That's Fit

The Dove Campaign For Real Beauty has been based upon the idea that, while our bodies might have flaws (real or perceived), we're all beautiful. It's a good message, and they're looking to boost the self-esteem of females of all ages, starting with young girls. I'm all for it -- it's important that women realize that they don't need to be able to trade clothes with their favorite actress or be stalked by paparazzi in order to be beautiful.

However, some discussion has recently surfaced saying that the women in the Real Beauty ads were retouched. Premiere retoucher, Pascal Dangin, told The New Yorker that there was a great deal of retouching done on those ads, "But it was great to do, a challenge, to keep everyone's skin and faces showing the mileage but not looking unattractive."

What do you think about this development? I can't say I'm surprised -- I appreciate the fact that Dove still used women of different shapes and sizes. I mean, these are regular women being photographed and filmed in their undies! I can't say I would object to a little digital help were I in their position. But, others feel that it destroys the message -- they're not showing "real" beauty if there's retouching. What do you think?

I recently saw this video on Back in the Skinny Jeans and when I checked it out on YouTube, and was surprised (and a bit dismayed) to see that there are many similar videos showing how easy it is to make someone look skinnier in Photoshop or Paintshop.

I work as a photographer too and I know how to take a few pounds off the subject of a photo. Do I? Hardly ever, because when I make an adjustment like that, to me, the photo is no longer of something real -- it's a product of technology. Photos are meant to capture real life -- when you change it to resemble what you'd like to see, it becomes a sort of cartoon, don't you think?

What do you think? Is any beauty in the media these days real? Is that a good thing or a bad thing?

Off all the women's magazines out there, I've always thought that Glamour was one of the more reputable ones. They seem to tackle issues of global importance and, at least in most of the issues I've read, were quick to emphasize healthy lifestyles over looking good at any cost.

But regardless of where they stand on such issues, they're still joining countless other magazines who crop images of their cover models to make them look impossibly thin. The latest victim is Ugly Betty star America Ferrera. I think there's no question that they cropped the image of her -- just look at those arms. They are certainly not proportional to the rest of the body.

I understand that thin sells more magazines than frumpy, but Ferrera is the furthest thing from frumpy -- she's gorgeous and talented and fully deserving of a spot on the cover as is. Don't you agree?

While the controversy is raging over touching up photos to make them look impossibly perfect, there's another set of controversial photos floating around the Internet, but this time it's the opposite problem -- it's thought that photos of Victoria Beckham have been photoshopped to make her look worse, not better.

Check out these photos of Victoria Beckham (or, more specifically, Victoria Beckham's cellulite) and let me know what you think. Are those really her legs? Can she have that much cellulite and be as skinny as she is? Victoria's friends say she doesn't exercise at all--instead she keeps slim by eating next to nothing--so she might be missing all-important muscle mass. But really, those legs look like they belong to a 90-year-old.

Faith Hill is on the cover of Redbook this month, and it's generating a lot of controversy. It seems that the image that appears on the cover was majorly touched-up -- any signs of wrinkles were removed and a bunch of flesh was skimmed off her arms (click here to see a comparison of the photos on Diet Blog.)

What do you think of the photos? I think she looks great before the touch-ups -- she looks much more natural. Her arms in the 'after' picture look impossibly small. And Faith Hill is unbelievably gorgeous and quite thin without any airbrushing -- why do they feel the need to make her look more perfect, more slender? Why mess with perfection?