It has been known for some time that one of the major features people psychologically associate with attractiveness is the symmetry of the face and other features. It turns out that several researchers have written software algorithms to make arbitrary faces more attractive.
Presented at SIGGraph 2008, the researchers have both a paper and video examples online of digital facial modifications rendering the subjects 'more attractive'. Quite impressive. Maybe someone will make it a Facebook application next.
I'm not sure if I think this is a great idea in the same way that I find the amount of digital retouching done to models in magazines and such somewhat disturbing as well. We've already developed a view of people that is unnatural; retouched and fixed-up. Our young people are trying to emulate the looks of unreal photographs already.
Maybe we could require a list of ingredients on advertising photos, much like on the food we eat (here in Canada at least). "Model is 14yrs old with dental reconstruction, make-up required 5 hours and 3 hours of photo retouching." Perhaps people would look at these pictures differently if they knew what a lie they were being sold. Even the people in Dove's now well-known Campaign for Real Beauty, as admirable as its claims are, were retouched.
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