Thoughts on Photo Retouch Ethics
The ethics of photoshop and photo editing software has been a hotly debated topic since its inception; information too illustrious to fully encompass in a simple Tumblr post. Any educated consumer of visual culture should be fully aware that any and all photos or videos you consume on the internet are altered, retouched, or edited in some way. Whether by a professional, good lighting, or intentional sequence choices. My personal retouch ethics are as follows: “Only retouch, manipulate, or edit an image as far as a person would look on their best day.”
I photograph a student’s graduation portrait, they have several noticeable pimples. They are temporary distractions from the person’s face. I remove them, because they are not their pimples. I photograph an older man for his business cards, he has heavy wrinkles that are more prominent and noticeable with professional photographic lighting. I’m going to lighten the wrinkles up because the people that know him and love him don’t seen wrinkles, they see him.
Of course there are retouchers who go a bit TOO far by manipulating bone structure, facial symmetry, etc. those are the kinds of photographs that can warp minds to see unattainable beauty standards, but I don’t see the harm in being an empathetic photo retoucher.
