Anonymous: Remember this post from a few

Anonymous submitted:

Remember this post from a few weeks ago? I got curious as to how bad the pose and photoshopping actually were, so I went in my bathroom and tried it out.  (Sorry about the random Brita pitcher handle there)

So, first a few things.  One, my bathroom mirror is placed fairly high, so I had to shoot from a higher angle to get the same coverage of my body.  So there is that difference.  Also, I am not nearly as ripped as the woman in the picture. (If you couldn’t tell, I’m on the left.)  I couldn’t get the shoulders quite right, because I had to also hold the cameraphone, but I got it as close as I could except for that.

However, I am running a BMI of about 17 right now, so if a healthy woman could possibly have a waist that thin, I should be able to get close.  I sucked in my gut as hard as I could for this shot, by the way.

The first difference is shown by the arrow on the left-hand shot.  Look, there’s a muscle there!  In fact, that muscle is necessary to stand upright!  It’s even drawn out more by the pose we’re holding.  If she doesn’t have that muscle, she should be collapsing at the waist. Anatomy fail!

Second, take a look at the other arrow, the one on the right.  Um… that’s a very interesting elbow she’s got going there.

Then I noticed the relative lineup of the hips.  On the left of both images, they look fairly much the same – both of us have hipbones that fall a little to the left of our boob bulge.  My boobs are smaller than hers, I think, so mine falls a little more left.  But that side of her body looks okay.

It’s the other side that’s a massive wtf.  The lines fall roughly on our upper butts; now, keep in mind that I’m pushing 30 and out of shape, so logically she should actually have a bigger butt than me, and a perkier one (because mine is mostly flab that’s started heading for the floor).  But!  My butt falls well to the right of my rib cage and shoulder.  Hers, on the other hand, falls about at her shoulder.

Combined, it’s clear what’s happened.  Here is my approximation of the conversation I think occurred:

Executive: We need a picture of a fit woman for this promo we’re running next week.
Image department: We have these stock images.  Will any of these work?
Executive: No, no, no… no… no… no!  None of these will work!  They all look too fat!
Image department: Well, what are you looking for?
Executive: She should look powerful!  We should be looking up at her while she holds a powerful pose, like she’s surveying her conquered domain.
Image department: Okay.  We’ll work on that.
Image department: (next day) How about this?
Executive: That’s – close, but her butt!  Look how it’s in our face!  And HUGE!  That won’t DO!
Image department: I thought you said we should be looking up at her.
Executive: Yes!  That’s what I want!
Image department: There’s this thing, sir, called perspective–
Executive: I don’t care!  Find me a smaller butt! And this needs to run tomorrow, so hop to it!
Image department: We’ll be right back.
Image department: (ten minutes in Photoshop, moves butt and hand to the left, swipes some airbrush over the joins)
Image department: How about this?
Executive: Perfect!

Because that is the only thing I can possibly imagine leading to this.

A couple of other notes on the pose: this involves a surprising amount of waist swivel.  It doesn’t really look like it, but I was pushing my swivel ability trying to get into this position.  Granted, trying to tense my abs and also hold a phone at the same time weren’t helping, but she’s actually turned quite a bit.  I wouldn’t want to hold this pose very long at all; it’s not particularly comfortable.  I also wasn’t quite able to duplicate the way she’s actually leaning slightly back here, because I was trying to get the hips and waist right.  I think they may have also photoshopped her stomach inward a little above her navel, which is the reference point I was using.

Thanks for the photo reference.  It is sad that simply showing a non-badly-photoshopped body wasn’t enough for that ad.  I’m actually scared that there might be people who buy that product hoping to get that figure.