NOTRE DAME UNI ON PHOTOSHOP LAW

There is an interesting article on Photoshop manipulation in regard to eating disorders of women, by Fremantle Notre Dame University School of Law lecturer Marilyn Krawitz in In Principo, the University’s magazine.

Ms Krawitz reports on the Photoshop Law in Israel that requires female models to have a minimum BMI of 18.5, and when photographers or magazines manipulate photos to make models look thinner, they have to include a warning that covers at least seven percent of the photo.

I quite agree that excessive photo manipulation needs to be recorded  somehow, as many photos are drastically changed in PS and other software, and that alters the reality of photos that will be seen as historic documentation by future generations.  The Photoshop ‘reality’ is in fact fake reality because things that were in the original photos might have been taken out, or things could have been added.

There is another issue for me. While eating disorder in young women is serious, the manipulation of innocent children under 15 in fashion photography is equally disturbing to me. Girls are made up and dressed up to look sexy,and are photographed in seductive poses and plastered on magazine covers as some kind of sex bombs, and that is absolutely unacceptable.

Every photo we take is the recording of our history and we need to be aware of that at all times. The overuse of Photoshop and other similar software often is a tool to hide bad and mediocre photography.

Roel Loopers