levine lost a torso in the November issue of Russian VogueKaty Perry looking unrecognisable on the cover of Interview magazineThe same photograph of Beyonce appears on two different covers with two different skin tonesCrystal Renn's figure was drastically reduced in the finalised image on the rightWhat Jessica Alba looks like before and after photoshopThe 2012 Swimsuit issue of Sports IllustratedKeira Knightley is given a boob job on the movie poster for King ArthurEva Longoria is given a boob job, hips and curvier waistEven celebrities in their 20s get photoshopped - Amanda SeyfriedCamilla BelleDianna AgronEmma RobertsGabourey Sidibe's skin has been lightened on the cover of US ElleMadonna on the cover of Out magazineFacial lines and wrinkles are erased on Fergie on the cover of ElleKristen StewartCharlize Theron on the February 2012 cover of WAlexa Chung on the cover of Grazia (Photoshopped image). Look at the length from her ankle to her knee. And look at her foot. *Grazia insist the image has not been stretched.Hilary Duff in an ad for DKNY jeans.Kate Winslet in GQ. Look at the length from her knee to her waist.Happy magazine. Look at the length from the model's knee to her waist.Prabal Gurung pre-fall 2012 campaign (Photoshopped image). Look at the length between foot and waist.Prabal Gurung pre-fall 2012 campaign (Photoshopped image)Daria Werbowy in French Vogue. Look at the length from ankle to waist.Kimora Lee Simmons (looking awfully similar to Daria Werbowy in the previous picture). Kimora is tall but the length of her legs and lower body in this image appears highly stretched.Look at the shoulder to waist ratio compared to the hip to ankle ratio on this model - photo appeared in the Sunday Life magazine.Ralph Lauren campaign. Not only has the model's waist and torso been carved into to 'slim' it down, her body has been stretched. Look at the length from crotch to shoulders.Ralph Lauren campaign. Many focussed on the outrageous photoshopping of this model's waist but she also appears very stretched.A Macy's ad from Macys.com - look at her torso.A Macy's ad from Macys.com - check out her torso, her oddly shaped legs and heel-less shoes.From a Zink magazine's fashion story. Look at the length between ankle and waist.Victoria's Secret swimsuit catalogue. Look at the length of this model's fake torso.Ralph Lauren campaign image (before and after). Look at the upper body proportions.Britney Spears' body and legs have been stretched in the after shot on the right.A Japanese adA Japanese ad
What do you think of Helen’s message? Is there a happy middle-ground? Can the magazine industry be trusted to self-police using retouching responsibly?