It is impossible for an ordinary individual not to be amazed by the cover of a magazine over the course of his entire life. The rules of marketing say that the aspects easily observed by the potential buyers must be eye-catching or else the product risks not being interesting; therefore, it is obvious why a cover magazine is a challenging task even for the best specialists on the market.

A considerable amount of magazines embraced the idea to present, as a selling entity, human profiles or close-up portraits and, to become more appealing, the use of specialized software to manipulate images has become mandatory. Adobe Photoshop gained the respect of designers and almost a new branch of design was created- “photoshoping”. The results are impressive, the designers have managed to display the image of the human perfection, and some works may be, fully provable, catalogued as masterpieces.

Photo credit: dl Q Retouch

Unfortunately, some people have wrongly interpreted the idea of creative human face & body retouching, this is straightforward manipulation and not shots of people who are almost perfect. A designer edits the bodies of men and women from cover magazines, they are maybe stars, but undoubtedly, they aren’t perfect. Thus, a new form of art is somehow regarded as a negative influence because a lot of people, especially youngsters, tried by all means to look like the models seen on the covers. The effects were simple to deduce, meaning serious health problems.

I am sure that a deeper understanding of what a photo manipulation suppose will make people really see the beauty of these and at the same time not to be influenced by it. The misunderstanding of this method makes people form a wrong conception. Usually, people consider that there are two big negative aspects of the human photo retouching:

1.       It is only for money

As I previously said, the cover magazine is a factor in making a product more profitable but it’s stupid to consider that all the designers in this huge world have no conscience and are addicted to money. These creations are appreciated in the same manner as the layouts, the logos, the icons etc., these are nothing more than a .psd file

2.       Create artificial concepts

Another bad interpretation of these kinds of projects is to consider them as living human beings; any of this starts with a human subject, but the final result may be or may not be a man/woman. The correct idea is to consider these as how a designer sees the perfection of a human, it is up to each ones preference, and this is the reason why some finalized projects are compatible with a real person. More pragmatically, some people agree with the concept that human beings are perfect and some are still adding some new features to realize it. Nothing more!

1.       A form of art

I am a great lover of photo manipulation and quite probably, I am subjective, but these projects are truly creative, implies a good aesthetic sense and a lot of creativity. The creator of these must be a good user of Adobe Photoshop (or other applications to alter images) but at the same time a good artist, hence few people can be really good manipulators of photos. People must appreciate them because these projects are very detailed and to finish one many hours/days are needed in order to obtain a good result.

2.        A source of inspiration

The showcases of beautiful photo retouches are some of the most attractive types of posts in the web design related blogosphere. This demonstrates that these are appreciated by people and it seems that may be a good source of inspiration for everyone. If you want to be convinced, look at the images below to understand what quality photo manipulation is all about.

A human face & body manipulation usually, doesn’t have any limitations but there are few capital aspects which must be treated correctly:

1.       Don’t hide the commercial purposes

Many women are envious on the body of the models from cover magazines and they are attempting to look as these but it’s a mistake to believe that someone may turn the corrections of a designer into reality. Personally, I consider that any “photoshopped” image must be specified clearly that is a manipulation and the real person has defects as each human being. In this case, the idea that photo manipulation is baneful can be ignored.

A human retouch doesn’t mean only the increase the size of the breast of a model, it’s shameful and the real specialists disregard this (each one has his own preferences, it isn’t a mistake to apply this idea but clearly, you shouldn’t limit yourself to it). A good retouch process implies a good manipulation of the lights, making impressive shadows, adding a soft skin and clear colors and the result should make people say “wow”.

2.       Pay attention to the age of the subject and of the public

Nowadays, to create more buzz around them, some designers use for the photo manipulation process young people, some of them being almost indecent. These people and their works are a shame for the branch of designers; we have nothing to discuss other than the banning of this kind of attempts.

On the other hand, offering a creative and educative photo manipulation especially for the kids and youngsters, I don’t see any problem. The subject of photo manipulation and the public target must be studied to offer the proper solutions else we can meet unwanted situations, bad both for also the creators and the readers.

At the end, the conclusions are facile to comprehend: the ordinary people must understand that photo manipulation is on the same level as creating websites or other “www” stuff and the creators of these should be aware that their work are influencing the behavior of many people. What is your opinion related to this problem, do you appreciate the human face & body retouch or is it just a fade?

Photo credit – Screamobassistxx

Take a look at these galleries below for more great examples

• Misoa Retouching Gallery
• RA Retouching
• iWanex Studio