A new trend is emerging in ad campaigns for swimwear brands that we highly applaud: use of unretouched photos! The Brazilian swimwear label Lua Morena has just released its 2011 collection campaign themed "Absolutely Natural". By leveraging the photographer's expertise in the correct lighting techniques (and of course, the natural beauty of model Michella Cruz), the campaign does not utilize software to treat the pictures - and the result is still amazing!

UK's department store Debenhams has also caught the wave for the more natural approach in their swimwear campaigns. They have begun displaying unretouched shots of models next to the retouched versions, with some details of the alterations that the image would have undergone in an usual swimwear campaign. The results you can see below.

It's a win-win situation really: women will be less exposed to unrealistic, unattainable body-images and companies will spend less money and time airbrushing images that are perfectly acceptable to the target audience. And we can't forget, the extra publicity gained by labels on the front of this trend is also a major plus for any brand!


Lua Morena's unretouched photoshoot for 2011 is pure beauty!


Dazzling swimsuits from Lua Morena's 2011 collection in unretouched pictures.


Debenham's latest ad feature an unretouched photo of a swimsuit model, along
with a point-by-point image of the typical retouching the picture would have undergone.