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itsenglishtome:

Photoshop Makes Tools.

Text Production: 1000 Word Opinion Piece

22/05/2013 

 The “ideal images” we see everyday are not real, not in the slightest.  Specifically, I speak of the images of people in magazines and advertisements that almost every person on the face of the planet seems to be blindly obsessed with.

When reading any kind of magazine and “admiring” the images of “perfection” splayed on every page, it is important to bear in mind the fact that these images are almost always altered.  Now, do not be shaking your head and telling me I’m wrong, that some magazines have “re-touch free zones” and others have banned Photoshop; of course, this I do not deny, but I stand here to remind anyone and everyone of the simple fact that, though they may not have been altered after the photograph was taken, you can be certain they were altered before.

How does that work?

Lighting, make-up, and costume are how it works.  When taking a photograph of yourself and your friends at home around the lounge it can almost be guaranteed that none of the people photographed look as models do.  Not to mention that your lounge room may have terrible lighting and your friends are probably sans make-up and wearing their most casual clothes.  For a magazine photography shoot, an outfit for each model is specifically selected to emphasise their best features.  Many of these “costumes” could be compared to a red carpet, personalised gown.  The make-up used to give a “natural, everyday” look could be compared to being worse than the “cake-faces” seen at an all-girls senior formal.  As for lighting, as every brilliant director would take great care to light their actors on a film set, for a magazine photography shoot a photographer lights his models appropriately, soft light, low light, high light, and bright light, whatever kind of light best brings out their models’ features and perfects any visual flaw, whilst simultaneously making their clothes appealing, also. 

Then, especially in the most well-known and popular magazines, there is the demon of Photoshop.  Photoshop is a fantastic tool for editing photographs for posters to advertise your school’s fair or for invitations to your parents’ twentieth wedding anniversary, but the majority of images found on Google when typing in a search for “photoshopped celebrities” are females in outfits that, to put it lightly (and kindly), are lacking in material.  I have little doubt that if these celebrities were uncomfortable in their bodies and uncomfortable with who they are as themselves, they would not bother wearing those outfits and would simply leave.  However, despite this, magazine companies use Photoshop as a tool to present the “ideal” image of a celebrity, regardless of their fans’ previously presented idolised views of them.

The amazing revolution of the marriage of Photoshop and Magazine is the increasing bad influence that it inflicts on body image in general.  I will only brief over this with a single example as it is not the issue I am to discuss here.  A young teenager weighing approximately fifty kilograms feels herself justified to complain to her friend, weighing in approximately double the weight she does, that she is “fat” and her “stomach is so gross” because she recently struggled with wearing a pair of jeans.  This girl’s friend of course has never been able to comfortably wear anything, with the exception of a giant jumper and baggy sweats.  Why does this young woman find herself justified to put herself on an extreme diet and think of herself as the opaque, gelatinous substance that is fat because she does not look or feel like the “ideals” she sees around her every day?

Here is my issue, the question that has been scratching at my mind to no end and to the nth degree since the day I found it.  My question, plain and simple, is this: why must GQ Magzine Photoshop the young, beautiful and wonderfully talented Jennifer Lawrence just so their readers can see her bones more prominently and see her thighs as slightly smaller [Gier, K. 2013]?  Can we stop for a minute and ponder how Ms Lawrence feels about being edited or does this just always slip our minds?

Was that really necessary, GQ Magazine?

To emphasise my point I quote the film Dodge Ball: “Necessary? Is it necessary for me to drink my own urine?  No, but I do it anyway because it’s sterile and I like the taste.”

This idea is simply the most ridiculous, and appetite removing, thing to read or hear; this demonstrates that necessity does not indicate whether or not an action should be taken in a certain matter.   Even if it is not necessary to sneak around to steal her mother’s make-up when, if she asked, her mother would only be glad to show her how to best use it, a young girl will still do it because she fears judgement.  Magazine editors may use Photoshop to avoid their models or celebrities being judged, and yet they will be judged for using Photoshop and their ideas simply become redundant.

Drinking your own urine, and liking the taste, is as ridiculous to me as using Photoshop to alter George Clooney [AAD 251 Final 2013].

Yes, even the Silver Fox himself is mutilated with the propriety of the Photoshop demon!  Mr Clooney is the reason behind women of all ages swooning before their television and theatre screens and yet, his beauty is “emphasised” for “our viewing pleasure”.

Even more aggravating is the moment when “fans” of certain celebrities get this “ideal” image in their mind and finally see an unaltered photograph of their dear, sweet, little guy/girl and are entirely repulsed, asking why they are not as the magazine displays!

Can someone explain why should they have to be ideal, anyway, just because they are “celebrities”?

Most importantly, can someone please explain to me why anyone would ever feel the need to use Photoshop to alter George Clooney?  That question is really getting to me.

    Sources

AAD 251 Final (2013), “before-after-george-clooney-photoshop”, http://blogs.uoregon.edu/, 22/05/2013, http://blogs.uoregon.edu/falseads/2012/12/02/the-lifestyle-room/before-after-george-clooney-photoshop-2/

Gier, K (2013), “Social Network Blogs and Eating Disorders”, http://thinkingvisuallyatunl.blogspot.com.au/, 22/05/2013, http://thinkingvisuallyatunl.blogspot.com.au/2013/01/social-network-blogs-and-htm

~Eden Kathleen Cousins~

 

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People who should be illegal (no order)
↳ Emilia Clarke

All of the press and stuff - that’s the scary stuff. The acting is what I got trained to do.

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ashleymater:

Tippi Benjamine Okanti Degré, daughter of French wildlife photographers Alain Degré and Sylvie Robert, was born in Namibia. During her childhood she befriended many wild animals, including a 28-year old elephant called Abu and a leopard nicknamed J&B. She was embraced by the Bushmen and the Himba tribespeople of the Kalahari, who taught her how to survive on roots and berries, as well as how to speak their language.

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