A friend of mine just tipped me off to these latest photos Beyonce posted to her Instagram, featuring the singer, clad in sort of retro-style two-piece swimsuit, golfing on vacation. I had two thoughts: Hey, looks like her stance is pretty good! and Wow, that’s some badly Photoshopped thigh gap. Aside from the obvious, which is that Beyonce’s (extremely toned, hard-working, bad ass, Blue-birthing) body doesn’t usually have thigh gap you could drive a kid’s fire engine toy through, the signs that something is “off” are easily recognizable to anyone who spends any amount of time photo editing. The slight wavy unevenness and a certain sharpness where there should be a natural curve indicate that the clone stamp tool was probably used to whittle down Bey’s thighs and butt area, just enough to look unnoticeable and natural at first glance. For a third and fourth opinion — my friend had already agreed with me that these were ‘shopped — I asked two friends who are very knowledgable about these things for their opinions. Both took one look and agreed that something had been done to the areas circled in white above, probably using Photoshop’s clone stamp tool. The image on the left being especially obvious to both of them.
This isn’t so much a criticism of Beyonce as it is a simple question: “Why bother?” Are we really Photoshopping our Instagram photos now? If there’s something I don’t like about a picture of myself — and trust, I am human, this happens plenty often — I just don’t post it to Instagram. Or if I like everything else about the photo — the setting, the story behind it, the fact that it’s the only photo of something I want to remember — except for whatever I have decided is wrong with me in it, I just post it as is with the knowledge that no one who looks at it is going to see that thing that I hated about my face/body anyway BECAUSE IT IS PROBABLY NOT THERE. But Photoshopping it to perceived perfection and then posting it to Instagram as if it was the original? I know Beyonce manages to do A LOT with each day and that is how she is the Queen of the Universe, but GIRL, talk about a waste of your damn time. Your thighs are fine! They’re great! Everyone’s thighs are fine and great! It’s Instagram! Not everything in life needs to be perfectly curated! Especially with amateur clone stamp skills. So can we not do this? Let’s leave the shitty Photoshopping to the professional thigh gap shavers at Target.com and the J.C. Penney catalog and Cosmopolitan, okay? That way you really focus on your golf swing, B. [Instagram]
Original by Amelia McDonell-Parry @xoamelia
