Glamour vs GlamourOUS

Hey,

Was discussing this the other night : Glamour vs GlamourOUS
(NB NOT 'or' vs 'our')

Audrey Hepburn = Glamourous

Katie Price (Jordan) = Glamour.

Now, please - what precisely is the point of Glamour photography in the grand scheme of things? It skirts within microns of pornography, yet is still deemed as largely 'OK' by (barely) covering the necessary, leaving nothing for imagination. And the point of all this glamour/lingerie advertisement? If garments are designed for support, why must they be 'sexy'? Who said that that's what sexy is? I think you'll find it's the media.
Nude art (centuries old) has its place, hell even pornographic material has been around for millenia...but this new half-way-clothed-look-but-don't-touch-I'm-so-cute-omg!! ....what'sa goin' on?

As society views it, there are a plethora of young and influenceable people (male and female) growing up at the moment, bombarded with the media's portrayal of 'beautiful'...and it's not Audrey Hepburn.

My point being that the younger generation will see this as normal and (believe me, I've met many) believe that large-busted & size 6-8 is what they need to aspire to, with perfect (read Photoshop-altered) skin...otherwise they can forget being 'accepted'. This, in reality is all but impossible for 90% of young people to achieve without alteration/self esteem issues.

This is, by no means whatsoever an attack on Glamour as a genre - it has its place...but what happened to 'actual', naturally beautiful icons (Lauren Bacall, Audrey, Marilyn etc etc) - unaltered, un-Photoshop-poked beautiful people?

Your views?

L

And I'm 21! :P

My view is that you are absolutely wrong about your whole premise.

There is no such thing as "unaltered, un-Photoshop-poked beautiful people". If you think Lauren Baccal, Audrey Hepburn or M.M. appeared as they were in real life - that is without makeup, air brushing of pictures, lots of dodging and burning in publicity photos, special lighting, and very careful posing and camera angles - then you are just naive.

"Glamour" is a noun; "glamourous" is an adjective. Therein lies the only real difference. The point of both is sexual arousal. It just isn't as complicated as you are trying to make it.
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rral22 wrote in post #8770161
There is no such thing as "unaltered, un-Photoshop-poked beautiful people".

I have nothing to say to that. *opens popcorn*.

rral22 wrote in post #8770161
makeup, special lighting, and very careful posing and camera angles - then you are just naive.
'

Nothing has changed in the digital age. Dodging and airbrushing is no more acceptable then as it is now, in my book.

The above (quoted) isn't 'cheating'. It's what was in front of the lens, and hence is a 'real' event, and a 'real' person. The minute you attack that with an airbrush etc, you alter reality.

Psychobiker wrote in post #8770234
Nothing has changed in the digital age. Dodging and airbrushing is no more acceptable then as it is now, in my book.

The above (quoted) isn't 'cheating'. It's what was in front of the lens, and hence is a 'real' event, and a 'real' person. The minute you attack that with an airbrush etc, you alter reality.

Well as long as your in charge of what is and isn't cheating I guess you can come up with whatever conclusion you would like.

Now taking part of a statement and making that the whole is cheating in my book.

Quad wrote in post #8770632
Well as long as your in charge of what is and isn't cheating I guess you can come up with whatever conclusion you would like.

Now taking part of a statement and making that the whole is cheating in my book.

There. Quoted in full. I was highlighting the difference between what is done BEFORE (posing/lighting/etc) the photo is taken and AFTER (dodge/burn, airbrush). The former is alterable to a degree, and 'exists' in reality.
The latter, in my opinion is untrue to the original image, whether one regards it as supplementary/compleme​ntary.

I was shocked at the blanket quote of : "There is no such thing as 'unaltered, un-Photoshop-poked beautiful people'". There quite clearly are.

I feel I've struck a nerve here. Such venom.

i don't really see your point. advertising and beauty has practically always been an art of manipulation. airbrushing skin to look silky smooth is as dishonest as powdering your face to cover pores and using toner to give your skin false colors and textures.

Thankyou alt. An unemotional, rational post.

My point in your case is : that makeup has been around for millenia. Ages. You can walk up to a person and remove the makeup. Remove the photoshop?
You can't 'photoshop in' beauty - makeup only goes so far.

i've been seeing this pop up in the news recently and i don't really understand it. magazine covers have airbrushed and digitally altered celebrities. i suppose if public awareness were more commonplace, this wouldn't be such a shocker to the governments considering bans and warning labels on any digtally altered photo.

do you think makeup was considered dishonest and unethical when the idea was first conceived? possibly. after all, it's an inaccurate representation of the individual. with mascara, people's eyelashes are unnaturally full, and concealer creates faces that are unnaturally blemish-free. however, public awareness of makeup and cosmetics have helped us realize that it takes work by a makeup artist to make people look that way. if more people were aware of the work that digital editors go through to create the images they see, perhaps there will come a time when people understand that what they're seeing is not a reflection of reality but rather something closer to what it actually is: a manufactured image.

i don't think audrey hepburn or marilyn monroe would have ever appeared on magazine covers without the help of numerous manipulations. if you want to wage war against fabrications of appearance, how about corsets and other under-clothing manipulation devices? they make people's figures dishonest to their true appearance. in the modern day and age, we no longer have so much clothing to cover up manipulation devices, so people harness technology to complete the task.

i understand what you're saying about dishonest imagery, but it's something that really isn't new at all and has simply taken a new form in the digital age.

No, it's not new. But I put it to you this way : you can apply and remove makeup. You can even wear corsets (I do, on Tuesdays only!!), but you cannot liquify your nose in real life!

Glamour photography is, to me, the bottom of the barrel. It's right up there with shadowless family portraits against a plain white background. Or the couple on the plain white background laying on the plain white floor and the man is in bare feet wearing a cheesy grin that looks straight out of a catalogue.

All of these things require almost no effort once the basic rules have been learned. There is no innovation, no chance, no risk, it's just the business of photography in visual terms.

Your example of glamour and glamourous is absolutely spot on.

No, no venom if I wanted to be venomous (as opposed to vemonour) you would have know clearly.

If people look to anything from the fashion or movie industry as to what their models/stars look like as anything remotely resembling reality then they just have no idea of what is really happening. This has always been the case, the soft focus lens alone is a very powerful tool for this.

I used to think that photoshop did remarkable things along this line until I heard what my brother does with protools in his recording studio. It makes what most people do with photoshop look like a bunch of kids with crayons. Really the governments should put warning labels on music saying that it was altered.

And yes there are beautiful people that have not been photoshopped or even had any makeup applied to them. I would say most people are very beautiful and one of the things photography can do is show this beauty, if the photographer has the skill.

If people want to find makeup and photo-retouching attractive they can but they don't have to if they don't want to.

Precisely, Quad. I too have a friend who owns a studio - I see your point. Not that in his case it's as drastic as that.

I suppose what I'm getting at is that many icons are naturally beautiful and require none/little alteration.
You then take normal-miss-next-door who wants to look like a Glamour (read swimsuit/nude who has been modified copiously in PP. etc) (YMMV) ... but is nowhere near ... cue the depression, plastic surgery...

Because someone said that's hot?

50 years ago, large format negatives allowed direct retouching of certain flaws, while retouching the print allowed correction of other flaws. It required skilled craftsmen to do this. Today any rookie can fix the same things from an APS-C format image in post processing, and the level of skill and training is much less to accomplish the same result. In other words, the world has not really changed fundamentally, only the tools and the skill required are different. And digital 'distortion' of reality permits us to go too far, in making someone who is 10 lbs overweight look 20 lbs. underweight, or in changing the profile of the nose or the size of the mouth to a greater degree than what can be done with face paint and lipstick.

Psychobiker wrote in post #8770842
you cannot liquify your nose in real life!

i beg to differ.

Psychobiker wrote in post #8770974
I suppose what I'm getting at is that many icons are naturally beautiful and require none/little alteration.

i honestly don't think there is any appreciable amount if any, celebrity photo or image that depicts an image true to their actual appearance.

Wilt wrote in post #8771114
50 years ago, large format negatives allowed direct retouching of certain flaws, while retouching the print allowed correction of other flaws. It required skilled craftsmen to do this. Today any rookie can fix the same things from an APS-C format image in post processing, and the level of skill and training is much less to accomplish the same result. In other words, the world has not really changed fundamentally, only the tools and the skill required are different. And digital 'distortion' of reality permits us to go too far, in making someone who is 10 lbs overweight look 20 lbs. underweight, or in changing the profile of the nose or the size of the mouth to a greater degree than what can be done with face paint and lipstick.

pretty much. same concept, different tools. some people can push it farther than others now, but at the very root of it, you're dealing with the same thing. it's just varying degrees. shades of grey if you will.