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What is Next Nature?

With our attempts to cultivate nature, humankind causes the rising of a next nature, which is wild and unpredictable as ever. Wild systems, genetic surprises, autonomous machinery and splendidly beautiful black flowers. Nature changes along with us.
The Photoshop Beauties: Before and After

The Photoshop Beauties: Before and After

Usually we don’t realize the hours of photoshopping spent on magazine and advertising images before publication. The raw photographic material reveals a lot about the fine craft of ‘beauty construction’. The photo above shows documentary maker, former soap actress and challenger of the beauty industry Sunny Bergman, before and after ‘the photoshop’.

Sunny’s latest documentary Beperkt Houdbaar (Limited Preservation) makes a powerful analysis of the cultivation of the body for the beauty industry’s economic benefit. We are looking forward to her contribution at the Powershow Next Nature in LA.

The photo is part of a larger photo series of new feminists by Manon van de Zwaal & Monique Bergen Henegouwen for HP de tijd magazine. I would love to see some reversed photoshopping done on the magazine models of which we haven’t seen ‘the before’ as well.

stine jensen

Stine Jensen.

Myrthe hilkens

Myrthe Hilkens.

Photos: Manon van de Zwaal for HP de tijd magazine. Image retouche: Monique Bergen Henegouwen /MissMo.nl. See also: Virtual Miss, Simulacra for Dummies, The Photoshop Reporters, Natural Breasts, Hyperbreasts, Modernistic Vaginas.

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  1. inlogic
    12/04/08 at 22:58

    Awesome. Though the end result is a bit too much on the uncanny valley side on the first and last image. The second one is exceptionally well made, except for the jaw line. That makes me remember the Dove clip two years ago.

  2. bailey blakeney
    26/06/08 at 23:03

    this is amazingly creepy!

  3. swept
    16/01/09 at 16:47

    very cool photoshop work, but creepy images. they definitely look better in the “before” photos. but if i never saw the “before”, i would think the “after” was real.

  4. Rosa Maria
    23/02/09 at 00:44

    Little social experiment I did with photoshop:

    http://www.nikanika.com/photoshopme.htm

  5. Arnoud van den Heuvel
    23/02/09 at 09:03

    Nice example Rosa Maria. By doing such an experiment with your own picture, you must have in mind an ideal image of the woman you want to be or… how you want others to see you according to ‘the standards’.
    And so it happens that the value of ‘beauty’ is inadvertently being carried out through these kind of video’s:
    http://www.nextnature.net/?p=956 (Dove) and http://www.nextnature.net/?p=2110 (Foster Farms).
    But if carried out thoroughly over the internet, we will grow mediated and come to recognize whether an image is real or not. So it’s videos like these that help us develop new sense-organs like the ‘photoshop-antenna’. It’s my hope that everyone with a photoshop-antenna will also develop a true sense of beauty whithout too many cosmetical, economical and social side-effects: just BSUR

  7. Lola
    08/03/10 at 00:42

    the last girl looks so much better natural than photoshopped! that photo in particular is proof that the winning ‘beauty proportions’ cant take into account what is beautiful about someone’s lack of perfect symmetry.

  8. Julianne
    30/03/10 at 00:21

    wow these are amazing. These ones are a bit different to the others out there that mainly focus on creating flawless skin, eyes etc. In these the structure of the face is pretty much re-constructed. Well done to the artists for their work and being able to create this, I know I cant.

  9. Alie Sulemani
    22/04/10 at 02:10

    lol its funny the way people change :)

  10. jelena
    22/04/10 at 02:11

    i agree alie sulemani :)
    they shoulnd’nt change because they should be happy with themselves :) )

  11. Alie Sulemani
    22/04/10 at 02:12

    SOO TRUEE Jelena have we met before?

  12. jelena
    22/04/10 at 02:13

    hyahah yeah i think we have :)
    you seem very familierr :D
    lmaoo
    xx

  13. Alie Sulemani
    22/04/10 at 02:13

    ohhk. Do you know Sasha?
    xo <3

  14. jelena
    22/04/10 at 02:15

    funny you ask because sash is my brother !
    do you know two girls calle kujtime and shpresa?
    xx <3

  15. Alie Sulemani
    22/04/10 at 02:18

    OMG! they my sisters! ayyyeeee you goo DHS! you should know what that stands forr :D
    xo<3

  16. jelena
    22/04/10 at 02:20

    bahahaha yeahhh ! DHS! IN AMERICAA AYEE ?
    LOL
    !
    aye you on fb /\
    omgh are you albanian ?
    broo i lovee albanians !
    theyerrrreeer soooc oool :) )
    lmaoo
    xoxo peacee girl.
    oh are you a girl btw
    ?
    coz you seem like a guy ;)

    xo

  17. Alie
    22/04/10 at 02:24

    lol yehh ima chick :)
    why did uasume i was a dude ;p
    i got fb buhh im not giving it too you:P
    i will never ever accept you wierdo! :)
    xo <3

  18. jelena
    22/04/10 at 02:30

    because your name is pronounced like ‘ ali ‘ or is it like the serb and wog name like it’s ‘alije’ ?
    ‘j’ meaning ‘y’ yeah ?
    hahahah lol
    fine dont add me on fb ill get my bro too ?:)
    and then yeah well probs become bestfroend FOREVER AND EVER !
    xo <3 xox

  19. Alie
    22/04/10 at 02:34

    yee man nahh its the wog way with the J! :)
    lol ewww SASHAS a homo! :P
    lol :D hheehehhe :D
    yee man BFFL forever :D
    <3
    ayye lets continue with the food pyramid shit :P

  20. jelena
    22/04/10 at 02:39

    yourr a homo :00
    yeah coz thee blonde teachers gonna like catch us not doing healthh !!
    :) 0
    loool
    yeahh BFFLS FOR FIFFLES :)
    LOL iay otgay hatthey ffoaye arasayy ;)
    lmaooo
    xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxox<3

    hahahahhaah loool

  21. azad dabirzadeh
    12/07/10 at 07:15

    so cute ….

  22. Jonas
    14/07/10 at 10:16

    Hey, i’m sorry but this is no good.
    You overdone it.

  23. jazzyj
    05/11/10 at 18:37

    This is awful. I can understand retouching a blemish, but when the after picture looks NOTHING like the before, that is just horrible. It doesn’t even look like the same person.

  24. felia
    08/12/10 at 15:48

    oh nice

  25. armonda
    10/08/11 at 11:37

    shka po bani naj sen tre ka ju a ka

  26. Eti Steinberg
    14/11/11 at 10:13

    i love nature beauty. i look at older women that dare to walk with grey hair and mostly i think: looks great! i’m passing the process of becoming grey myself. i use to color my hair in different colors as a teenager. i choose already for years to be natural. i believe in the power of smiling. a real smile shows the beauty from inside.

  27. Kris Malloy
    17/12/11 at 19:26

    Thank God this has become a “real”, quite public discussion, now. You can tell girls that the magazines distort the models’ real appearance; but as always, a true picture tells a thousand words. Good work!

  28. Kris Malloy
    17/12/11 at 19:29

    I agree. The retouches make the girls look like aliens! Look at poor Stine, for example. The retouched photos do NOT look at all like the real girls. The tragedy is – the girls are beautiful, flaws or whatever, without being retouched! They look SO much more appealing. They look REAL. We all crave what is real, now. We want the truth. Enough deception for profit. We don’t want retouched models anymore!!!

  29. kate
    13/01/12 at 02:56

    bit harder with the third one, who was gorgeous already. most photoshopping efforts tend to turn interesting faces into generic dolls. good for the less genetically blessed of us, unfortunate when (as in the third one) it renders the face void of any meaningful expression

  30. kate
    13/01/12 at 02:58

    (not to suggest the three examples here aren’t really well executed)