Reality vs. retouching: How does it make you feel?
You’re at the grocery store aisle; you sneak a peek at the barrage of women’s magazines and notice a perfectly sculpted body, small waistline and smooth skin – the only fullness in the photo reserved to a pouty lip and the voluminous layers of wavy hair.
Maybe you think twice about the ice cream in your cart? Instantly feel uncomfortable with your love handles? Begin studying the photo to find a touch of imperfection to improve your suddenly ruined mood? Or simply utter the words, “I feel so fat” in your mind?
Whatever you say to yourself, after glancing at flawless photos, do you feel like crap?
In response to this potential negative influence of retouched photos, some editors of top British magazines, including Vogue and Elle, are set to meet with their trade association to talk about establishing a code for airbrushing photos; publishing house representatives and the fashion council will also be there. And kudos to Australia, whose government just launched a voluntary body image code.
In the meantime, airbrushed photos abound. In a powerful post on The 5 Resolutions blog (an excellent resource!), the authors share some before and after photos, with condensed versions of Katie Couric and Faith Hill and a ridiculously bulked up Andy Roddick, whose photo looks shamefully similar to the Incredible Hulk.
In another post, they include a link to a gallery of before and after photos of celebrities.
But even if we know that magazines are generous with their vast armament of retouching tools, do we really feel any less inferior about ourselves after viewing these photos?
My guess is maybe, but not by much. And frankly, I find it disgusting. As a long-time subscriber of Marie Claire, I find myself consistently turned off by their blatant retouching (and all magazines).
Take this month’s cover featuring Tina Fey. Not surprisingly, even the glimmer of any wrinkling, uneven skin or other normal imperfections has been brushed away. But, surprisingly, also gone… is her facial scar.
If a celebrity got hit with a bad case of blemishes that morning, okay, fine, I get it: airbrush away. But why erase a scar? Is it because it’s unattractive in some way? If that’s the case in the magazine’s eyes, then what does that tell their subscribers, and how does it promote their message of natural beauty? Hypocrisy, maybe.
People in the industry say we wouldn’t buy magazines if they didn’t parade images of perfection on their pages.
Would you rather see a drastically diminished Kelly Clarkson on the cover or the real Clarkson, an average-sized woman with curves?
Would you still buy a magazine showcasing a flawed face and body with wrinkles, cellulite, big under-eye bags and other imperfections?
Maybe you think twice about the ice cream in your cart? Instantly feel uncomfortable with your love handles? Begin studying the photo to find a touch of imperfection to improve your suddenly ruined mood? Or simply utter the words, “I feel so fat” in your mind?
Whatever you say to yourself, after glancing at flawless photos, do you feel like crap?
In response to this potential negative influence of retouched photos, some editors of top British magazines, including Vogue and Elle, are set to meet with their trade association to talk about establishing a code for airbrushing photos; publishing house representatives and the fashion council will also be there. And kudos to Australia, whose government just launched a voluntary body image code.
In the meantime, airbrushed photos abound. In a powerful post on The 5 Resolutions blog (an excellent resource!), the authors share some before and after photos, with condensed versions of Katie Couric and Faith Hill and a ridiculously bulked up Andy Roddick, whose photo looks shamefully similar to the Incredible Hulk.
In another post, they include a link to a gallery of before and after photos of celebrities.
But even if we know that magazines are generous with their vast armament of retouching tools, do we really feel any less inferior about ourselves after viewing these photos?
My guess is maybe, but not by much. And frankly, I find it disgusting. As a long-time subscriber of Marie Claire, I find myself consistently turned off by their blatant retouching (and all magazines).
Take this month’s cover featuring Tina Fey. Not surprisingly, even the glimmer of any wrinkling, uneven skin or other normal imperfections has been brushed away. But, surprisingly, also gone… is her facial scar.
If a celebrity got hit with a bad case of blemishes that morning, okay, fine, I get it: airbrush away. But why erase a scar? Is it because it’s unattractive in some way? If that’s the case in the magazine’s eyes, then what does that tell their subscribers, and how does it promote their message of natural beauty? Hypocrisy, maybe.
People in the industry say we wouldn’t buy magazines if they didn’t parade images of perfection on their pages.
Would you rather see a drastically diminished Kelly Clarkson on the cover or the real Clarkson, an average-sized woman with curves?
Would you still buy a magazine showcasing a flawed face and body with wrinkles, cellulite, big under-eye bags and other imperfections?
Add a Comment
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Comment by Ellen S on June 4, 2008 at 12:35am -
Yes, I'd buy a magazine with imperfect bodies on the cover, but photos are artwork and art tends to look toward perfection as that is where perceived beauty usually lies. I think it's part of human nature.
Sometimes the beauty is in the imperfections, and a good photograph will tell that story don't you think? Beauty discovered in imperfection requires thought tho, and covers of magazines are designed to create an initial impulse to buy them. It's harder to create a piece of thought provoking art, than something "pretty".
If you have wrinkles, smile. Cellulite, wear a little longer skirt. Under-eye bags are why God created cucumbers and tea bags. Goodness, if you're 50 don't try to dress and look like you're 20! Just because you have flaws doesn't mean that you have to let them all hang out if you don't like them.
I have a huge forehead, so I wear bangs. I have a bald spot on the back of my head, so I wear my hair long. Varicose veins courtesy of medication I take, mean that I wear long skirts or pants. The beauty of being in my forties is that I no longer care that I am imperfect, nor do I care about someone else's imperfections.
I'm not proud of my flaws, but I also know that everyone has them. I can wish them away all that I want, but they're the things that make me unique...
The scar on my leg reminds me that I survived childhood with a bone tumor.
The stretch marks remind me of 17 months when I was not alone in my body, and when I close my eyes I can almost feel my children moving within me 19 yrs later.
My gray hairs (which I refuse to change) remind me that I am sick, but that I am also alive long enough to be blessed with gray hairs. I plan to be gray and make good use of it!
What do you have that makes you unique? Do those things hold beauty for you?
I've been on the other side. Can you imagine what it is to have to live up to those re-touched photos? They can't go to the grocery store without having someone picking them apart and comparing them to those photos of them on the magazine cover. They look at those photos themselves, then in the mirror and wonder at the difference, and those airbrushed flaws bother them just as much as or more than everyone else. Heaven forbid they should ever be caught without makeup or perfectly coiffed and colored hair.
I'm a natural girl. I plan on earning every single wrinkle and gray hair. Yes, I miss the days before the years began to show, but that's the journey of life.
With any luck at all someday I'll be covered in wrinkles from laughing in the sun, and scars from wild adventures, and a little body fat so when I am old I am not frail and my grandchildren will feel comfortable when they hug me. I won't be on anybody's magazine cover, and that's fine with me.
Someday, when my family lays me to rest I hope they look at my aged hands with the scars, veins, and broken bones and remember that it was those hands that held the reins to dancing white horses and also cradled them as babies. I hope my old and ugly hands are beautiful to them.
There can be beauty in imperfection.
That's all that matters to me.
© 2009 Created by Marie
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