The Photoshop Effect

This week we had a chance to look at and analyze a few ads by

Channel and Abercrombie. We identified the signifiers present

in the images and speculated on the meanings they signified.

But what we did not mention is the fact that most of those ads

are retouched. In other words, their 'real', that is, natural form is

most often altered by a so called retoucher, who uses editing

software like Photoshop to achieve a 'better' effect.

While some people argue that this kind of electronic retouching

is another way of enhancing beauty, similar to makeup, others

accuse photographers, retouchers and people photographed

of deception. It is true that young people aspire to celebrities

and stars, who constantly appear on various magazines. They

strive and invest to achieve the same, sophisticated look, but

what they fail to realize is that these 'motivational' images do

not correspond to reality. They correspond to a distorted version

of it. As the photographer interviewed in the video above

asserts, 99.9 % of photos published today are retouched, yet

these photos and ads serve the purpose of setting standards

for what the ideal body must look like. They create artificial

signifiers, which in turn produce misleading signifieds.

This also challenges Pierce's theory about iconic signs. In the

case of digital photography and digital editing, the signifier

does not resemble the referent, rather the referent photographed

and the referent that appears on the image after post-production

substantially differ from one another.

In conclusion, to solve this problem, some people offer to

include disclaimers next to images, which will indicate to what

degree they have been retouched. An idea similar to including

ingredients on products themselves. However, this still remains

only an idea at this point.