Image Manipulation - Has it gone to far?
After viewing the Dove movie in class, read the article on Image Alteration, from CBS Sunday morning and respond to the two questions below by typing a paragraph for each one.
1. After watching the ad created by Dove and learning more of the features of Adobe Photoshop and how to alter photographs, how do you feel about many of the images that you see in magazines? What messages are the advertising agencies and companies who pay to run these ads trying to send? How does it affect you as an individual, as a teenager, as a society?
2. Based on the article from CBS Sunday morning, what did you think of the photo of Senator John Kerry with Jane Fonda as it was used in the presidential campaign- how does this affect us?
After viewing the Dove movie in class, read the article on Image Alteration, from CBS Sunday morning and respond to the two questions below by typing a paragraph for each one.
1. After watching the ad created by Dove and learning more of the features of Adobe Photoshop and how to alter photographs, how do you feel about many of the images that you see in magazines? What messages are the advertising agencies and companies who pay to run these ads trying to send? How does it affect you as an individual, as a teenager, as a society?
2. Based on the article from CBS Sunday morning, what did you think of the photo of Senator John Kerry with Jane Fonda as it was used in the presidential campaign- how does this affect us?
1. I feel that many of the photographs in magazines are sending the wrong signal. The people in the photos really do not look perfect as they appear in magazines or billboards. When the ad companies run there ads i feel it is showing teens and individuals the wrong impression of celebrities and normal people. Nobody looks 'perfect' like they make the celebrities in there ads. It affects teens by making them think they need to try to look like that fake 'perfect'.
ReplyDelete2. Because the picture of Senator John Kerry with Jane Fonda was actually two different photos, it shows false advertising. It shows that they were trying to have the public see something that really was not happening. I feel it could be called false advertising.
Tyra Gefroh
1) I personally think that everything that is advertised is sending out one main message; Use this product and be perfect. The "false advertising" complaint always comes into play. To me I don't really mind it. If I think it will actually work I will get it, If not I won't.
ReplyDelete2) I don't have a lot of opinions about politics but I feel that politics are a huge part of this country and shouldn't be tampered with.
1. As a person gets older they begin to realize that the pictures that we see everyday are far from the original. However, when we are young we can not seem to wrap our minds around it. By not beginning able to understand this concept that is how people create mental/physical disorders. With these images people believe that this is how a person has to look in order to succeed in life. In result a person could then form OCD issues as well as several others. There are even some cases where a person has become so obsessed with this image of the "perfect body" it has resulted in death. I realize that the people in this world are in it to make money. But it is similar to the cigarette companies where if they can profit from someone losing their life they are OK with it. This makes the world look extremely selfish in my opinion.
ReplyDelete2.Senator John Kerry with Jane Fonda and the "fake" picture. Personally, I am not big in to politics. So if I was viewing that paper, I don't know if I would of cared or even noticed for that matter. But in this case where I was able to read about it makes we wonder about all those gossip magazines. Are they true? Or did they use Photoshop as well? Did that actor really gain all that weight? The situation that we find our self in is false advertisement. This is wrong and it should not happen. However, we can't really control it.
Becky Schuldt
In this day and age, you can never know if a photo is real or not. Tons of things can be done to make a picture look better. This happens especially with celebrities. And as teenagers, we look up to those "perfect" celebrities and try to be just like them. The celebrities look skinny...so we starve ourselves to become just like them. Their skin is perfect, so we go out and buy every product humanly possible. This is sending the wrong message. Being "perfect" is not the only way to be beautiful.
ReplyDeleteUsing things such as that photo in political races just seems like a dirty way to get ahead. Although it was fake, not everyone may know that it is. Photoshop is great for enhancing photos...but sometimes it just gets out of hand.
1. i feel all the comments posted have hit the nail on the head and it's unnecessary to build on that perspective anymore. i do agree that the reality of what we saw on the dove commercial is kind of shocking, but it's a beauty product for women and they're portraying someone idealistically - much like they used to do in old paintings that we talk about in art history. ad design is my major and i think touching up photos is my favorite. to me the fact that the pictures of people in magazines aren't original is fine - i'm not affected by it. if there are teenagers or any other people that are that's really too bad because it's 2011 and CS5 just came out - i don't think anyone's going to stop now! =]
ReplyDelete2. i think the picture of john kerry and jane fonda is incredibly strange...i don't keep up with politics what so ever, but i bet they wish that wouldn't have happened and even more so that people wouldn't have figured it out. kudos to whoever photoshop'd them in there together though - i gotta learn how to do that!
1. Advertising agencies just go for what looks perfect and what is going to grab the viewers eyes towards there products. By using photoshop, they what they believe the perfect person should look like if they use there Dove products. I think some advertising companies are sending mixed messages to there viewers about how things really are in the world. No lotion out there has the power to fix every blemish, wrinkle or aged face that you see. There is always going to be at least some imperfection that we are going to have to deal with, but that is just life.
ReplyDelete2. I think the picture of John Kerry and Jane Fonda is weird, I don't follow politics very much as well. Using photoshop doesn't seem like it would be the right thing to do when running in a political race. Seems like it would be an easy way to manipulate someone in a bad way.
1.Advertising agencies are telling us that it is not alright, unless we like this certain way or dress like this. It does not help at all that the models are perfect in every way. They have perfect skin, hair that always fall the right way and close that fit them perfectly. This sends the wrong signals to everyone!
ReplyDelete2.Once it cam public that this was two different photos, I believe that it has given those who work with photos, a bad name.
1. Personally, I hate the fact that the advertising world has taken this medium from fixing pimples and blemishes to reworking the idea of images into something else entirely. As much as I love some of the creativity and fine tuning that this work requires. But, it has twisted the public's view of beauty and made the idea of perfection impossibly graspable.
ReplyDelete2. Just like with the rest of journalism - there are boundaries. Fabrication of the news, even past news, is wrong. Its false journalism and we shouldn't lower ourselves to it, no matter what is happening in the political realm.
Businesses are going to do what will make money. If that means digitally touching up photos, then that's what they will do, unless an overwhelming negative reaction to the methods used outweighs the benefits gained from running the ads. Even dove's anti-touch-up commercial is intended to sell dove products. They believe that being known as the company that doesn't do photoshop is the most efficient way to increase sales.
ReplyDeleteIts good that the photo-manipulators who were caught were fired. News photos that are retouched to alter actual events are unethical, and I am glad that there are ways to tell if a photo has been retouched.
After seeing the dove video, I have a completely different opinion on photos in magazines. It is clear that what we are seeing is nothing close to reality and our perception of celebrities being flawless and perfect is obviously incorrect. I feel that the message trying to be depicted is that if we use their products we ourselves may become better looking a flawless. I feel like these photos have a largely negative impact on today's society because they give everyone a poor feeling about themselves and make us feel inferior.
ReplyDeleteI feel like the photo changes what we as viewers should believe. If a picture like that can surface and appear so real, we cannot believe every thing we see because photos can be altered in such a drastic fashion that it completely changes everything.
1) I don't expect the images represented in ads to represent the real world. Most images have been altered so much that nothing represents reality, so finding out the people have been altered doesn't surprise me. I don't take much stock in the images I see in ads, so seeing a unrealistic person representing a product doesn't effect me much.
ReplyDelete2) The image of John Kerry and Jane Fonda shows us what is possible with photoshop but doesn't really affect what our reality is. Even if they weren't in that shot, that doesn't change the actual facts of campaign.
1) I thought the dove commercial was pretty good on introducing people to Photoshop. I also think that now everybody knows that billboards, magazines and etc...aren't the real person that is being advertised because they are making adjustments to them and making them look more realistic.I like to see who the real person is sometimes but I guess if they have to make adjustments to them to show off their product than photoshop is the best way to do it.
ReplyDelete2) I think they over did the John Kerry and Jane Fonda because its making the people who did the photo look bad. It just seems to be fake and making it a false advertisement.
I always knew that images in magazines were digitally altered, however after watching the Dove video I was amazed at some of the extents they go to. I think that in a creative/artistic way, the features of photoshop are really interesting and cool to experiment with if; however in terms of portraying "realism" ads in magazines are clearly distorting the image of beauty. They are completely altering some women's looks when they don't even need to. So I think it depends on the context for how I feel about photoshop adjustments.
ReplyDeleteI think the John Kerry and Jane Fonda photo was a little silly. In today's day and age with technology you can't get away with false advertising to that extent anymore, so it was kind of ridiculous that they even tried to create something that was documented in the media and people would know didnt happen. However it is another impressive example of the power of Photoshop.