Celebrity Retouching: 10 Reasons to Revise Your Reality

Retouching isn't going to go away, unfortunate as that might be. All I can say is that women (and men!) need to take all photographes as pieces of art rather then accurate representations of a person. For my own part, I no longer allow for my photos to be retouched beyond basic exposure issues.

Sage said:
Perfection is unattainable, yet these magazine companies make it seem easy with all this touch-up crap. No wonder so many women have self image issues! Get back to the basics, people![...]

I agree, we have got get our lives back and stop obsessing about being thin.

I've had my own photos retouched before--- it made me look like a model. And thin. Too funny.

Eu acho que é muito interessante se soubermos usar com sabedoria sem escrachar ninguem. um abraco a todos nao entenderam mesmon rs..

As a Graphic Designer, I think it's unfair to place the blame on us just because me make some corrections in the images. Not all models/people are give bigger boobs and smaller waists as an example. I'm sure if you had the chance/knowledge to make one of your favorite pictures of yourself look better by removing wrinkles, whitening teeth, fixing blemishes, hair, smoothing complextion and more, you would probably do it! Although, letting the public be aware of ads showing flawless people as retouched is justified! As studies show of the whole Dove Beauty Campaign, people do want to see "beautiful" models in ads. That's what sells, for example magazines(men's and women's) that feature women with bigger breasts, sell better. It's just how advertising works, based on principals of nature's beauty.

Very interestingly. 5 minutes in a Photoshop

This is great!!

Qwan, I agree that it is better to eat organic, healthy food and that fast food is bad. I also can see that regular exercise is important. These things will make you healthy, but not necessarily anything like those air-burshed models. Even if you are at an dieal weight, and have good muscle tone and no flab or cellulite, you still may not be an "ideal" appearance. You could be short, have big ears, small breasts, etc. or you may be born with a lot of freckles. These are not bad things, they are just not typical of those "perfect" celebrities. I think the point of websites like this is to encourage people to accept these kinds of difference, not to make it ok to live a sedentary lifestyle, full of junk food.

it is sad that this is happening, but on the other hand- i read somewhere that 88% of women addmited to wearing makeup in the past 6 months. Is this considered as bad as photo retouching? these 88% are trying to change their looks through the use of makeup whereas models have computers do this instead.

Retouching be darned... is there anyone else disturbed by THIS IMAGE???
http://www.touchofglamour.com/Retouching%20Portfolio%201.htm

I saw Liz Hurley's old fat photos at plusmeet..com,where hot big people&celebrity meet and have fun together.

Cannot belice it she was so fat before she became famous.

Its almost as if it is starting to get to the point where you can't really trust any photo you see if any of those celebrity magazines.

If someone was retouching a picture of me to change my features, I would feel pretty worthless.

Why are you blaming celebrities for retouching?

Celebrities aren't telling people to retouch their photo's. Once the picture is taken, they go home.

It is the advertisers, their agents, handlers, directors et al--they are trying to present this "I WANT TO BE HER" thing that does seem to sell despite what we say here. Take for instance the magazine JANE--it had women who looked real and were bigger than a size ten. The Young lady who put the magazine out there had high hopes that women woudl flock to the magazine because it represneted what the average woman looked like...

What happened?

They went bankrupt and Jane changed hands to a publisher with a mroe traditional approach.

We want to see these perfect images--why? So we can hate the people on them and loathe ourselves--we want to dream of unattainable goals and cattily strike out at people who seem to have it all.

And to the person who talked about celebs crying into heir millions--money doesn't male you spiritually whole, my dear. Centuries of life on this planethas taught us that. All the meney in the world can't make us whole becasue we have to be happy, andloved, to feel complete--if you odn't have that you have nothing.

Look at the Lindsey Lohan and the Britney Spears--if you think the average woman gets crap for not being perfect what do you think happens to them--do you think it is more or less painful because they are rich to have millions of people point out their figure flaws?

Also, they were kids pushed into this field of work (both were six when their parents signed them up on their downward spirals) and now they don't know what else to be.

I mean dang--Britney spears came back on the scene and sported a little baby fat and people acted like she was obese--she was barely a size six!

Brit and Lindsey didn't ask to be in a business this harsh--their greedy parents pushed them into it--and when you consider how bad you feel when you are compared to someone else, think about the pressure to remain an ideal even when you know it is all tricks and cameras--that is why celebrities like Tyra Banks are speaking up and saying hey, I have cellulite and scars--it's all tricks to sell a product. We need to stop caring about what these people do and face reality. Teach our little girls to love themselves no matter what some girl, who is probably be pushed into it by her parents, on a magazine looks like--it's up to us, not the shallow world of film, music or acting, to help them love themselves.

Blame the magazine / publication not the retoucher.

I am a retoucher and I like the natural looks. The editors send the photos back with notes that say more, more, more. Its ridiculous!

i agree with the peeps here before me...they pretty much said it already and would make not to much sence to completely repeat it with rambling rants

It is amazing to see the difference between the real shot the the reworked image!!

Hollywood is crazy. To be honest, I don't know why anyone would want to be a celebrity :)

Computers are making everyone think everyone really looks better than they actually are. How many times do we see a picture in a magazine or even on TV and think that person must have had plastic surgery.

Photo retouching comes handy when your wedding phographer has botched most of your pictures and there is no way to re-shoot that wedding as you understand.

yea beacuse miley cyrus is actually very ugly but they fix her photoes to make her look beautiful.. shes really NOT

I can understand that a lot of people disagree with strong retouching. Although I have found that as a photographer a lot of people feel a lot more comfortable modelling for me as they know that I can retouch bits of their bodies they dont like out. This makes it a much more enjoyable experience for the model and myself as they are not constantly worrying.one model I remember saying to me "I feel so comfortable around you because I know you'll sort out my wobbly bits" It doesnt have to make u feel ugly or insecure...models have told me that its nice to see themselves in a different light as if they are a celebrity...

Do they WANT us to feel bad about ourselves?

These guys did a good job editing my photos for various websites and personal promotion: retouching can be useful and fun if done properly.
http://dingsfoto.com

I have to agree with some of the people on here about retouching not being easy. No, its not easy. I'm a graphic design student and self taught in photoshop. It is really hard to get the "perfect" look. But, to those of you who can't get over the "it's not easy" line, who cares. The majority of high school girls (and older) don't care about photoshop. Most don't even know it exists. It's the image that it creates for them. I knew so many girls that were dangerously skinny and still not happy! I feel that if you really want to airbrush celebrities, don't do it to the point that you lose the model's unique self. It may not be easy, but it's still not right.

I agree with Anise. It has go so far beyond color correction blurring out a scar or removing wrinkles in fabric around the waist so that the clothes look like they fit better.

I think women should take over the photo industry.

Imagining creates reality. This is not a myth, but scientific fact. Everything begins with a thought in the mind first, then externalizes into your physical reality.

Everyone is critical of the photoshopping techniques. Why? Its simply an art form. If you "Think" for one minute that its a bad thing, you're only showing the world what you really think about yourself on the inside, and its most likely low self-esteem.

If you're overweight, the most important and first step for you is to imagine yourself thinner, right now. What helps the most is getting yourself photoshopped to a thinner you and retrain your subconscious mind to accept the new slimmer form and it will go to work on it now.

You are not what you eat, you are what you think. If you think that women are being influenced to think badly of themselves by seeing celebrities photoshopped, then you will. But, remember, thoughts are a choice. You choose to think that a photoshopped celebrity is just the industry's way of presenting the best picture for the public and you won't go and get your feathers ruffled. C'mon, this is the 21st century, lets get with the program and understand how our minds work and stop this petty complaining about everything and everybody, its uneducated at the very least and becoming aware and tolerant is a better choice. Check out Neville Goddard's text site, or Florence Shovel Shinn to learn more on how to use your thoughts to gain a better, more valuable, peaceful abundant life.

And... its not ready yet, but I had my overweight photo submitted to a site (its being updated right now, I'm told) to have my body in a photo reduced so I could use my thoughts and imagination to pretend I'm already thinner and so far, in six months, I've lost 57 lbs, without a formal diet.

It works, changing our minds. Anyway, like I said, they're getting so much attention and success, they're updating their website for this week, I think. Check on it to see when they'll be up again, the website is called: www.pictureyourselfthinner.com and from them I found an author who wrote another great e-book that complimented my new slim photo, so I'm doing great and its the only success in weight loss I've found that truly works from the corp of us, not always just a diet from the outside of us. That doesn't work, I know from 30 years of yo-yo dieting. So it tweaks me when I see people complain about photos that have retouched and you can look better, its a very good thing indeed.

There is a case for retouching - someone looks great but when you look through the lens syou are really close up and looking closeley - and so can see all the imperfections one doesn't see in a normal situation. So it must be OK to remove imperfections so the subject looks like they do to an acquaintance who doesn't look at them closeley for 30secs from 1 foot away.

its amazing how many people out there feel ugly or unnatractive because of this. many girls wish they looked like the models in the magazines but i've got news for you. THE MODELS WISH THEY LOOKED LIKE THEMSELVES.
i found a very cool blog dedicated to showing what happens when photo retouching goes bad. worth checking out. www.photoshopmistakes.com

I don’t think people should be able to retouch their pictures. It is not being true to their self or the people that see it...

I wish that you all would educate yourselves as to what exactly goes into photo editing so you can then differentiate between a real and photoshopped picture, and exactly how much skill it takes to do it. The only reason most of you have a problem with retouching is because that you are mostly ignorant to it.

did you know that ignorant people are also easily offended?

I stopped reading magazines when i was 16 yrs old. I dont know why, just one day i realised everytime i saw a hot girl on the front cover it made me mad that i couldnt look that good. So my solution? Stop reading it. Plus they always had that dirty section in the middle. At 16 who wants to see a mans diddle? Lol seriously...

Ps...im 24 yrs old now

Yes, I do agree with photo retouching because when we see we think that we can we like that but infact it is not possible ...