But you can't come to a conclusion because you don't know - for in
instance - how the image is processed. A lot of people love and look
for smooth skin, and PP their pic to achieve this effect. We don't
know the lighting, some make up (even dry) do not help, etc.
Bottom line: you're jumping to conclusions and you have no evidence
to support them.
Well, I'm not exactly jumping to conclusions.
Mine is an educate guess of course, but I have good chances of being enough accurate.
The lighting is pretty easy to make it out, there are not many secrets there. Having taken shots like the one below for magazines and Ads for Cosmetics for the long time I have some idea on how light, make up and skin interact. If you used the Nikon 60mm Micro, you know how sharp it is, the kind of contrast it has and how it DOF at a given aperture and distance. The picture was not retouched and the skin has not been modified/smoothed or what so ever. they may have cloned out some small blemishes on the skin or some imperfection of the make up, but it looks like they did not. They may have sharpened a little just to remove dullness of the raw file, but it does not look like.
Really, I have taken photos like those so many times, with so many different cameras and lenses that I cannot even remember.
After all is not rocket science and looking at the images there are more than enough elements to make an educated guess, that stand good chances of being accurate enough.
Another frame would be more appropriate, this is the only one I could get with a link.
If you look more carefully you can see what I see.
I know it is not 2+2=4, but that is what experience, practice and a bit of knowledge come to help.
than if you do not like what you see and want to believe something else, it is another story.
