This is Real

We collaborated with NYC Media Lab and Viacom to create content circling outrages of 2015 for their billboards in Times Square. We created an interactive experience around body image outrage through a custom web-app that allowed people on the streets in Times Square to remove photoshopped layers from a selection of 9 'models'. 

challenge

Beauty standards today are unrealistic, unachievable and unacceptable. We
are constantly exposed to these images across platforms. This causes psychological harm that has resulted in social issues such as 'body shaming', eating disorders, unhealthy use of supplement drugs among others.

Viacom wanted to test out their an interactive experience on their screens for the first time ever through thought-provoking content. 

Solution

We created an interactive web-app that reveals the truth behind the layers of photoshop in on of the most public and superficial areas in the world - Times Square. 

Process

We photographed 9 ordinary people (designers, artists, coders etc) and
photoshopped their image to reflect the standards imposed on models in reality.

We then created a web app that layered the original image under the photoshopped image in the form of a magazine cover. Using an iPad, users could select a model and slowly wipe away the fake layer, revealing the true person underneath the digitally manipulated version in real time.

User testing the interaction provided useful feedback for the changes needed to get the effect we wanted in terms of interaction as well as visual changes to the models and fake magazine cover.  After several iterations and testing several types of poses, design styles and "erasing" interactions, we created an effective and engaging app. 

Tools: Photoshop, Illustrator, Photography, UX, UI, Interaction Design