The Biggest Retouching Scandals

Retouching is pretty much expected whenever a celebrity or model are doing some kind of photoshoot, it’s becoming more frequent and some celebrities claim they hate it although I think they only hate it when they get caught. Photoshop has made teenagers go under the knife to try and be like their favorite celebrities. Well here are some of the most ridiculous retouching scandals over the past few years.

Kate Winslet

In January 2003, 27-year-old actress Kate Winslet was livid over a slimmed-down image of her already-long legs and board-flat stomach on the cover (and inside, pictured here) of British GQ. Winslet called the retouching “excessive” – noting that “I do not look like that, and more importantly, I don’t desire to look like that.” Not that that mattered to GQ. Said editor Dylan Jones: “We do that for everyone, whether they are a size six or a size 12.”

Katie Couric

No, Katie Couric didn’t discover a miracle diet. But over a four-month period in 2006, as the anchor prepared to take over the CBS Evening News, it suddenly appeared as if the 53-year-old had shrunk to a third of her body weight. The photo at left, snapped in May, was widely circulated to the media as an official CBS publicity shot. Then, in September, a slimmed-down Couric, her face and waistline radically trimmed, appeared in CBS’s in-house magazine, Watch! When the media picked up on the alteration, the network said the retouching job had been the work of an “overzealous” employee. Couric, meanwhile, said she liked the original better. “There’s more of me to love,” she joked.

Beyonce

The many shades of Beyonce, as evidenced by (from left) a 2008 L’Oreal ad, a 2007 cover shot from Joy magazine, and a 2009 image on the cover of Russian Glamour.

Andy Roddick

Men’s Fitness wants to know: How do you build BIG arms in five easy moves? When it comes to Andy Roddick, apparently the answer has more to do with Photoshop than tennis. After posing for this shot in early 2007, tennis superstar Roddick reportedly did a double take when he saw the magazine while walking through a Rome airport – noting that his biceps had been blown into “22-inch guns” and a prominent birthmark on his right arm had been removed. And while a Men’s Fitness spokesman responded to the scandal by saying he didn’t see “the big issue,” Roddick joked that he was “pretty sure I’m not as fit as the [cover] suggests.” Does Hulk Hogan want his arms back?

Faith Hill

Redbook couldn’t have been pleased when an unretouched image of Faith Hill, featured on the magazine’s July 2007 cover, was leaked to the bloggers at Jezebel. In an annotated before-and-after shot, the bloggers pinpointed 11 digital alterations the already picture-perfect Hill underwent before she hit newsstands – next to a cover line teasing the “56 ways to unleash your sexy side.” (Do 55 of them involve airbrushing?) Redbook was accused of contributing to an unattainable body ideal, but editor Stacy Morrison said the picture was “completely in line with industry standards.”

Jessica Alba

From hips to breasts to erasing even the slightest thigh muscle, even Jessica Alba’s body wasn’t good enough for this 2008 Campari calendar. Need we say more?

Real Women

Remember Dove’s 2005 “Real Beauty” campaign – the one that featured a room full of underwear-clad “real” women, love handles and all? The ads took heat because they were created to promote a new line of skin-firming creams but were lauded for their use of authentic, curvy women in print. Which was great for Dove – until a prominent fashion retoucher who’d worked with the company was quoted in The New Yorker describing the “challenge” of retouching the women to keep their “skin and faces showing the mileage but not looking unattractive.” Dove immediately denied that the photos had been retouched – and the retoucher said he’d been taken out of context. But in many ways, the damage was done.

Kim Kardashian

“So what: I have a little cellulite. What curvy girl doesnt!?” That was Kim Kardashian’s response to an unretouched image of her that was mistakenly posted on Complex magazine’s Web site in May 2009. The snapshot – which was quickly replaced by the Photoshopped version – showed that Kim’s waist had been cinched, her thighs slimmed, and her cellulite removed.

Madonna

In April, the blogs went into a minor frenzy after an unretouched version of Madonna’s “Hard Candy” promo shot, released in anticipation of her new album, hit the Web. In it, it’s clear just how far her retouchers went to morph the already good-looking 51-year-old mom into a glowing, ageless wax doll.

Kelly Clarkson

Kelly Clarkson looks trim and adorable in this September issue of Self – under the headline “Total Body Confidence” – except that her “confident” body has been digitally slimmed down. (The image on right was taken around the same time as her magazine shoot.) Two Self editors explained that the cover was not “journalism,” but “meant to inspire women who want to be their best.” Some message.

Lauren Manhattan

This magazine ad for Ralph Lauren, which spurred protests outside Lauren’s Manhattan headquarters in 2009, features 23-year-old model Filippa Hamilton looking positively non-human. At 5 feet 8 and 120 pounds, Hamilton (pictured in another Lauren ad at left) later said that the brand – which ultimately apologized for the image – had quietly fired her for being overweight.

Demi Moore

Demi Moore has long seemed to elude age, while denying that plastic surgery has had anything to do with it. But when the 47-year-old mom appeared on the cover of W Magazine in November 2009, her image sparked widespread discussion. W was adamant that photographers Mert Alas and Marcus Piggot did nothing “unusual or out of the ordinary on Demi Moore,” but many commentators noted that the huge chunk missing from her hip implies otherwise.

Crystal Renn

She is the industry’s best-known plus-size model, and yet Crystal Renn says that she’s constantly bombarded by the same response when she meets people who know her profession: “I thought you’d be bigger.” At 5 feet 9 and a size 12, Renn will defy any notion that retouching is reserved for making women look smaller: her curves are often enhanced to make the “plus-size” model look bigger. “Because I am a plus-size model, they like to make an example,” she told The New York Times. “They see a roll, and they say, ‘Oooh, a roll!’ And they focus on it.”

source: Unattainable Beauty [Newsweek]

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The Biggest Retouching Scandals

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