Rachael Leigh Cook fights Photoshop

Courtesy of Edelman Public Relations

Rachael Leigh Cook, the actress known for her role in the movie "She's All That", has joined Geena Davis in a summit held in D.C. by the Creative Coalition and the Girl Scouts of America to raise awareness about the impact that airbrushed images in the media have on youth. She spoke about her experiences growing up, having her own body image issues..

“I did not grow up getting told about how manipulated the images we see of women and girls out there are, and I think it's an absolute travesty that young women are seeing what the media is feeding them.. It breaks my heart to be part of an industry and part of a machine that really pushes out these images and propagates these really terrible standards that are false.”

Recently, we put up an article of how post production in film has been getting even more advanced and doing some of the things we already do with still photographs, Unreal Future. It seems the problem they're trying to tackle just expanded into areas they're not even aware of. Cook also goes on to say,

via Wikipedia"Nothing that you see is real, even if you look at what looks like a candid photo of someone, anything can be done. It is false advertising and false advertising is a crime so why isn't this a crime? I'm just up in arms about it,” Cook added. “People need to know that there are actual lenses that are put on cameras that make people stretched out. If you saw these actors in person, you wouldn't even recognize them as the people you see on TV. It's just all a complete illusion and maybe it should be viewed as art, the way that art isn't real. The way that a picture of a rose can be beautiful, but it's not a real rose.”

Awareness is probably the best thing that can be done for the youth seeing these images, it really can't be made illegal like false advertising. While cosmetic companies, fashion magazines and workout videos benefit from these images causing a low self image in people,it's the people who ultimately decide if they'll allow the images they see change their own perception of themselves. Children are not only ones susceptible to being deceived by an altered photo. Anyone without an untrained eye could easily miss a professional retouchers handiwork.

It still comes down to the individual and if they will to allow themselves to be manipulated into changing how they perceive themselves. Awareness is important, but it's about all that can be done. Airbrushing techniques are just going to get more and more advanced and it shows no sign of stopping. It's only a bad thing if you allow it to be, because beauty is still in the eye of the beholder. After all, it's just in the name of art, right?

Product Photography: Jo Handbags

Here a few photos from a recent product shoot we had for Jo Handbags. We covered their current line for the season. You can find their products at a number of different boutiques in the country. It was an interesting shoot that involved a lot more creativity than the photos themselves give away. You can tell by the behind the scenes photo, it wasn't very simple and straight forward.

Camera settings: We took everything with a wide open aperture f/8-13. We put use to the 100mm macro and used a max sync speed of 1/160th. We took the larger mannequin photo with the 70-200mm f/2.8 lens.

Joanna Jojo Levesque Shoot

Last month, we posted that Shukmei of WeRoqq PR managed to get us a nice write up on Just Jared Jr. website of our bracelet photo shoot for She's The First with Interscope recording artist, Joanna "Jojo" Levesque. The shoot started with us taking product photography of the She's The First bracelets designed by Asha Patel. We then took photos with Jojo wearing the bracelets. The shoot was fun and laid back since Jojo is very easy going and a pleasure to be around. Our team for that day was also amazingly efficient. We ended with a PSA in which Jojo spoke about why she supports She's The First. We got it in only three takes, giving us time to have a little fun and take a few group shots to end the shoot. If you would like to support She's the First and wear one of these bracelets, you can get one from She's The First gifts.

From left to right: Jeff Chastain (hair), Franklyn Bonfante (CI), Tammy Tibbetts (STF), Reinaldo Irizarry (stylist), Jojo, Chris Vongsawat (CI), Cynthia Hellen (STF), Ivy Ermert (MUA)

Camera Settings: Product was taken with a Canon EF 100mm f/2.8 Macro USM Lens; Jojo's photos, the PSA video and group shots were taken with the Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L II IS USM Telephoto Zoom Lens. The video was recorded at 24fps at 1/50 shutter.

Atomic Tom in the Subway

Since recently completing our first music video, I've been looking at ways people having been getting viral buzz from their music videos. A cool music video you may or may not have seen was taken in the NYC subway on what seems to be an iPhone. The band Atomic Tom, had their equipment recently stolen. But because of their desire to jam and their ability to improvise, they actually made something worth watching. Production values aside, their concept for the video was actually the coolest part. I'm familiar with some of the apps they used to perform the piece so it's nice to see that they can be used for actual improvisational performances.

Headshots: Scott Gofta

Unreal Future

Here are two videos demonstrating some new incredible post-production software that really takes video doctoring to a whole new level.

MovieReshape is a post-production system being developed in Germany that seems to use adjustable 3D models as a basis for deforming a 2D moving image allowing for the readjustment of body shape in post.

Diminished reality, as opposed to augmented reality, refers to effects that remove objects from the view in real-time video. This video demonstrates such an effect, which also happens to have been developed in Germany, by Jan Herling and Wolfgang Broll of the Ilmenau University of Technology's Department of Virtual Worlds / Digital Games (link in German).

While there's nothing new about computer generated visual effects, looking at these two techniques makes me wonder what amount of unreality we will be willing to expect and accept in future media. I imagine that most people already assume, and rightly so, that every commercial image they see is retouched in some way beyond mere adjustments to color, contrast, and brightness.

Am I just going to assume in ten years that all the bodies I see in big budget movies have been reshaped? Will I expect most videos I watch to have been doctored so that elements have been removed?

I was pretty surprised seeing the anti-aging effects in X-Men: The Last Stand. Check out these images from fxguide.com showing a before and after shot of how they made Patrick Stewart look 25 years younger in post-production:

If you've seen the movie, the effect is very convincing. But this is an extreme example. I wonder where this effect has been used more discreetly to hide age?

Lastly, as someone who shoots video, I wonder when this sort of manipulation becomes a standard part of my workflow. I already retouch headshots and commercial images. If anti-aging, body reshaping, and diminished reality techniques ever become easily accessible in your standard off the shelf editing software, how will that effect how I work? What will be expected from me as a professional image maker?

How unreal will my images need to be?

Headshots: Kelsea Brennan

Headshots: Michael Cotton

We took this one just messing around doing Zoolander faces.  I thought it was pretty funny!  

Headshots: Ted Lewis

Taking Photos Without Looking

Check out this video of photo enthusiast Joe Wigfall talking about how he shoots street photography without bringing the camera to his eye! He brings up a lot of good points about some of the advantages to doings so.

I sometimes used a similar approach when I was in Afghanistan, and even today with some of the event coverage I do. I find that sometimes you HAVE to shoot this way if people are particularly aware of you and your presence changes the way they behave. Of course it's harder to do this indoors when it's darker and you need to open up your aperture, which makes your depth of field narrower and the focus much critical, and if you're shooting with a flash--well, good luck.

But try it out! Let me know if you get any interesting results!