I’m surprised no one has posted a link the the horrible picture of Eddie Van Halen. The guy was never super handsome I suppose, but he doesn’t look as bad as that picture where he could be cast as the crypt keeper.
Recently, somewhere I saw a recent photo of Madonna with really muscular arms. It was amazingly unattractive (although I suppose if you go for that sort of thing, you might like it).
Not bad. Took her from about as appealing as a hair in your hamburger to about a 3 on a scale of 10.
The question is, would the world media have lionized her as they did if she had shown up on Britain’s Got Talent looking like that? Wouldn’t it have made her just another talented Briton, without the stereotypical freak value?
OTOH, if the “real” Ms. Boyle is the one you get a glimpse of here, you could say it’s amazing what a difference half-a-century of isolated small-town Scottish spinsterhood makes.
I think it’s sad that kids on Myspace can take better pictures than some of these. I’ve seen people on Myspace who look like they could be a model, if I didn’t already know what they looked like in person.
That Fergie pic looks bad. It looks like someone trying to airbrush out flaws and doing a cartoonish job of it. Though to be fair, I saw a magazine cover of Cher once that was so airbrushed she looked 2 dimensional. It looked like a line drawing.
That Linda Hamilton pic is dreadful.
foolsguinea said:
Are you smoking crack? (Is she smoking crack?) She’s 52, but looks 72 in that pic.
That Madonna pic is bizarre. Definitely llama woman. Again, the product of airbrushing gone awry. Her eyes are huge or something.
Mug shots
Nick Nolte
Lindsay Lohan
At one point there was an email circulating with some pics of women without makeup looking pretty bad. IIRC Cameron Diaz was one.
Madonna of the scary arms
http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/629f5f87c4.jpg
stars without makeup (but most of them are just bad photos)
http://seehere.blogspot.com/2006/08/celebrities-without-makeup.html
It’s amazing what a makeup artist, hair stylist, wardrobe consultant, professional photographer, and airbrushing and photoshopping can accomplish!
I think most of them probably look just fine when they do their own makeup and hair and go out on the town. What we’re seeing here is a quick run to the store for milk, etc. I certainly wouldn’t want anyone taking candids of me driving my kid to school at 7:30 or grocery shopping after a long day of school or work.
And if that’s the worst picture of Halle Berry, then I’d say she is just about freakin’ perfect. Ditto on the Marilyn Monroe pics. When you are truly beautiful, you don’t need all of the extra help to look good.
I take your point on Linda Hamilton.
But this? She looks good here!
I also love that the “without makeup” pictures appear to be grainy stills from a video camera while the “with makeup” pictures are professional glamour shots often taken years (or decades) earlier.
You must have posted that while you still had morning wood. 
Yes - we have gotten used to seeing celebrities all sexed-up, so when we see them in their natural raggedy old person state, they’re suddenly scary by comparison.
This past weekend, I saw in person the (largely b- and c-list) celebrities shown here: September 10th, 2009 - Rendezvous with Robt. — LiveJournal
In addition, I saw in passing Catherine Bach, Richard Kiel, Traci Lords, and others whose names do not come to me at the moment.
The only ones I would say looked raggedy were Richard Kiel and Peter Mayhew, and as I understand it, neither of them are well. Looking “raggedy” is by no means a natural state of affairs for all people.
Granted, Traci Lords looked scary in person, but for entirely different reasons.
I use the term only for comparison sake. Maybe I should have used scare quotes. Compared to the airbrushed & photoshopped celebrity pictures that we get bombarded with via advertising, normal - even above average - people look “raggedy”.
If that weren’t a “fake” smile in the after picture, he would look a lot better.
Other than the slightly bloodshot eyes, Lohan looks hot as hell in that pic.
One man’s bloodshot eyes are, evidently, another man’s dilated pupils. Also, her mouth doesn’t look big enough to … let’s just say, I’ve seen her look more appealing.
I find the freckles that are so much prevalent around her mouth look like sores at first glance. Combine that with how trampy her reputation is, and it’s easy to see why I, at least, get grossed out.