Yesterday, Jezebel offered a $10,000 bounty to anyone who would slip them the unretouched photos from Lena Dunham's Vogue cover shoot. We immediately had to endure a spate of pieces about it ranging from the OMG Photoshop Fail variety to the obligatory
I think it's a pretty safe bet that EVERY studio-produced cover photo on EVERY periodical (news photos excepted) is color corrected, dodged, burned, tweaked, nudged, 'shopped, etc. to within an inch of its life. The covers of a magazine like Vogue are never derived from photojournalism. Rather they are always studio shots and are carefully crafted to conform to a certain "look" that is characteristic of the publication. This is hardly surprising since the cover is the "face" of the publication. Art directors spend A LOT of time making sure that the cover shot that will be used for the upcoming issue looks exactly right. The covers are artistic expressions rather than photographic records of actual events. So OF COURSE those images are highly manipulated. Why the fuck is this suddenly controversial?
Being quirky, irksome and cringe-inducing at various points during each episode is precisely the point. Those are exactly the reactions that the show is trying to elicit. They aren't the only ones, but they are the reactions that everyone talks about. Which is completely intentional on the part of the writers, directors and cast.
I absolutely detested the first couple of episodes of the Ricky Gervais version of "The Office" when I saw them for the first time, even though I got the joke right away. Even after I came to adore the series, I still had to steel myself before viewing each episode, and I still do. The nuclear facepalms and head-desk collisions that I experienced weren't due to fundamental defects of the show or the result of some presumed poor casting choices or scripts populated with quite unlikeable characters. Rather they were, of course, very deliberately invoked on the part of the writers and director. These "negative" elements became the most celebrated feature of the series.
I think it's a pretty safe bet that EVERY studio-produced cover photo on EVERY periodical (news photos excepted) is color corrected, dodged, burned, tweaked, nudged, 'shopped, etc. to within an inch of its life. The covers of a magazine like Vogue are never derived from photojournalism. Rather they are always studio shots and are carefully crafted to conform to a certain "look" that is characteristic of the publication. This is hardly surprising since the cover is the "face" of the publication. Art directors spend A LOT of time making sure that the cover shot that will be used for the upcoming issue looks exactly right. The covers are artistic expressions rather than photographic records of actual events. So OF COURSE those images are highly manipulated. Why the fuck is this suddenly controversial?
"Yes she annoys me."
Being quirky, irksome and cringe-inducing at various points during each episode is precisely the point. Those are exactly the reactions that the show is trying to elicit. They aren't the only ones, but they are the reactions that everyone talks about. Which is completely intentional on the part of the writers, directors and cast.
I absolutely detested the first couple of episodes of the Ricky Gervais version of "The Office" when I saw them for the first time, even though I got the joke right away. Even after I came to adore the series, I still had to steel myself before viewing each episode, and I still do. The nuclear facepalms and head-desk collisions that I experienced weren't due to fundamental defects of the show or the result of some presumed poor casting choices or scripts populated with quite unlikeable characters. Rather they were, of course, very deliberately invoked on the part of the writers and director. These "negative" elements became the most celebrated feature of the series.