AboutScott Valentine Expertise Beginning to expert questions using Photoshop for a variety of applications; digital photography, graphic design, image analysis, web, screen and print. I am an administrator on a Photoshop learning forum, which has over 13,000 members, and am also an 'expert' in the Digital Photography section of allexperts.com.
I support Versions CS3 and CS4 Extended. Please - no questions on Lightroom, Elements or Express.
I am currently writing a book for Adobe Press on composite artwork using Photoshop CS4.
Experience I have been a professional level user since 1999, and have used Photoshop for photography, fine art, graphic design, web design, and technical image analysis. I have also conducted classes at the college level in both artistic and technical uses. I am currently an Adobe User Group manager.
Organizations National Association of Photoshop Professionals
Education/Credentials Bachelor's degree, Physics
Awards and Honors Several awards for digital photography.
could the "before" pic, not be real but the one that was really retouched?
thank you!
Answer Without a thorough investigation, it's impossible to tell. However, I can tell you that photo retouching is pretty much the standard for magazines, and that it's much more difficult to make a believable "before" picture such as this than to retouch to a glamour shot.
Given that lots of photoretouchers are showing their portfolios online, specifically before and after shots, I'd be willing to bet this is an actual "before" picture.
The problems in creating the "before" picture are in the details. She not only has some blemishes and wrinkles, she also has a sock line, a waistband line, a straight back, etc. All of these things are not individually difficult, but to create all of them so convincingly would be extremely challenging.
Having seen literally thousands of retouched images for professional commercial work, I could believe quite easily that these are in the correct order. Mostly because I've never seen a magazine cover of a model that wasn't retouched, and most models have some kind of feature (hair, spots, shadows, fat, clothing marks, etc.) that needs to be fixed.
It would also be very difficult to extract that image from the magazine cover, considering the text and soft gradients.
