We must say that the opinions of people in the comments to the publications are radically different. Some are simply delighted with the retoucher's really outstanding work, and some simply do not understand why all these filters should be applied to already beautiful people. "LOL she's already beautiful without the facetune," writes, for example, one of the commenters to the photo where the actress Alexandra Daddario is depicted.
"As a professional, I can judge these shots from two quite different angles," says Dmitry Kravtsov, a Ukrainian photographer who was asked by Bored Panda to comment on these works. "On the one hand, the excellent work of the retoucher is really visible. Almost flawless, you can't say anything. On the other hand, over the years of working with Photoshop and Lightroom, certain 'standards' for retouching the skin, eyes, lips and etc have been developed - and thus a kind of unification is obtained."
"Just look, let's say, at one of the photos of Gal Gadot exposed here - commenters are trying to guess who it is, and only a third of people name her correctly. That is, we are faced with a problem when, in an effort to emphasize their individuality, people in fact achieve the exact opposite - they become damn similar to each other. I'm not sure if that's what we really wanted."
According to statistics provided by Consumer Reports, around 1 out of 5 Americans (21 percent) who has ever had any social media account has used a beauty filter before posting pictures on social media. Among these, 9 percent said they “always or nearly always” use them and 13 percent said they “often” use them.
At the same time, 47 percent of those who regularly retouch their photos are in the age group from 18 to 29 years, and 33 percent - from 30 to 44 years. In other words, these are practically all generations of modern Americans, starting with Gen Z. At the same time, many of the respondents understand that there is a certain problem here.
"They seem to recreate the same problem that fashion magazines perpetuated in the '80s and '90s - literally unobtainable beauty standards - but on a more insidious microscale," one person that took part in the survey admits. They do understand, but continue doing so simply because almost everyone does it.
"The problem with these filters is you see a side of yourself with dramatic filters that don't exist, which corresponds to an unnatural and inhuman ideal of beauty that you can now achieve with filters," says British influencer Faye Dickinson, founder of popular Instagram page 'Filter vs Reality', in her interview with the Daily Mail. "It's the unhealthy obsession we all have with that perfect look."
In any case, there are thousands of social media influencers with millions of followers, and literally all of them continue to live an incredibly beautiful, carefully filtered online life that has almost nothing to do with reality. And people seem to be happy with that. So let's just look at these women. Look and perhaps enjoy.
