2014 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue Revealed.

[Scootaloo]

585. I wasn't referring to the fashion, actually

I imagine that outfit is rather racy for 1964, what with being a two-piece and all (compare to Sue Peterson's 1965 outfit, for instance.) But the presentation itself is different.

First, there's still sports content - Apparently back in 1964, there were still sports going on in midwinter... like boxing apparently. Oh, how times have changed, when we no longer do anything between the superbowl and early season playoffs...

Second, the shot itself is very different. For one, it's an actual photo, not a heavily-edited composite. I guess one could argue technological limitations vs. cost, and i guess there would be a point - these days when you can find an intern who makes lolcats for a living and pay him in hostess treats to touch up a model's picture, there's not much incentive to not go ahead and do so.

For another, the composition itself. Babette March is not staring at the camera, but looking off to the side. She's rubbing her nose and grinning; it actually looks like a candid photo of a person having, as the tagline says, "fun in the sun."

The angle is so that the camera is slightly higher, looking down - this actually gives prominence to her face and profile, rather than her ah, attributes. Some other examples of this from the 1964 issue:


Compare the the 2014 issue cover in the OP, or the ones I posted. The focus of these is clearly NOT the models' faces.

Another comparison, one I already pointed out - the models from recent issues are stripping or already sans top. Which kind of makes the swimsuit edition kind of a head-scratcher. Babette not only isn't stripping, she's actually not in a suggestive pose at all. She's a woman, in surf, in a period-sexy swimsuit.

While both are objectification - selling a woman as a product based on her physical appearance - the trend has has actually reduced the "value" of the "objects" in question - Babette is being "sold" as a whole person, while the models on this years cover are being "sold" as butts who happen to have faces somewhere above. And I will try to not use so many quote marks in future paragraphs,