For years (decades, even!), photo correction has erased human physical flaws. Thanks to software like Photoshop, retouching has improved and is available to more people. But not everyone is good at Photoshop. Enter Bijyo Photo, a Japanese service that will make your face smaller, your skin lighter, and your boobs bigger. But will it actually make you look better?
Bijyo Photo (美女フォト; "Beautiful Woman Photo"), which is run by Japanese tech company DC Archives, offers pro style retouching to portraits with quick turnaround. Some of the types of portraits listed are, for example, hair saloon pics, bridal pics, or even modeling photos. The service, however, is also available to people who want their personal portraits retouched. It's possible that the service could alter photos being used in Japanese matchmaking (お見合い; omiai); photos of prospective partners are used in the selection arranging the initial meeting.
Bijyo Photo's various services include clearing up skin, making eyes larger (or even adding an extra eyelid fold), making faces slimmer, fixing teeth, tucking in tummies, and more. Bijyo Photo can also apply digital make up and even alter the outfits in the photos (such as making skirts shorter). Depending on the work you need done, prices vary, but simply Photoshop work starts at around ¥840 or US$11 for each specific alteration (full body fixes, however, start at ¥2,100 or $27).
If people want to Photoshop the crap out of themselves, that's fine. That's their choice! But all the examples on the Bijyo Photo site don't look natural. The uncorrected versions, however, look far better: there are laugh lines, frown lines, imperfections that not only make the portraits looks real, but the subject, too.
As video games get more and more realistic, it's fascinating to see how developers are now tackling the ability to put physical imperfections in game characters, right down to every last wrinkle and spot. Because game creators know that those imperfections are what make us human. The desire for digital perfection results in plasticity, not reality and certainly not humanity.
Photoshop-type programs are allowing people to give themselves anime eyes—or even ridiculous triangle faces. This blending of "real" and "digital" seems contemporary—just as our own lives are becoming increasingly digital, the records of our appearance are, too. What's real is no longer real, and it's impossible to believe what you see. Bijyo Photo points out on its website, first impressions matter in portraits. Retouching those first impressions, unfortunately, matters more.
美女フォト [Official Site]
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