Air brushed pictures

wriglucy
wriglucy Posts: 1,064 Member
edited September 18 in Health and Weight Loss
So..I know that models are all air brushed to look good. But, does anyone know much air brushing is done on the models in Self magazine? They are all about being healthy and happy as yourself, so do you think they air brush the girls a lot? The reason I ask is because I cut out a pic or 2 of a healthy looking girl, and put it on my fridge, and one on my treadmill, kind of as motivation as to what I want to look like. I'm just wondering if they are real people, or fake and air brushed.

Does anyone else use anything cool for motivation?

Replies

  • wriglucy
    wriglucy Posts: 1,064 Member
    So..I know that models are all air brushed to look good. But, does anyone know much air brushing is done on the models in Self magazine? They are all about being healthy and happy as yourself, so do you think they air brush the girls a lot? The reason I ask is because I cut out a pic or 2 of a healthy looking girl, and put it on my fridge, and one on my treadmill, kind of as motivation as to what I want to look like. I'm just wondering if they are real people, or fake and air brushed.

    Does anyone else use anything cool for motivation?
  • icandoit
    icandoit Posts: 4,163 Member
    A picture of me in a swimsuit. If that doesn't motivate me to lose weight, than nothing will.
  • AJCM
    AJCM Posts: 2,169 Member
    Self magazine - I would assume ALL images are HIGHLY altered - head to toe.

    Years ago I worked for a very small lingerie company, and when we produced our flyers, all the images were "photo shopped" (they no longer air brush - but I bet with the rapid changes in technology "photo shopping" is also dead technology!) and we were a very small company with a very small budget.

    In all of the images skin colour was altered, smoothed out, shaded to create slimmer contours and "abs", torsos and legs were lengthened, faces thinned out and colours enhanced, and hair made shinny, with every fly away removed...

    Check out this eye opening "Dove Evolution" video to show you just what happens in the "creation of beauty"... let me know what you think! :smile:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hibyAJOSW8U
  • ali106
    ali106 Posts: 3,754 Member
    I think they are probably too....BUT I've seen people in some serious shape in real life and I used to be in pretty tip top shape myself and in my early 30's sooo it can be done (again hopefully lol)

    I say use the pics...just think of it as you! I have a great pic of me in a two peice on my honeymoon omg...I can't even believe I didn't feel comfy in one, I looked really good LOL i was goofing w/ my hubby doing a body builder pose at the pool so it shows muscles and toneness...sigh....hindsight is the best! I have that one on my mirror in my bedroom and everymorning I look at it and say...this time I'll appreciate it more and it will last!!!

    hugs and good luck! use what works for ya!
    Ali
  • wriglucy
    wriglucy Posts: 1,064 Member
    Wow..that website was ...wow. Anybody could be a model!! I was looking at celebrities without their makeup....and some of them are pretty ugly. From now on....I am soooo having a different outlook on models.
    Thanks for the site!
  • AJCM
    AJCM Posts: 2,169 Member
    Kristin - it's amazing isn't it? I just found another Dove video about young girls and the influence of the media... ugh... it was heartbreaking (I have a 14 month old daughter so everything is changed)....

    With that said - I too use Self and Shape as "inspiration" and just take it all with a grain of salt! Love the ideas of the pics on the treadmill!
    :smile: :smile: :smile:
  • Helawat
    Helawat Posts: 605 Member
    Everything is photoshopped in magazines. In fact, I photoshop my own pictures before sending them off to relatives.

    I'm so sneaky!
  • jenbar
    jenbar Posts: 1,038 Member
    I'm a Graphic Artist and I too "fix" myself!
    I had a picture of my stomach when I was pregnant with my hubby next to it kissing it and because I was framing it I airbrushed all the stretch marks off!

    also I made myself skinny in one of my honeymoon pics (and believe me if I only had that body NOW!)
  • greysweatshirt
    greysweatshirt Posts: 411
    My partner is a photographer/retoucher..I can't believe some of the things he can do with pictures! It's amazing! In fact, my picture was taken by him!
  • AJCM
    AJCM Posts: 2,169 Member
    Helawat and Jbaranello - if I had your abilities I would be unrecongnizable! I'd fix everything! ... :tongue: (so IS photoshop still the software used?... just curious)

    Grey - your pic did look proffesional - makes sense if your partner is a photog! :smile:
  • banks1850
    banks1850 Posts: 3,475 Member
    Oh it is. Because photoshop has evolved along with time. It can do more now then you could have with it then.
  • Carolwd
    Carolwd Posts: 18
    I'm curious just like AJCM...do you use photoshop? and is there a version you prefer? I am a hobby "artist" and have just a good version of printmaster...and can change quite a bit in photos...but can't do cool things like whiten teeth or add a person into the picture....etc. What do you recommend? (Thanks... I know this is totally off the topic of losing weight but would love your professional insight!)
  • jenbar
    jenbar Posts: 1,038 Member
    Yes, I use Photoshop. One year we had taken our family portrait on the beach and my 8 month old had his tongue out in one of the pictures and was kicking sand, so I took his head off another photo and plopped in on the body of the better photo and removed the flying sand! You never knew unless I told someone! It's a fun application.
  • banks1850
    banks1850 Posts: 3,475 Member
    Photoshop is pretty intense. There is a lite version called photoshop elements, better for the "amateur" photo editor. The problem is, Photoshop CS3 is like 500 Bucks. Elements is only like $90 or $100 but still, it's not cheap. I think they have a trial download for both of them at the adobe website. I found elements to be very good, albeit a little complicated to use, which would, I assume, make CS3 crazy hard.

    There is a free alternative. It's called GIMP. It's opensource (I.E. free for home or non-commercial use), and by almost every account and review, just as good as Photoshop. How? You may ask. Well folks, there is a whole big world out there called open source. It's a giant community of developers that make stuff like LINUX, UNIX, GIMP, ...etc almost every software or OS out there has an open source equivalent. I'm serious. And since it is open source, millions of programmers can download and fix the code to fix bugs. So most open source products have less bugs then things like Photoshop (although adobe has pretty rigid quality control, so that's usually not an issue).
    Here is the download link for gimp if you want to try it. It has similar requirements to Photoshop CS3 though, so if you think you can run it on some off the shelf, every day, low video card quality computer, you may be a little dissapointed, it requires a lot of ram and processing power.

    http://www.gimp.org/about/introduction.html
  • AJCM
    AJCM Posts: 2,169 Member
    You guys are talented on the computer... I think Photo Shop is to challending! if I can download my pics, and save them to the right folders, I feel like a techy!
    :wink:
  • yoginimary
    yoginimary Posts: 6,788 Member
    Photoshop is pretty intense. There is a lite version called photoshop elements, better for the "amateur" photo editor. The problem is, Photoshop CS3 is like 500 Bucks. Elements is only like $90 or $100 but still, it's not cheap. I think they have a trial download for both of them at the adobe website. I found elements to be very good, albeit a little complicated to use, which would, I assume, make CS3 crazy hard.

    There is a free alternative. It's called GIMP. It's opensource (I.E. free for home or non-commercial use), and by almost every account and review, just as good as Photoshop. How? You may ask. Well folks, there is a whole big world out there called open source. It's a giant community of developers that make stuff like LINUX, UNIX, GIMP, ...etc almost every software or OS out there has an open source equivalent. I'm serious. And since it is open source, millions of programmers can download and fix the code to fix bugs. So most open source products have less bugs then things like Photoshop (although adobe has pretty rigid quality control, so that's usually not an issue).
    Here is the download link for gimp if you want to try it. It has similar requirements to Photoshop CS3 though, so if you think you can run it on some off the shelf, every day, low video card quality computer, you may be a little dissapointed, it requires a lot of ram and processing power.

    http://www.gimp.org/about/introduction.html

    Geek. :wink:

    Speaking of free ware, NeoOffice for Mac and OpenOffice for PC are very good too.
    http://www.neooffice.org/neojava/en/index.php
    http://download.openoffice.org/index.html
  • filergirl
    filergirl Posts: 240
    Self? Air-brushed? Definitely.

    I'd recommend clipping a bunch of paprazzi photos of celebrities in bathing suits / without makeup. You'll notice they're far from perfect. They have sagging skin, cellulite, and sun damage just like everyone else, only they're (mostly) thinner.
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