Truth in Pictures
Newsweek's undead Princess Diana cover puts Photoshop in the crosshairs: Warninglabels next?
Could Photoshop be bad for your health?
According to a decision released this week by the American Medical Association, it just might be.
The AMA states in its release that ubiquitous images present a confusing version of reality for impressionable minds and Photoshopping images "can contribute to unrealistic expectations of appropriate body image." The group links these unrealistic body image disparity with the rampant explosion of eating disorders in adolescents (mostly in young women) in the United States.
The furor over Newsweek's Photoshopped cover of what the magazine imagines Princess Diana would look like at age 50 has only heightened the scrutiny over altering digital image.
The AMA wants ad agencies to begin working with private sector child and adolescent organizations to create a workable set of rules on how ads are created and presented to the general viewing audience. (Whether these two organizations could get along well enough to work together is another matter altogether.)
A similar plan was proposed two years ago in France when parliament member Valerie Boyer suggested that all enhanced media images (including advertisements, press photos, political campaigns, art photography and product packaging) also come with a warning label.
The warning would be similar to the U.S. Surgeon General's Warning that appears on packs of cigarettes here in the States. The phrase, "Photograph retouched to modify the physical appearance of a person" would accompany each retouched image in bold print.
Fifty fellow members of parliament stood in solidarity with Boyer, and the French fashion industry quickly agreed to a charter to refrain from using images that promote "extreme thinness."
Would a measure like the one the AMA suggests fly here in the U.S.? Or would there be a backlash by photographers, models and Americans who are used to seeing our celebrities stick thin and blemish free?
Photoshop has taken some industries to new artistic heights, but let's not forget the tragic missteps of Photoshop overzealousness as well.
Perhaps it is time for a refresher course for the media and Americans on what Photoshop was created for originally: Bringing a subject more into focus, not creating works of fiction.
