See Germany.

Freaking embarrassment.

The majority of the others were just subtle changes..my faves were the ones who did barely nothing - she's beautiful in the original pic, I think.

In one, her features other than her eyes were made smaller and she looked more childlike. Not cool.

It's the photo that wasn't photoshopped where she isn't wearing any makeup.

I was about to say.

In my eyes women start as perfect 10s. Then they do stuff.

a bit of makeup to highlight parts of her face but without changing how she looks.

though the peculiar re-structured U.S. eyes and outlandish sweep of hair look cookbook.

Otherwise, if she was wanted by the cops, she ain't gonna secret her looks behind the OP's 'shopped images.

is that there are a lot of tweakers in the world passing themselves off as Photoshop artists who are really talentless hacks.

The US ones are disturbing for what they represent...but a lot of the others show really just terrible Pshop work.

Holy moly! That's some crappy Photoshop. The US "Photoshop afficionados" should be banned from using the software for life.

It's like going to grade school kids around the world, asking them to design a bridge, then drawing cultural conclusions from the results.

in Photoshop and in beauty standards. I'm pretty sure I could have gotten much the same result by having everyone on my block do this project, without any need to look around the world.

The USA version is one of the worst and in the German version she's so pale, she appears dead.

The USA one is just awful.

That Kenyan blue eye shadow has got to go.

BTW, I came across an ad for a home program that does that sort of thing. It evens out skin color and lights up the eyes. Looking at the before and after shots was sort of mesmerizing.

Looks like a moron pageant mom or idiot cheerleader coach did the makeover for the USA.

Absolute worst of the bunch.

Even after almost twenty years away from that place, I see that the Germans are still high on red hair.

Its a nice look, reminds me of early 20th century portraiture, though I still prefer the original. Or the Israeli version, which somehow makes her look more "real" and less made-up than the original.

Thats some of the worst work Ive ever seen. wow.

The idea is interesting, but the execution is weak. A couple show some skill, but most look like high school students did it. Too bad she couldn't have hired actual professionals.

I love the idea but come on. Most of those look like theyve been done by students taking 'intro to photoshop 101'. If thats what passes as acceptable now, I might as well turn in my mouse.

I had such high hopes when I clicked on the link. ugh.

But you miss the entire point.

But the point is lost when the majority of people are commenting on the shit retouching. Read the comments on the link. People cant get past the horrible photoshop. This was a real missed opportunity to exemplify an idea.

And you haven't talked about "missed opportunity" and how you'd do it better.

Enough said.

I cant make you.

But please, continue.

Im in marketing. And when you blow a good marketing campaign with bad messaging its considered a failure. The concept was great. The execution was horrible. If you want to ridicule me for my professional opinion, by all means, continue.

Ive had a lot of weird conversations on DU. But never quite like this. That youre here and dont get it... Im stumped. bye then.

I wont make any judgements about you though.

Ive tried to explain it. You dont (or refuse) to get it. Which, like I said, is weird. Guess things have changed around here.

As was mentioned upthread - weird conversation.

Have to agree with your premise. The idea was excellent and IMHO should be redone with professionals from each country. There is greatness in the idea but those were not great examples of photo shopping skills. The crudeness of some of them detracts significantly from the idea they are intended to present.

I'm sure you'll get excellent results
about beauty and truth.

The point is obliterated by the poor skills. These are no more representative of global beauty standards than the hackery of kindergarteners altering the images with crayons would be. It's a GIGO problem...if you hire amateurs, you get hackery back that defeats the entire point of the exercise.

You could take any of those images to the nations they're supposed to represent and ask people on the street and be told that they've taken a perfectly pretty picture and jacked it the fuck up. They're not representative of much beyond that and certainly not a reflection of beauty standards from around the world.

I find it a bit offensive, and clearly I'm not going to make headway explaining my POV to you.

So goodbye.

Please take your offense and yourself somewhere where clearly-brilliant people can understand whatever point you think you're failing to make. I'll remain here knowing that you're not actually making any point.

As the novelist Nick Harkaway wrote: "Garbage in, garbage out. Or rather more felicitously: the tree of nonsense is watered with error, and from its branches swing the pumpkins of disaster."

I agree with bunnies, this is the oddest exchange I've ever had on DU.

Horrible photoshop job imo.

One of the photos is an effort to turn her into Kristen Stewart; and the other one is just too weird for words.

Romania's photo shop made her look very natural. But I like Venezuela's choice the best.

I thought Venezuela's looked the most natural.

but Australia looked like a clown shop did it, so an honorable mention there.

the Australian response was to add tan, colored contact lenses, and comically overdone make up. This is a sarcastic response to the request "make me beautiful". She is already beautiful. They gave her the a caricature of what they believed the culture of her origination would find "beautiful". Much like lip rings and neck extenders im parts of africa way back when.

That would be a considerable relief.

This kind of "freelance" work won't pay the bills here.

In some places five dollars will get you an actual artist, in some places you are more likely to get someone who is just fooling around.

Personally, I think she's beautiful in all of them - though I admit I find the American version to be the least beautiful. I don't really care where she's from or what the standards of beauty are supposed to be - she's gorgeous.

better to use a semi-transparent clone setting.

...though I have a daughter who spends a lot of energy to do her make-up about how the photoshop here was done. She complains about the "bags" under her eyes (even as a teenager!).

Subjectively, it makes her look more intellectual, a little more inward-turned and critical. Not a bad look at all, but I still prefer the original.

She has relatively close-set eyes. Lining the entire eyes makes them look even closer; try it again going only from the center of the eye outward (both top and bottom), and put a little white on the inside corner of her eye.

Also, lose the bright pink lipstick. It doesn't go with olive skin.

(This, of course, is only my personal taste.)

The U.S. is an outlier itself, a freak of an economic system and a broadcast system gone awry.

So of course its photos should reflect that bizarre, off-kilter, freaky quality.

Anybody who watches a lot of BBC and TV from other countries will recognize the phenomenon. People look like, well, people. And then there's American TV, where people have to be made over to reflect some strange idea of perfect.


Cher

and you will realize that some states have the biggest bunch of freaks around.<SARCASM>

because her personality shines through.

Italy's artist did pretty well -- just evened out her skin tone, added a dab of natural-looking eyeshadow and lipstick, pretty subtle.

A lot of the others -- eek.

and my speakers have turned into little demons that, in a voice that's a cross between Gollum and Victoria Jackson, are castigating me for enabling Uncle Sam clown gynecologists.

Somehow I've managed to not know about these Psychedelic Republican cards for the past 10+ years. Maybe I was having a really long bad trip, man. Hilarious stuff... unfortunately out of print now.



http://chickenhead.com/psychedelic/index.asp

These people suck.

A little too Aryan? That one surprised me the most. Very interesting article. Thanks for posting!

Note: there's only a couple of pictures where the operator added clothing, and a few where jewelry was added. Some of them make you wonder, "have you ever applied makeup to a person before, and did she speak to you after you were done?" (Yes, Sri Lanka, I'm talking to you.)

Not a real big fan of the middle India one, where in addition to the weird makeup (painted-on brows?) it was color-corrected to look like it was shot on film then developed in contaminated chemistry.

The US one is just awful so I decided to make an attempt, what do you all think?

Interesting take on beauty.

You should send it in to the people that made the project! Much, MUCH better imo...those USA ones are strange looking.

Great job! And welcome to DU!

Bad photoshopped images imo.

"making her beautiful" seemed, for most, to be about makeup. Is it a common global understanding that women are not beautiful without it?

Makeup aside, the variation in skin tones, and the manipulation of features in some is interesting.

Just a couple were pretty close to the un-enhanced image she sent them, and, not surprisingly, those were the images I liked the best.

I don't know what idiots they found to represent the US there - those are the only ones that make her look like a different person altogether (and a strange one at that).

My first preference would be the representation from Israel, and my second preference would be the original. There is something unattractive to me about too much make-up, or someone trying to like like an ornament (though it has its place, I imagine).

Thanks for posting.

movie stars, etc.

Depending on some doofi using Photoshop fails to impress.