Ralph Lauren Photoshopped Ad Saga - Altered Image or Model's Actual Size?

by Katie Hintz-Zambrano (Subscribe to Katie Hintz-Zambrano's posts)
Posted Oct 7th 2009 at 7:55PM

ralph lauren's reportedly photoshopped ad

The picture that's causing all the controversy. Is it really the work of Ralph Lauren or a mystery photoshopper?

Is Ralph Lauren really Photoshopping models to such an extreme that heads come out bigger than hips? That's what Website Boing Boing is claiming.

After finding an advertisement of longtime Ralph Lauren model Filippa Hamilton-Palmstierna with her entire body whittled down to an almost emaciated state, a blogger at BoingBoing.com put the picture online with a caption that read: "Dude, her head's bigger than her pelvis," as reported by The Huffington Post.

After dozens of comments flooded in criticizing the ad and Ralph Lauren, The Huffington Post reports that the legal team at Ralph Lauren accused Boing Boing of copyright infringement for reprinting the ad.

Boing Boing editors fired back saying Ralph Lauren's accusations were bogus and that their actions were legal and fell under the umbrella of "classic fair use: a reproduction 'for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting.'"

Cory Doctorow, Boing Boing's co-editor told StyleList that getting yelled at by the companies the site criticizes is something Boing Boing editors are used to. "We have indeed gotten spurious legal threats before and have always used mockery as our tool of choice for dealing with them," he says.

Part of the "mockery" they are using with this Ralph Lauren fiasco includes publishing Lauren's letter to Boing Boing, as well as keeping the original post up.

Apparently, all of this mess stems from a picture that might not even be a legitimate image finished by the hands of Ralph Lauren's advertising team. Boing Boing editors actually snatched the image off of a blog called Photoshop Disasters, which follows all of the gross misuses of the notorious retouching tool.

However, Photoshop Disasters acquires their images through anonymous sources who randomly send them in, which doesn't bode too well for Boing Boing's case that Ralph Lauren was somehow responsible for the overly altered image.

Yet the editors at Photoshop Disasters tell StyleList that their anonymous source claims to have taken the photograph of the ad at a "trendy" mall in Tokyo, and believe it's a picture is of an outdoor poster.

While everyone knows that many designers abuse Photoshop, it would be very surprising if the forces at Ralph Lauren took an ad to that far of an unnatural-looking extreme, especially when all of their other ads featuring Hamilton-Palmstierna look respectfully in proportion.

But what do you think? Should Boing Boing have posted the image without authenticating it first? Should Ralph Lauren have taken the legal action they did? Leave a comment below.

To find out more about the controversy over computer enhanced images -- including proposed laws to clearly label retouched pictures in both the U.K. and France -- keep reading.

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Filed under: News
Tags: ad, boing boing, BoingBoing, photoshop, ralph lauren, Ralph Lauren ad, Ralph Lauren photoshop, Ralph Lauren Retouch, RalphLauren, RalphLaurenAd, RalphLaurenPhotoshop, RalphLaurenRetouch, retouching, Skinny model, SkinnyModel

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READER COMMENTS

(168)Add A Comment

jose, 10-08-2009, 6:20AM

dat is not even attractive......man im from the hood.....n im also Dominican and i have good taste in women.........n i wouldnt even hit dat wit da other guys $%$%.........like she needs sum whey gainer......15-20 more pounds......n den she would look better in that outfit.....dese ppl be outrageous in the model entertainment......dat shyt is ugly.....now she might get picture for ralph lauren....but can she get a real man.....

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sidewlksurfer, 10-08-2009, 8:04AM

english...maybe? some spell check possibly? hood, really? who cares. next time you would like to express your opinion, try using some sort of proper english before you embarass yourself. "dat, da, den, dese, whey"...wow.

so yes, girls are being misled by advertisements these days, its ridiculous. this picture has to be photo-shopped.

csiblackwell, 10-08-2009, 9:48AM

Oh-Tay!
Can you say il-lit-er-ate?

tulipferia, 10-08-2009, 9:42AM

Did you actually read the article at all? The image has been altered with Photoshop, she's not actually that skinny. Nobody could be that skinny.

Artemis, 10-08-2009, 12:15PM

If you look closely, the right side (as you are looking at the pic) is so definitely photoshopped, her left hand is missing.

LADY T, 10-08-2009, 1:12PM

ALL I WUD LIKE TO STATE... IS THAT....
IT IS 2000 AND 9 PEOPLE... YES 2009
AND THAT DOES MEAN, IF U HAVENT LOOKED AROUND, THERE ARE MORE OBESE PEOPLE IN AMERICA, THAN AN ANY OTHER COUNTRY. AND AS THE YEARS MOVE FORWARD AND WE CONTINUE TO EAT ALL THIS EXTRA NON-HEALTHY FOOD... OUR NEXT GENERATIONS WILL ONLY GET FATTER, THAN THE LAST..... IM NOT SKINNY AND IM NOT OBESE. IM CHUBBY, FAT, DELIGHTFULY PLUM....
BUT WHERE THE HELL ARE OUR CLOTHES AT?????
DEBATE OR ANWSER THAT ONE

cb, 10-08-2009, 1:45PM

Dude! You are butchering the English language the same way those photoshop dropouts butchered the model!

Delacourte, 10-08-2009, 2:24PM

Come on Glenn Beck,you aren't fooling anyone with your fake "hood" posting! Dominican? HAHAHAHAHA!!!

Debs-frm-GP, 10-08-2009, 6:35AM

OMG this is so sad, especially for the young girls heading towards their teens,, Even way back in my day, I was thinking I needed to diet at the age of ten or younger, Now I see girls even younger worrying about it. Yes one reason for this in very young girls is because the parents have let them grow up with no physical activity, eating the wrong foods and too much food,so the kids of today are over weight.Then now they have the doctors understandably telling the parents the kids need better health habits, I have seen these kids being told to diet, such a wrong word to use with these young impressionable kids. Now putting this horribly skinny unhealthy woman on the covers of magizines is just unresponsible to say the least... How dare they....

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mary, 10-08-2009, 6:49AM

that pic is so fake. i wish advertisers would just cut the crap. nothing is real anymore. we have become such a fake society.

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errrr, 10-08-2009, 6:58AM

Completly sad. She looks awful. Totally anorexic! As far as our children's weight problem,I told my husband years ago when they started phasing out PE @ schools that American children are going to be overweight. As stats prove our kids are getting heavier most kids in my day recieved exersize and sports through our PE programs. Lots of times this was the only time most kids got to exersize. Now our kids are paying the price. we absolutly need to bring back PE to schools

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Penny, 10-08-2009, 9:46AM

or maybe the parents should just do their parenting job

Annie, 10-08-2009, 11:50AM

Just like that movie Wall-E. Did you notice all humans in the future are huge!

Maggie, 10-08-2009, 12:17PM

You are SOOOoooo RIGHT! Plus, our city/state managers have allowed EVERYTHING that had any grass or trees growing on it to be plowed over in favor of concrete and all the "kickbacks" they get. Such corruption has contributed GREATLY to this problem (no decent parks...no open, wilderness areas...no playgrounds with proper equipment...no adequate safe places for kids to play and hang out, INCLUDING schools! Now, after there are no more kickbacks to steal, my city is begging the residents to pay $50 each to plant trees in the parkway...y'know,,,the city's property! Such a @#%* TRAVESTY! Only one solution -- VOTE'EM ALL OUT!!!

Aanjelica33, 10-08-2009, 7:02AM

It would not surprise me that this photo was indeed altered. That is what the fashion industry does to make young girls and even women in today society to think is gorgeous being a basic skeleton when if they were to do research it is not healthy promoting this idea to the general population. Women that were considered the most beautiful women in the day were women such as Elizabeth Taylor who was not a size 0-1 but a size 14 and even Marilyn Monroe was a 14 as well as Jane Mansfield. These women oozed sex appeal and that is what women wanted to look like and now if a woman is that size she is considered obese and fat. Look at the attacks on Tyra Banks for when she put on a little weight and how about Khloe' Kardashian being called fat because she does not look like her sisters even though she is alot taller than them. We need to get people to stop allowing these fashion companies dictate what our size is. Foreign industries are putting a stop to it why do we not follow suit?!

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xXAmy1021XX, 10-08-2009, 2:32PM

I hate when people say, "Oh, Marylin Monroe was a size 14."
Keep in mind, the size 14 of 1950 is the equivalent of today's size 6. This is how overweight our society has become, it's disgusting. The average waist size used to be 24 inches. Now you're considered skinny if you are under 30. It's disgusting.

I'm not defending the ad. People should be comfortable with and love their bodies. But they need to stay healthy, too. Saying, "I accept myself" is no excuse to let yourself go. If you truly love your body, you will keep it healthy. Healthy means not fat. But it also means not crazy skinny. It means healthy.

cqdeed, 10-08-2009, 7:01AM

All this because designers CAN'T design clothes for normal sized women.

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Lynnia, 10-08-2009, 7:53AM

Okay I know this is totally inapropriate but:The thinner the girl, the less fabric, the less expensive to make. lol Sad part is, it's true.

kara, 10-08-2009, 9:18AM

Recession at its best, guess the designers are trying to get more out of clothing. Be real, how many people can wear this? Imagine, photos put more pounds on a person. No wonder so many youngesters are ill from dieting. This just causes more health problems for our youth. These designers need to get real, frankly I do not know how they can make money from not only selling these clothes, but help with the problem of anorexia and so many dying and health issues. I say boycott these designers. Be real Ralph Lauren, there is no one going to be wearing these sizes, be part of the soultion not part of the problem.

csiblackwell, 10-08-2009, 9:50AM

First of all define normal.

New definition of normal is lower the bar, not raise the standard.
Apply little effort, spend day sitting on couch eating chips.
Anyone reaching beyond the status quo is called not normal.
Shopping cow section of Wal-Mart for XXXL sizes, not cool.