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The sketch artist could have intentionally drawn the women as slightly disproportionate from reality just to make this piece more polemic. I don't see how that

The sketch artist could have intentionally drawn the women as slightly disproportionate from reality just to make this piece more polemic. I don't see how that was prevented?

strangestchild 13y ago
Agree - especially given that this was funded by the Campaign for Real Beauty, and it wouldn't exactly have supported Dove's ad campaign if the pictures looked the same or the sketch was reversed.
friendly_chap 13y ago
It wasn't. It's marketing. Pure and simple.
- pan69 13y ago
  You mean; It was. It's marketing. Pure and simple.
  - MichaelApproved 13y ago
    No. OP is responding to the question "I don't see how that was prevented?" with the answer "It wasn't [prevented]."
    - pan69 13y ago
      I misread. Apologies.
fossuser 13y ago
Yeah he shouldn't have known when the person was describing themselves or someone else.
jtheory 13y ago
Yup; this is a "great" idea that falls apart when you think about it a bit. The artist knows perfectly well what the intention is, and which group is which. ALSO, the results are going to be skewed by standard rules of politeness -- even given a person with a perfectly balanced view of themselves, the way they describe themselves to a stranger surely should avoid being too praising (or they'd seem narcissistic), whereas someone else's description of them would be skewed to the positive side, also out of politeness -- who knows if the person being drawn is going to hear this description later, or is a friend of the artist, etc.? It would be easy to do this better. Imagine if this were (seemingly) a study about the value and accuracy of police sketches. Use multiple sketch artists, and let them know their sketches are going to be tested by IDing from a large lineup. Some sources will be self-describing (i.e., someone very familiar with the face) and others will be someone with only a short encounter with the subject. This is a plausible (fake) study, and the remaining problems (with the real intent) are much, much fewer.
- xwowsersx 13y ago
  I agree that this "study" is completely unscientific. But I think it definitely opens up a direction for further inquiry. A counter to your point about politeness skewing the results is that the women who were shown the sketches of themselves afterwards clearly seemed to react in such a way that indicated that they realized they were too harsh on themselves, that they had negative views of their appearance which was unjustified, and that they were relieved/flattered to see how strangers saw them. So, it's not a proof of anything, but I'm just pointing out that womens' description of themselves seemed to be pretty reflective of how they genuinely viewed themselves.
  - jtheory 13y ago
    Quite right -- I think there is something actually interesting here. That's why I was so frustrated that they just went with the publicity stunt when this could have been real. it would have been a bit harder to spin into a slick documentary, but it would have been much more valuable.
    - 13y ago
cristianpascu 13y ago
Women DO see themselves uglier then they really are. It doesn't matter if he exaggerated a bit. The effect is what matters.
- Houshalter 13y ago
  That is common belief. On the other hand they see themselves in the mirror everyday and, I would think, they would likely have a far more realistic image of themselves, than a random stranger who just saw them for a short time. It would be really interesting to see this done under proper conditions rather than just a marketing gimmick.
  - unalone 13y ago
    Image has nothing to do with reality and everything to do with perception. The interesting thing about this campaign is that it shows how strangers are far more complimentary about how people look than those people would be about themselves. We know our own perceived flaws far better than anybody else does; in our culture of image obsession, it is far too easy to assume that every person in the world is judging you for every little imperfection on your face and of your body. There have absolutely been experiments conducted about people's self-perceptions as compared to others' perceptions of them. This is nothing new. But it's far more interesting to look at than your average psychological study, and since it's not saying anything especially groundbreaking – does anybody really think strangers would be more critical of a woman than that woman would be of herself? – "interesting to look at" is what matters.
    - mistercow 13y ago
      >The interesting thing about this campaign is that it shows how strangers are far more complimentary about how people look than those people would be about themselves. No, it asserts that. It does not show it. To show it would require a valid methodology.
      - unalone 13y ago
LeeHunter 13y ago
Surely you're not suggesting that this was (or should have been) some kind of scientific study? For all we know, they might have shot another 20 women who looked much better in the self-description than the stranger description. It's just an interesting visual way to tell a story about body awareness. And of course, the whole point is to reinforce the Dove marketing approach, which is still a lot more healthy and wholesome than the typical cosmetic pitch (i.e. you're not beautiful unless you look like a skinny white photoshopped supermodel)
- johncoogan 13y ago
  I completely agree with this, and I actually do think that they shot more like 10 women because at 5:37 in the video, a woman is smiling at what seems to be her own sketches, but they never made it to the website. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=litXW91UauE#t=337s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=litXW91UauE#t=337s
- Evbn 13y ago
  Dove has a big tent that includes skinny and fat people, which is nice, but they still tell women that their skin is ugly.
  - DanBC 13y ago
    Yes, all of their ads feature people with great skin, which is a shame if you're someone with eczema or dermatitis pilaris or similar bad skin. Especially since those people buy a lot of product. They make money selling nice versions of very simple gunk. I haven't checked, but I hope they're not doing the science-BS of "skin tightening" or "lip-plumping" that other brands do.
    - LeeHunter 13y ago
      "all of their ads feature people with great skin," I'm sorry, but that's just uninformed bullshit http://www.adverbox.com/ads/dove/ http://www.adverbox.com/ads/dove/ No, they don't show people with severe skin issues but really, that's a little unreasonable for a company selling skin care products. " I haven't checked, but ..." Ahem
Zimahl 13y ago
The sketch artist could have intentionally drawn the women My thought was that we, as individuals, don't really know what we look like. Sure we see ourselves in the mirror but how much detail do we see? I see my wife all the time and could probably have a pretty accurate sketch drawn of her but if I had one drawn of me it would be pretty far off.

The sketch artist could have intentionally drawn the women as slightly disproportionate from reality just to make this piece more polemic. I don't see how that was prevented?

strangestchild 13y ago

Agree - especially given that this was funded by the Campaign for Real Beauty, and it wouldn't exactly have supported Dove's ad campaign if the pictures looked the same or the sketch was reversed.

friendly_chap 13y ago

It wasn't. It's marketing. Pure and simple.

pan69 13y ago
You mean; It was. It's marketing. Pure and simple.
- MichaelApproved 13y ago
  No. OP is responding to the question "I don't see how that was prevented?" with the answer "It wasn't [prevented]."
  - pan69 13y ago
    I misread. Apologies.

fossuser 13y ago

Yeah he shouldn't have known when the person was describing themselves or someone else.

jtheory 13y ago

Yup; this is a "great" idea that falls apart when you think about it a bit. The artist knows perfectly well what the intention is, and which group is which. ALSO, the results are going to be skewed by standard rules of politeness -- even given a person with a perfectly balanced view of themselves, the way they describe themselves to a stranger surely should avoid being too praising (or they'd seem narcissistic), whereas someone else's description of them would be skewed to the positive side, also out of politeness -- who knows if the person being drawn is going to hear this description later, or is a friend of the artist, etc.? It would be easy to do this better. Imagine if this were (seemingly) a study about the value and accuracy of police sketches. Use multiple sketch artists, and let them know their sketches are going to be tested by IDing from a large lineup. Some sources will be self-describing (i.e., someone very familiar with the face) and others will be someone with only a short encounter with the subject. This is a plausible (fake) study, and the remaining problems (with the real intent) are much, much fewer.

xwowsersx 13y ago
I agree that this "study" is completely unscientific. But I think it definitely opens up a direction for further inquiry. A counter to your point about politeness skewing the results is that the women who were shown the sketches of themselves afterwards clearly seemed to react in such a way that indicated that they realized they were too harsh on themselves, that they had negative views of their appearance which was unjustified, and that they were relieved/flattered to see how strangers saw them. So, it's not a proof of anything, but I'm just pointing out that womens' description of themselves seemed to be pretty reflective of how they genuinely viewed themselves.
- jtheory 13y ago
  Quite right -- I think there is something actually interesting here. That's why I was so frustrated that they just went with the publicity stunt when this could have been real. it would have been a bit harder to spin into a slick documentary, but it would have been much more valuable.
  - 13y ago

cristianpascu 13y ago

Women DO see themselves uglier then they really are. It doesn't matter if he exaggerated a bit. The effect is what matters.

Houshalter 13y ago
That is common belief. On the other hand they see themselves in the mirror everyday and, I would think, they would likely have a far more realistic image of themselves, than a random stranger who just saw them for a short time. It would be really interesting to see this done under proper conditions rather than just a marketing gimmick.
- unalone 13y ago
  Image has nothing to do with reality and everything to do with perception. The interesting thing about this campaign is that it shows how strangers are far more complimentary about how people look than those people would be about themselves. We know our own perceived flaws far better than anybody else does; in our culture of image obsession, it is far too easy to assume that every person in the world is judging you for every little imperfection on your face and of your body. There have absolutely been experiments conducted about people's self-perceptions as compared to others' perceptions of them. This is nothing new. But it's far more interesting to look at than your average psychological study, and since it's not saying anything especially groundbreaking – does anybody really think strangers would be more critical of a woman than that woman would be of herself? – "interesting to look at" is what matters.
  - mistercow 13y ago
    >The interesting thing about this campaign is that it shows how strangers are far more complimentary about how people look than those people would be about themselves. No, it asserts that. It does not show it. To show it would require a valid methodology.
    - unalone 13y ago

LeeHunter 13y ago

Surely you're not suggesting that this was (or should have been) some kind of scientific study? For all we know, they might have shot another 20 women who looked much better in the self-description than the stranger description. It's just an interesting visual way to tell a story about body awareness. And of course, the whole point is to reinforce the Dove marketing approach, which is still a lot more healthy and wholesome than the typical cosmetic pitch (i.e. you're not beautiful unless you look like a skinny white photoshopped supermodel)

johncoogan 13y ago
I completely agree with this, and I actually do think that they shot more like 10 women because at 5:37 in the video, a woman is smiling at what seems to be her own sketches, but they never made it to the website. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=litXW91UauE#t=337s http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=litXW91UauE#t=337s
Evbn 13y ago
Dove has a big tent that includes skinny and fat people, which is nice, but they still tell women that their skin is ugly.
- DanBC 13y ago
  Yes, all of their ads feature people with great skin, which is a shame if you're someone with eczema or dermatitis pilaris or similar bad skin. Especially since those people buy a lot of product. They make money selling nice versions of very simple gunk. I haven't checked, but I hope they're not doing the science-BS of "skin tightening" or "lip-plumping" that other brands do.
  - LeeHunter 13y ago
    "all of their ads feature people with great skin," I'm sorry, but that's just uninformed bullshit http://www.adverbox.com/ads/dove/ http://www.adverbox.com/ads/dove/ No, they don't show people with severe skin issues but really, that's a little unreasonable for a company selling skin care products. " I haven't checked, but ..." Ahem

Zimahl 13y ago

The sketch artist could have intentionally drawn the women My thought was that we, as individuals, don't really know what we look like. Sure we see ourselves in the mirror but how much detail do we see? I see my wife all the time and could probably have a pretty accurate sketch drawn of her but if I had one drawn of me it would be pretty far off.