so-called 'portrait professional' software ethics

[fotobiblios]

I don't think they advertise on this forum, but ads are currently appearing on many other photography sites for a retouching software called 'portrait professional':

no doubt the software is very clever and usable, but --- the ads show befores and afters of many women --- am I the only one who thinks all the befores are much more attractive than the afters?

quite apart from any ethical/personal-political issues, the 'befores' just look like real attractive people, whereas to me the 'afters' look like the creation of some immature youth who doesn't actually get out and see how interesting people can be

danny

 

[jsrockit]

This kind of stuff always rubs me the wrong way too, but a lot of money is made off of illusion and idealized versions of beauty. I've let it go... meaning letting it get to me. It's a losing battle.

 

[dazedgonebye]

Plastic is in.

Funny "Fotoshop" ad.

http://vimeo.com/34813864

 

[nikon_sam]

Self-Centered people don't want Reality they want the Fantasy and this gives it to them...
Take a good look at any of the Fashion magazines out there...I would venture to guess that 100% of the photos in them have been retouched to some degree and mostly at the request of the person or their PR people...
There are many out there that want to appear as perfect as possible...they want to look like the people in the magazines...
I prefer looking at real pictures...not retouched plastic looking faces...
If the subject doesn't look good in the original photo then the photographer didn't do his/her job right in the first place...

 

[batterytypehah!]

I have the same reaction to those before/after ads -- plus it's just plain creepy -- but I'm with jsrockit, why let it get to you? I just grin and think, guys, you're wasting your ad budget.

 

[NickTrop]

This is a philisophical question that I think is summed up nicely in this review of the software...


...portraiture has always been about flattery. The artist's job has always been to "convey the subject's personality."

http://www.imaging-resource.com/SOFT/PORTPRO/PORTPRO.HTM

This review continues with a quote from the authors of the software:

"Essentially we now had a sparse representational model of human faces," CEO Andrew Berend told us, "that could be trained in beauty by being shown hundreds of well-shot, well-lit photographs of beautiful and not so beautiful people. All the software was told for any given face was 'this is beautiful' and 'this is not beautiful.'"...This means that once a few points on the face have been identified, a user can add attractiveness to a particular face simply by moving sliders. The clever bit is how the software retains the person's identity while subtly improving their appearance.

"It's very easy to make someone more beautiful by simply morphing them towards a beautiful person such as Jessica Alba -- but this progressively destroys their identity as they become more like Alba and less like themselves. We avoid this and can subtly enhance many aspects of a persons appearance while retaining their identity really well."


I'm not familiar with this software but it appears we now have a "beauty slider" that synthesises your mug with that of a beautiful face - most likely shifting nose, eye, and mouth postion along with head shape (guessing) in addition to the usual stuff - smoothing skin, whiting teeth, removing blemishes, eliminating that goiter, etc.

Hmmm... Not sure whether I'm okay with this or not but if I was trolling for dates online this might be a worthwhile tool. (And obviously I didn't use this for my avatar here...)

 

[dazedgonebye]

Actually, it sounds like it might be fun.

Run my picture through to see what changes it would make to make me "beautiful."

I'm betting my before and after would be identical. 🙂

 

[shadowfox]

I don't think they advertise on this forum, but ads are currently appearing on many other photography sites for a retouching software called 'portrait professional':

no doubt the software is very clever and usable, but --- the ads show befores and afters of many women --- am I the only one who thinks all the befores are much more attractive than the afters?

quite apart from any ethical/personal-political issues, the 'befores' just look like real attractive people, whereas to me the 'afters' look like the creation of some immature youth who doesn't actually get out and see how interesting people can be

danny

It takes time and effort to "grow" the appreciation towards authentic portraiture.

Most people in the world don't care to spend the time nor the effort.

Unfortunately, portrait photographers had to work with these people as customers.

So, like Steve said: 'Plastic' look becomes the trend.

 

[Turtle]

I can't stand it, but understand the will of the customer is paramount. It is up to the photographe to decide where he or she stands and to each his own.

 

[fotobiblios]

Thanks for checking this out NickTrop --

When you see a portrait from great photographer like H C-B or Eugene Smith or --, or -- yes the artist's job may be, among other things, to 'convey the subject's personality' - that seems a million miles away from 'always being about flattery' - in the latter caseI would hesitate to call the portraitist an artist.

If the examples are meant to be what CEO Berent calls subtle ---- I'm lost for words.

I do like your avatar, nick - I think if I put my portrait and pushed the slider somewhat toward Tom Waits or William Burroughs, I'd get something similar, but I think I'll go for 11 on the Samuel Beckett (by Brassai) or Giacometti (by H C-B) scale.

I'm not being naive (I do look at the fashion, and, worse, celeb, mags in waiting rooms etc) but I was just struck by how much better these people looked before applying the beauty slider.

stay cool
danny

 

[tbarker13]

I detest the plastic look. Don't want to know how it's done. Don't want to do it.
I shoot a ton of people. For those sessions where it's all about making someone look good, I'm happy to do minor retouching - eliminating blemishes, softening wrinkles, lightening the dark circles around the eyes, etc.

If I were doing an honest portrait of someone, I'd probably just leave it alone. If you have wrinkles, you have wrinkles. I'd still probably be OK with getting rid of something that's not permanent - an unwanted pimple, for example.

 

[f6andBthere]

Not for me but I can see how it exists in a world where cosmetic surgery, excessive tooth whitening, tinted contact lenses etc etc are par for the course.

Human beings (westerners now in particular) have been dissatisfied with their appearances since they first caught a glimps of their own reflections in the first pool of water they stumbled over when they emerged from their caves.

What a vain bunch we are! 😛

 

[noimmunity]

Well, I think there is definitely room for philosophical reflection on this phenomenon. Image is one of the principal ways that we collectively engage in the enormous plasticity of the human. Given the range of new technologies that enable vast intervention in and manipulation of human plasticity, the images that people have of who they want to become are less and less fantasy and more and more blueprints for actual tinkering.

Sounds like the software is doing, albeit much more efficiently, what statistics has been doing for centuries: reducing human beings to a "population" with normalized characteristics. What the software brings to the table is the synthetic power of the image. That is a very potent mixture.

I feel that there is at the base an ethical argument that as harmless and silly as such software appears, its use could very easily "train" or "habituate" one's sensibilities to process anthropological difference in ways that favor extreme normalization.

In this day and age, we are really really desperately in need of the opposite kind of training, one that would enable an entirely different vision of what anthropological difference means.

 

[Leigh Youdale]

I don't think they advertise on this forum, but ads are currently appearing on many other photography sites for a retouching software called 'portrait professional':

no doubt the software is very clever and usable, but --- the ads show befores and afters of many women --- am I the only one who thinks all the befores are much more attractive than the afters?

quite apart from any ethical/personal-political issues, the 'befores' just look like real attractive people, whereas to me the 'afters' look like the creation of some immature youth who doesn't actually get out and see how interesting people can be

danny

Nah! It's just your age showing.

 

[NickTrop]

Thanks for checking this out NickTrop --
I think if I put my portrait and pushed the slider somewhat toward Tom Waits or William Burroughs, I'd get something similar, but I think I'll go for 11 on the Samuel Beckett (by Brassai) or Giacometti (by H C-B) scale.

HA!!!!!!!!*

*(Extra !'s added to meet 10 character minimum post requirement)

 

[cabbiinc]

I worked at one studio that used PP and I know someone else (via the internet) on the other side of the U.S. that works for a studio that uses it. I've also seen immature people abuse the program and frankly butcher the portrait. It doesn't do anything that you can't do in Photoshop or other editing programs, and people have been doing this type of editing for a while. Even before digital.

If you get hung up on the tools, the process, or the "original intent" then it's not for you. If you see it as a tool to achieve what you need then it is. It's a tool, nothing more.

Regards
Dan

 

[dcsang]

I wonder if you guys feel the same way about Zeiss softars... or any other filter that affects the "true image".

Curious,
Dave

 

[Roger Hicks]

I wonder if you guys feel the same way about Zeiss softars... or any other filter that affects the "true image".

Curious,
Dave

Dear Dave,

Quite.

Frances's favourite portrait of herself was made with a Thambar. As she says, "It's the way I see myself in dreams: every age and no age."

There are many kinds of portraits, and absolutism about which kind is 'best' is back to asking which flavour of ice-cream is better.

Cheers,

R.

 

[damien.murphy]

Dear Dave,

Quite.

Frances's favourite portrait of herself was made with a Thambar. As she says, "It's the way I see myself in dreams: every age and no age."

There are many kinds of portraits, and absolutism about which kind is 'best' is back to asking which flavour of ice-cream is better.

Cheers,

R.

Yes, and this brings this debate to the crux of the matter for me - that of passing off such manipulated portraits as the normal way in which these people look. It's a dangerous practice, and know its being going on for a long time, but I honestly feel retouched portraits for publication or advertising purposes should come with disclaimers disclosing the manipulation. Even if the advertiser or publisher does not explicitly state that these are what these people look like, there is an implied assumption by the masses that it is, who gobble it up whole and usually ask for seconds.

I agree with the normalisation argument also, as this constant image of a normalised world, be it people who look perfect, or fruit which is of a specific variety or size, is not reality, let alone my own personal preference for life with a bit of bite or character. The homogenisation of the world at its core really does break down culture I feel, as a capitalist market-fuelled ideal of being able to swap products into and out of markets and countries with ease, with no real difference between what consumers in Germany or Ireland or America or anywhere demand, having been educated/ conditioned to demand the same things.

I'm not a bleeding heart liberal, nor an anti-capitalist, but I do like variety and despise this erosion of it, even if the insidious argument of 'greater choice' is foisted upon us to argue otherwise. Also, as someone who enjoys taking portraits, I appreciate everyones demand to look good, but this trend towards identical perfection disturbs me.

 

[sreed2006]

I don't think they advertise on this forum, but ads are currently appearing on many other photography sites for a retouching software called 'portrait professional':

no doubt the software is very clever and usable, but --- the ads show befores and afters of many women --- am I the only one who thinks all the befores are much more attractive than the afters?

quite apart from any ethical/personal-political issues, the 'befores' just look like real attractive people, whereas to me the 'afters' look like the creation of some immature youth who doesn't actually get out and see how interesting people can be

danny

The 'after' pictures appear to me to be suitable for use in an advertisement, selling the latest product with an attractive person to draw your attention to the advertisement, and not suitable as an actual portrait.

If I took anyone I know in for a portrait and got something like the 'after' back, where the end result doesn't even look like the real live person, I would be pretty upset. So I cannot imagine that portrait studios would do such a thing and have happy customers for very long.

The software probably has its place only as a tool to provide an advertising client with a gorgeous model's face. There is no authenticity, but it is not needed or even wanted.

But then we get into the sad dilemma of distraught teenage girls who cannot look like Barbie dolls or Brittany Spears and their whole life is ruined. This software certainly won't help that problem one bit.