Two images depicting women digitally edited to look unrealistically skinny have been making waves in the media recently.

In the Queen Victoria Building in Sydney an advertisement for Ralph Lauren with an unrealistically skinny model is displayed. The model in the picture has had her waist significantly reduced to make her appear much smaller, as can be seen in this before and after shot from NineMSN. A larger version of the altered image can be found here.

Also in the news, Demi Moore is on the cover of December’s edition of W magazine with an attempt to airbrush her waist to a smaller size having gone awry. Part of the model’s hip has been trimmed so much that it doesn’t line up with rest of her body. A spokesperson for the magazine reportedly said the magazine “did not do anything unusual or out of the ordinary” to the photo.” The image can be found here.

These advertisements emphasise the call from a group of academics, doctors and psychologists for all digitally altered pictures in the media to be clearly labelled as such. The group cited research linking airbrushed images to health problems including depression and eating disorders.

Writer Tristan Boyd, Editor Dr Ramesh Manocha.