Airbrushed Magazine Photos of Babies Spark Debate

by Amy Hatch (Subscribe to Amy Hatch's posts) Nov 16th 2009 4:20PM

Categories: Newborns, Babies, Money & Work, Celeb Kids, Life & Style, Media

Do you think babies' photos should be airbrushed in magazines? Credit: Getty Images

Critics are outraged that some parenting magazines admit to airbrushing images of babies that run on their covers, but industry insiders say that almost every photograph in a magazine is retouched.

The hubbub started when a BBC documentary, My Supermodel Baby, revealed that the publication Practical Parenting and Pregnancy retouched a photograph of 5-month-old baby model Hadley Corbett. According to The Daily Telegraph, the magazine's casting director, who was not named, told filmmakers that the child's image was airbrushed: "We lightened his eyes and his general skin tone, smoothed out any blotches and the creases on his arms. But we want it to look natural."

Hadley's mom, Esther Corbett, tells the Telegraph that she was neither surprised nor offended that her child's image was altered. "You kind of know that they do it because if you look at the front cover of magazines, most of the images don't look really real," she says. "But it didn't put me off."

Plenty of other people are put off, however, and some say that the practice is "shocking." Jo Swinson, a U.K. political leader, campaigns against airbrushing in magazines. "People will be appalled that a magazine would not think images of beautiful healthy babies are alright as they are and instead have to conform to some standard," she tells the Telegraph. "The idea that babies must look more perfect – that they can't have creases in their skin – shows the obsession with a particular ideal. Where does this end?"

"You will have parents thinking, my baby isn't attractive enough, how do I make my baby more attractive?" she says.

Industry insiders who have worked with children in media say that retouching photographs -- of everything and everyone -- is standard operating procedure at most publications and is in no way sinister. A friend who has a long resume working with children's publications tells me that the goal is to improve the likeness by adjusting the color, lighting and yes, getting rid of drool or flyaway hairs.

With photo-editing software and services readily available today, plenty of parents are doing the same thing with their private snapshots. I'm not above editing out the chocolate smears on my kids' faces to get the perfect holiday card, and I don't think I'm alone.

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Comments (41)

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)

SKL 11-16-2009 @ 5:55PM

Oh, it's child abuse! Exploitation! Capitalistic greed! Let's boycott!

mezl 11-16-2009 @ 8:37PM

i wish some one with a lot of money would start a magazine featuring REAL people with OUT the air brushing nonsense. in the old days, photographers never had air brushing as an option, and they got better results. pictures look much more fake today than they used to. but i guess that's what happens when you have untalented people doing this stuff. they gotta use other methods of improving their pictures because they just don't have the same talent old time photographers did. oh, well....

Alice 11-18-2009 @ 7:10AM

If you assume there was no photo retouching in the old days you are wrong. Indeed there was a lot. It was done by hand up until the advent of computers. Common practice, it has been taken to extremes in recent years like taking a whole person out etc. But, tweaking pictures for covers has always been done.

Master Shake 11-18-2009 @ 7:17AM

LOL - guy, you have NO clue! Photographs for magazines have been retouched going all the way back to the 19th century when it first became possible to print photos in magazines and books. The main difference is that they now put much LESS makeup on babies and children than they used to, because blemishes and tones can be fixed digitally. Go back to the pre-Photoshop era, and babies would have full makeup on them for a product label photo, or a cover shot for a magazine, because the manual art of airbrushing was much more difficult.

LS 11-16-2009 @ 8:46PM

I liken well-retouched photos of today to the ones from the fifties (and I say 50's, because I'm thinking of my parent's wedding photos) that were done with those soft-focus filters. They couldn't photoshop the blemishes out, but those filters sure hid a lot of "imperfections".

Looking at the photos of my son, who, of course, was the most beautiful baby ever to grace this planet... ;) ... if I look at those pictures with a critical eye, like a magazine photo editor might, I can see some teeny things I might change... look how that hair lays in front of his beautiful blue eyes, it's distracting. And how did we miss that spot of apple sauce on his cheek? And the lighting is slightly off. These things can be nipped out without changing anything about him, or reaching for some unachievable goal.

Now, if they were photoshopping babies like they do adults... giving them rock-hard abs, or removing half of their waist and removing their elbows and kneecaps, well, then we'd be having a problem.

But little tweaks, I don't think are troublesome. It's publishing... that's what they do.

SKL 11-16-2009 @ 10:37PM

When I was a tot, they used to put red color to make all the kids' cheeks rosy and improve shadows, etc. In that and earlier generations, the photographers also used to slap the kids' faces in order to get the obligatory crying photos. (I can just see the whole slew of outraged comments that would set off here - oh, they had better not touch my precious poo or I'll rip their arm off, etc.)

Alas, professional photography of children or anyone else has never been particularly honest. For that matter, I've looked at a lot of art from before the days of photography, and I don't think I've ever seen a painting with a booger in a child's nose.

I love the highly concerned comments about the potential fallout of airbrushed babies. Parents will be led to believe their child isn't allowed to have creases! And that will lead to - what? Baby starvation and excessive exercise? A baby body image crisis? Some people have way too much time on their hands.

chris 11-16-2009 @ 9:53PM

I guess the entire problem with "photoshopping", retouching is the hypocrasy involved. The very same magazines that run articles about the dangers of dieting and bulimia(to name a few) also help to create the unreal images that the individuals are trying to match.By retouching the cover photos. Retouching baby photos also adds to the unreal expectations. Babies are at their most beautiful stage in life,and, simply do not need "enhancing".

watdafuk 11-16-2009 @ 9:46PM

They should just try to find babies that are not ugly.

shelly 11-16-2009 @ 10:26PM

I guess the person who wrote this article has no experience with the business. EVERY PHOTO IS "AIRBRUSHED" that appears on or in magazines. It's been that way since the beginning of time. So what? Do you think people in portraits from centuries back actually looked that way? Or those beautiful black and white vintage photos of stars from the 20s and 30s weren't doctored? Including child stars? Or those gorgeous technicolor pinup beauties from WWII weren't "enhanced" ? Get over yourself. My daughter modeled as a child and at once point, her tooth fell out during a shoot for a billboard. Guess what? It magically appeared on the print. It's not a big deal.

chris 11-16-2009 @ 10:32PM

Shelly, I hate to disagree with you, BUT it is a big deal. We have created images in Teen girls minds (a very impressionable age), that are simply unattainable. And the constant shifting and changing to accomodate an editors view of beauty or shape, or size are sendiong the wrong message to our youth.

Linda Hunter 11-19-2009 @ 9:31PM

I thought my daughter looked absolutey precious when she lost her front tooth.When I took her picture you should see the big smile she gave me. That was 39yrs ago. Now I`m seeing children with their hands over their mouth or not smiling at all...mmm wonder why!!

Sandyone 11-16-2009 @ 11:52PM

I dunno...maybe these photo-shopped pics can actually wake some people up to the fact that *it's all fake*. Heck, if they think even a baby needs to be touched up to be 'better', there ain't no one safe from their criticism.

My babies? The most beautiful creatures I have ever seen. So, if someone thinks they need to be airbrushed, I'll know that they're just crazy. And then I might make the connection that *they're crazy and not qualified to determine what is beautiful*.

Does that make sense? It makes sense in my head, but I'm not sure I 'splained it very well.

CPU64 11-17-2009 @ 1:38AM

Should we tell the writer that the burgers used in ads for fast food places such as BK and McDs are actually perfectly stacked photo files?
Next time you go to burger king, check out the image of the single/double/triple whoppers. The bread, lettuce, tomato and mayo are the same exact image, just on different meat stack images. No one is perfect, so if you can edit them to look less funky on a magazine cover, why not?
I would rather that happen, than have what I really look like, printed on a cover. Yikes!

silly 11-17-2009 @ 3:16AM

okay lets be real here. everyone knows that every photo is airbrushed to a certain extent. why it it a big deal? its not that editors are implying that these babies are ugly. its just giving the public what they expect. think about it. if you passed parenting magazine and saw a photo of a baby on the cover that was drooling, crying, blotchy, uneven, food on the face etc (without any of these factors being the goal of the image) you would probably think its strange. its no secret that what we see there is not reality. so we accept that fact yet we continue to fight it in a feeble self righteous attempt for "fairness, realism, equality" when the truth is that the majority (not all people because i don't want to generalize) embrace this surrealism.
how many of you women have bought pantyhose and opted for the tummy control option over the regular kind or even Spanx? you buy this to make yourselves look thinner correct? its not shameful because most people do it. is that wrong though? to present a "false" illusion of yourself?

all im saying is that we shouldnt criticize the media for presenting the best possible image to an audience who has come to expect it when we do the exact same thing every time we get dressed for work.

but that is solely my opinion

NYBill 12-21-2009 @ 4:37AM

They are still cute but let Chuckie Shumer investigate...it's probably the Republicans again.

alise 11-17-2009 @ 11:48AM

why is everyone else worring about someone elses kids picture! atleast they are beautiful enought to make it there in there in the first place!

aurorab981 11-18-2009 @ 8:50AM

are you implying that not all children are beautiful?? if so then imust say that your comment is the most ignorant comment i have seen on the internet all day.children are a gift from god and are all beautiful BECAUSE they are precious and innocent .it is an unacceptable practice ,it sends the wrong message and you really need to think before you type.

SKL 11-17-2009 @ 12:44PM

I just noticed this statement:

"You will have parents thinking, my baby isn't attractive enough, how do I make my baby more attractive?" she says.

Ha ha! I have never met a parent who thought possible the existence of any child more attractive than his/hers! Myself included!

Sandyond 11-18-2009 @ 12:33PM

And you only think that because you haven't met *my* kids, yet!

Amy 11-17-2009 @ 2:03PM

As an advertising Art Director, I think people are getting bent out of shape about nothing. Photoshop is a tool which in most instances is used to correct problems with an image.

I retouch about 25% of my own home snapshots because of redeye, shiny foreheads, pimples, etc. and none of these things change the beauty of the individual, these are problems with lighting or not prepping for a pretty snapshot (hello drooling baby).

At work we're fixing the same issues only on a professional level. Adjusting skin tones so that the final printing is truer to real life, and yes sometimes smoothing blotchy skin or taking out a wrinkle. All because really high resolution, brightly lit images sometimes highlight things that you would never notice in real life.

Of course there is a fine line with retouching and sometimes its crossed, but those images always make things look unnatural. Don't blame photoshop, it has its place. Its bad users that weld a tool badly that are tarnishing a good thing.