Thursday, October 2, 2014

TIFF Revisited

It's like having a new toy:
I'm not saying it's photoshop,
but somebody vandalized the car's detailing and
left blurry smudge behind.
They got a bit of her hand, too. Just zoom. You can see the paintbrush smears.

Thinking they aspect ratio'd this to the vertical - not only does Tessa have
stilt-legs, so does Ryan (compare to others from this event, heels and all).

I don't know it's photoshop; I do know
there's stray pink pixels sticking out from
her dress, the edge looks like a jigsaw puzzle,
and there's noise all around the edge and none
anywhere on Ryan. (Noise is the degraded
resolution, lighter colored blur/pixel scatter that
hovers outside her silhouette in this picture. In
fact it looks pinkish.)
I think somebody stole parts of Tessa's ribcage up there.
If it's of any interest, I'd recommend just going to the original of these photos on line, opening it up and clicking zoom. That's much clearer than looking at them on the blog (you lose resolution every time you crop or copy, so the contrast is clearer if you go to the original image, or at least what was put online).

This manipulation is evident in photos the day after TIFF as well, particularly one standing next to Ryan where his shirt is bloused out on the right and there's a halo between its outline and Tessa's left side.
At first I thought this one was closer to how Tessa
really looked at TIFF, but if you zoom in on the margin
between her dress and Semple's jacket just at the band
under the bustline that goes all the way to the lowest
wrinkle in the fabric at her midsection, there's what
looks an
awful lot like the tracings of the clone tool
(cloning the edge of Semple's jacket to cover more
of Tessa), largely dark charcoal mixed with some pink
pixels. P
hotos start pixilating when you zoom in really
closely, particularly at the edges, but if you look at any
of Semple's other edges, none resemble the "hand made"
looking margin that lines up by Tessa's midsection.
I'm familiar with what clone tool margins look like because for the longest time it was the only tool I understood in photoshop. :)

Won't do it now, but if you go back to the official event golf photos, there's tons of noise around Tessa and "some" on Scott, but not around Scott's outline, as seen on Tessa. There are a few photos where there's none on either of them, clean as a whistle, no static anywhere. All of these have her facing the camera. The ones where she's torqued, jumping, or in profile - noise for days around the outline of her body down to the hem of her golf skirt, after which it disappears, go figure.

At least this image is all the real Tessa.
#wow #4inchwaistline
Check it out, Tessa, there's a supernova outside the window, and somebody amputated your right hip. I like how they blew out all the light on her right, to soften the contrast between the shrunken right side and the larger dimensions of her left (and, looking again, to hide where the interior on the image's left side is warped). I think Tessa (and/or her friends) should mix it up with the warp tool. Try liquefying what's in the right side of the frame for once. #stopwarpabuse.

I'm beginning to suspect Tessa didn't carry Little Moir, and isn't carrying Baby Moir, anterior or transverse. In the real world, she could be carrying like a tank.

P.S.


This is another one where it's best to find the original and zoom in, if you're interested. The advertisement behind Tessa is warped. Her right hand has found its way into the ribs (or whatever the dish is) or the ribs have jumped off the ad and smeared her right hand. Her left elbow is BEHIND the printed letters of the advertisement. The entire front of her outline is jagged and broken. The plate pictured in the ad in front of her is warped, the plate behind her is warped, but I really want to know how she got behind the ad itself. Her right hand in the ribs/sauce and her elbow behind the printing. A merge layers fuck up?

Thanks to the comment below for the link to this on "Just Jared":


P.P.S.

Meryl Davis agrees this photoshop talk is nonsense, and can't wait until the blog gets back to the skating.

ETA: This is my photoshop. I thought it would be self-evident. Anyone can see by this blog's banners that the blog's photoshop expertise is nonexistent.The above took me less then a minute.Then I spent about five minutes playing with filters, including figuring out if there was a way to get a supernova to blow out Meryl's entire right side. Oh well.

And FWIW: I indented both sides of her waist using "move", and expanded both hips using "move". I expanded the bust line using "move" and "grow." Ran some filters over it and cropped.The End.

Notice how little evident distortion there is in the water (although I bet if you zoom in, you'll see some). Look at how the backgrounds in instagrams of Tessa are completely WTF. I have no idea what's back there! She got a bit too clever with the golf glove image, segmenting everything into grids, and I guess you have to be alert to notice the segmented grids don't match each other AT ALL.

I'm definitely side-eyeing Tessa's shadow in her "plaid dress in Montreal" image. (The dress itself is a mess, but I feel as if, if I post close-ups and zooms of what's been done to that image, I'll be spamming my own blog.)

But, yes, of course, it's too much time and trouble for a professional photographer, who can do the most popular "slim" fixes faster than they can exhale - assignment pros and free lancers who can batch edit and set up macros - to eliminate Tessa's pregnancy.

This bit is for someone in the comments section below, whom the blog has put in a time out: everybody at TIFF was photoshopped. People have pores. Unless everybody was at the colorist in the morning (which would not be untoward, but some just can't), people have roots, however faint. People's clothes wrinkle and their antiperspirant fails. People's eyes could use some color intensifying and sharpening. Although they're all celebrities to some degree or other, at times people break out. You wouldn't know it by these events, and it's not always hardworking concealer.Then there are those celebs who insist on tanning the natural way, and need the sun damage softened. Sometimes people just don't get their 8 hours the night before, and perhaps there's bloodshot elements to deal with.

We can all choose to believe that in the era of HD film and video, digital photography hasn't caught up, and that's why everybody's skin looks like Barbie, and is blurred around the margins. So primitive. But go ahead, choose to believe nobody but Tessa was photoshopped, therefore Tessa wasn't photoshopped either. Every single person at TIFF had invisible pores, Barbie hair, wore non-wrinkling fabric, and the whites of their eyes was not only the purest white of the heavens above, but their eye color was uniformly deep, sharp and clear. Gums as pink as a baby's tuches.

Every red carpet event has a media staging area, and if you've ever seen one, they all sit on their folding chairs, laptops running, and photoshop their little hearts out. Every single image. Even though it's possible to upload the raw images for someone else to edit and publish, the goal is to get these out as fast as possible, and many photogs do it themselves.

Tessa's pregnancy situation is one of the fastest, easiest fixes there is. Scott and Tessa have both been trodding these particular red carpets for over four years now. Athlete red carpets are largely charity and fundraising events. Reality celebs and the D list are often at "Look - Minolta has a new point and shoot!" Or, "Elizabeth Hasselback and her former college roommate have started a charitable enterprise and hope you can attend the gala auction!" When Scott and Tessa attend an event, most of the time it's crammed with other athletic notables.They're not at the screening of "Men, Women and Children". They're on the charity/fundraising list. Guess what. For the media/photogs in the mixed zone taking the pictures, there's also a list. There's always a few newbies, but many of these media pros have known Scott and Tessa for years, and know the score. Everybody's been wearing a hole in the same red carpets for years.

145 comments:

  1. I completely agree with you about the TIFF pictures. I've thought they were photo-shopped since the event. Some you don't even need to zoom in on they're so obvious.

    I do think she is showing more this time though.
    Last time we had the benefit of video. Which can be altered to some degree as well (and positioning herself is important and was obviously employed), but it's still overall movement that can be tracked...instead of one moment or place in time, which, as we've seen, can be completely changed. We haven't had that this time. Many, many, many different pictures though. Which are not only incredibly inconsistent (this should be the first tip off), but that also have the visible distortions.

    Last time it was her first pregnancy, her body was still maturing, and her abdominal muscles hid most of it. I'm not saying there wasn't photo-shopping or slight of hand then too. There most likely was. But I think most of what we saw was closer to reality.
    This time, I think she is showing more, hence the onslaught of social media keeping us frequently updated on how she (supposedly) currently looks. It's possible for her to look the same as before. She was able to get back her shape fairly easily and quickly due to the fact that she didn't lose much of it in the first place, it's been years, and she is a ridiculously fierce training Olympian.
    If she is bigger this time though, ITA that we wouldn't really know. However, a change compared to last time could be for a variety of reasons, including, but not limited to, the presentation (positioning).
    In any event, she (and apparently also many friends) have been playing heavily with the image of her that's put out there.


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  2. Can I just say I didn't like Tessa dress at tiff ? The detailing a around the bust was mondo-bizarro. Anyway--another thing that makes u hmmmm....this tiff gallery ...the reporter didn't have time to photoshop?? Everyone else's body is shown except........? http://o.canada.com/entertainment/gallery-tiff-3rd-annual-charity-gala

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  3. There's one TIFF photo where you can see much more of what's under the dress in the middle - well, more than one, but with this one, she's facing the camera and you can see it even though she's facing. And then others from the same angle where that whole midsection has shrunk. Tessa has never had a Jessica Rabbit silhouette - these distortions are ridiculous. Suddenly prominant boobs, tinier waist than she has even when not pregnant, and vavooming out in the posterior. Her own body is gorgeous, but she's never been hourglass. Then she'll post something like the Nerd photo where she looks teensy petite, not an ounce of flesh or even muscle. A little nerd waif off to the library.

    The ones that looked photoshopped to me the most were the ones the next day, day after TIFF, in the blue off the shoulder top with the blouson cuffs. Her torso looked like an ironing board - very unnatural, and the color was flat and monotone, ungraduated.

    I haven't gone back to check which video, but there is one video in particular from her first pregnancy. It's a television special, and they skate I Want To Hold Your Hand with Tessa wearing a red dress that has ribbon detailing around the waist. At the time, I hadn't looked up anything about different video formats, but there was something so freaking vertical about that video, it was distracting. Usually with a skating show you don't have this boxy proscenium framing with tall, lean figures in the middle. There's not an emphasis on foreground and background. They show a lot of left-to-right ice and the emphasis is on the skaters within that space.

    THIS performance of I Want to Hold Your Hand is used on television. They'd change the aspect ratio of a movie to squeeze it into a television screen and everything got vertical. Now letterbox formatting is more popular. In any event, figure skating is almost always shown with an aspect ratio that emphasizes the horizontal. Like most people here, I've watched a ton of figure skating, including boatloads of figure skating specials and galas, so I was brought up short by how vertical this video was - it jumped out. I couldn't figure out what they could possibly have done, but I also didn't look it up at the time.

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    1. Based on her Montreal tweet, she's gonna change it up. No more warping the right side of herself. She's gonna be wide, but use the warp tool to hollow out the center of her core to where she could lie on her back and serve as a punch bowl. This should limit background distortion. You can see a huge gap in her center in that image..

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    2. I agree that picture she put up yesterday was messed with, but I'm still not sold it was actually *from* yesterday. I do think it was in this current pregnancy though, so that would explain the alterations.

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    3. Oh me neither, but "Tessa Virtue Style" has an image of what (seems to be) the actual dress. If you go into the shadows at her waist and her underarm, and you look at the chest, waist and crotch, there are white tracks and broken pixels in all over the place where there aren't in the dress pattern anywhere else.

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    4. Also in the middle, there's a section where the white band part of the pattern in that section simply disappears. There's white band echo traces all over the place, and there's a big chunk bitten into one of the wider, dark bands, which also abruptly changes shape. Yes, the dress is folded and etc., but you can follow the pattern where it's not photo shopped, and then you can see where it's been broken up to hell and back.

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  4. Oh I just looked at some other tiff pics--it's not the bust detailing...oops.

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  5. Well well...look at what a commenter wrote on this tiff article. I have to admit I laughed.http://www.justjaredjr.com/2014/09/04/sarah-gadon-ice-dancer-tessa-virtue-hit-up-tiff-opening-gala/

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    1. IMO it's risky for the sham to find itself on general gossip web pages like Just Jared. Just Jared sucks up to certain celebrities, but the people who use the comments section there and on other general gossip sites aren't figure skating fans and aren't cowed by the politics of the figure skating fandom. Scott and Tessa don't want to hit the tabloids.The tabloids play the game differently.

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    2. I don't wish any ill on them but at this point, I wouldn't lose any sleep if they hit the tabloids. I'm tired of being messed with and especially with another baby on the way, they need to grow up and stop fucking around.

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    3. I'm tired of the #bowdown routine. Celebrity social media is all about ass kissing each other, and sponsors, publicists, fellow actors are always in the act, but with Virtue and Moir, a lot of it is basically trying to pre-emptively shut fans down from calling them out. #begrateful, #betterthanyou, #don'thavetodoanything

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    4. ^the thing they're shutting down is the manipulation and the hoaxing. It's all - "two beautiful people living their lives and trying to have a bit of privacy." They'll use their friends on social media for that one, and the turn it around meme. (i.e. - "it's their lives.") Yes, it is their lives, their choices, but they've also proactively hoaxed the public, eroded trust in their sport (not that the sport needed any help there) because Skate Canada energetically helped them hoax the public and did so even recently. They marketed incredible lies to the public by aggressively going out and telling the public the lies were the absolute, unvarnished truth about them, factual and real. Legit journalists, sportswriters and representatives of their sport have promoted Tessa and Scott's lying above and far beyond. P.J. Kwong kept touting the reality show, a program she knew was nothing but a bullshit junkyard.

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    5. Those photos of Tessa next to/under the photos of Sarah Gadon are hilarious. "Tiny" Tessa looks like a tank compared to Sarah. Plus I can see the photoshop around Tessa's waist without even looking at it closely. She is either pregnant or gained all her weight in her waist, butt and boobs in the past few months...just like a pregnant woman...hmmm.

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    6. I had always wrongly assumed Tessa and Scott were too smart to use blatant photoshop. There's SO much in the media about photoshop, particularly around how it impacts women's self-image.There's seminars online, and countless before and after pages explaining how the images were altered and what tools were used. Photoshop, to me, is almost like having something "accidentally" end up on social media. Oops, I accidentally loaded up an image of them with their child. Oops, I accidentally loaded a picture and didn't notice Tessa on Scott's lap in the background.

      IOW, never gonna happen. But obviously, they've been doing it with photoshop. It's funny because the only reason I've become sharper at seeing photoshop, and recognizing the tools used, is from doing something completely unrelated to the blog.

      Turns out they are photoshopping in a MAJOR way. And I ask you, Tessa is a world class athlete. She's in peak condition. Why are photographers, publicists and events busy scrubbing away her midsection? You'd think they all know she's pregnant, that it's not just an open secret in London, OT, but in most of the three dimensional world that has ever intersected with them. But how is that possible without some of these people rushing to tell fans online?

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  6. And when she is supossed to give birth? They're touring for like 5 months from Jan-May/July,a baby needs a lot of work and if a 4 y.o is also involved is worse, going away that long will be cruel, cause I doubt they will risk themselves bringing the babies with them. I don't know... they make easy things look so hard, they could be a cute family but NO they like to hide... silly people.

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    1. You can take children on tour, other skaters have done it, and you can also take along someone to care for the children, such as a family member.

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  7. So the child is never seen in public? what happen's when the child has to go to school? where are they keeping the child? so many unanswered questions that we will never know.....

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    1. Do you know what open secret means? Everybody knows. They just don't go online and officially confirm to fans. That kid can walk around London with "Tessa Virtue is My Mommy" stitched onto her jumper without a problem.

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  8. Shibs' SD...night and day better than Chock/Bates, yet depressing to know this will be undermarked compared to C/B:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDa07kw9IlE

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    1. That thing is GORGEOUS even now, especially the step sequence. I guess ISU and the USFSA is going flagrant, because Chock and Bates' "step sequence" is absolutely pathetic compared to that, and compared to W&P. Everything the Shibs do is miles beyond Chock and Bates, from ice coverage to content to speed. I have W&P's short dance loaded up and broken down into gifs, just have to add the text. There's some shaky parts where you really wonder how these two won a silver at Worlds even in a streamlined field, but there's one paso section that's really good and some linking moves that are wonderful. Note Chock and Bates have no linking moves. They pose, or he drags, lifts and pulls her.

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    2. The Shibs SD is the best one we've seen so far this season, IMO. Of the teams left to debut their programs, I'm looking most forward to seeing PI and HD.

      US Nationals is going to be a sad affair when CB get twice the inflation that Shibs and HD do.

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    3. canadablue! I'm so excited - I can't even tell you how thrilled I am that you've done this for these programs, both for selfish reasons and because I didn't know if you were going to continue for the new season, and it's so so important. Can't wait to put them up.

      The Shibs program is killer. The skating is absolutely wonderful, the program CONTENT kicks Chock & Bates ass. I can't believe they are going to just hand that team the gold at Nationals.

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  9. They are so good for this early on in the season. Wow.

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    1. I know. They were using every inch of the rink, everything was smooth and powerful. Compared to W&P, who had good stuff but were hot and cold and struggled with the paso character. That's where Kaitlyn had her issues. The Shibs step sequence makes Chock and Bates' look pitiful.

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  10. Yet another Scott spotting on Twitter. And it just happens to be on a day where Tessa tells us she's in Montreal...

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    1. And just when KL is going to be in town. Funny how he's only spotted when she's around, or he's somewhere where she is...

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    2. Or to demonstrate that he's nowhere near Tessa. 99% of sightings fit one or both of these categories. Gee, I wonder why?

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    3. Providing Tessa's actually there. We're without a doubt supposed to think she is, but if we're getting technical she didn't say that picture was from today. I'm sure we'll get the "confirmation" shortly though, in a "sighting" or picture-that may or may not be current and more than likely will be altered, given the pressing situation.

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    4. I assumed she was in Montreal for the Let's Bond event as RS was listed as it's ambassador and expected it to be a great sham night but, weirdly enough, not a single photo or mention popped up

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    5. Amazing. Yet the guy disappeared for weeks not long ago. KL is in town and suddenly - a sighting!

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    6. 4.15 And what is so surprising? When he's in town on his own he probably is stuck at home or in the neighborhood. When she's in town he's finally out in the restaurants, shops, airport etc

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    7. Still waiting for pics of Tessa in a fancy dress and Ryan suited up. That was the one and only reason for her to be in Montreal "briefly"

      Because of that event I knew she'd be there on this exact date weeks ago. Not coincidental

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    8. Right, because when he's in town "on his own" he's stuck at home, not knowing anybody in London or Ilderton, and what little family he has living so far away and introverts at that.

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    9. Poor poor Scott. Can only go outside the neighborhood when his Winnipeg-based presumptive girlfriend is in town.

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    10. He doesn't have to be downtown or at the airport when she's not there. What is so wrong in spending time around his house (and his parent's house?)

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    11. 5:16, enough with this. The man has grown up in Ilderton and London his entire life. He knows a million people and has even more relatives. But only when his out of town girlfriend is in town is he recognized. The reason he's not recognized at other times is he's hanging out only at his parents house in Ilderton or at his own house. She's his only social life. That's why he's not "sighted" at other times? Never works out, goes to a bar or restaurant, goes shopping for groceries, hangs out with friends, goes to an athletic event, goes to the park, goes to a movie, a concert, has a business meeting? Never at an airport except when it's girlfriend-related? But the instant Kaitlyn Lawes is in town he's spotted and not even with her, just spotted on his own like suddenly people can see him?

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    12. It's this shit that is so freaking ridiculous: "He doesn't have to be downtown or at the airport when she's not there."

      Yes, of course. You know this, because you know him, his schedule, and all of the reasons he'd have to be anywhere so well.

      This is a perfect example of a fan telling themselves something and deciding it's true based on absolute jackshit.

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    13. The funny part is that when he was "dating" a London girl (Cassandra) - never spotted with Cassandra. The reality show cameras? Until the damn thing was announced in a press release and Scott's friends started putting show-related stuff on instagram, nobody in London or Ilderton or Michigan or Paris saw the damn cameras, not at the restaurants where they shot Scott and Tessa (and Kaitlyn and Andrew), not at the airport where not only were Scott and Tessa but a film crew filming them, not inside the plane where they sat together as a film crew filmed them. In Paris during TEB, where fans magically used to see Jessica and Scott mugging down away from the venue, not to mention David Pelletier and Tessa being "unmistakeable", none of these fans managed to spot Scott and Cassandra, or see the film crew in the venue during practice, or notice a film crew filming Scott and Tessa on the Seine.

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    14. And nobody at that fair thing (not looking it up) where they traipsed around with an entire camera crew in their wake saw Scott and Tessa. They're invisible when they're together, except they tell us they're mostly only recognized when they're together. Except when they're only recognized with their super famous significant others.

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    15. Anon @ 2:21, I was waiting for them (in droves) as well. Especially given the type of event and since the event said they were donating a $1 each time someone hashtagged the event in their photos...
      Not to say they still aren't coming, but it does make me wonder if she was even there at all. The event has been known about for awhile, and like you and others, I knew she would "pop" up there. When her picture went up yesterday it was a no-brainer. Her comments I took more to mean she would be back home by tonight. Now I wonder if she couldn't go out tonight because she was never there at all. If she says she's in town yesterday, it's going to be presumed she was there for that. Perhaps that's all she had the will to do, rather than go to another event with him... as we saw across the course of TIFF, she (and/or Scott) didn't seem so keen on being with him in that capacity. Maybe it was the plan all along to go, but she recently decided she didn't want to, or couldn't because of something related to the pregnancy (travel issues, tired of photo-shopping, not being guaranteed she wouldn't be snapped in a photo that wasn't photo-shopped, etc.)
      The important thing is to make it look like she went. There's semantics with the photo caption already.
      I'm not saying (altered) pictures can't still appear. Although, I'll most likely question the legitimacy of her actual presence at the event in any photos at this point. Also with tweets talking about how nice it was to see her there, (with Ryan, #starstruck #imstillshaking #suchnicepeople #attractivecouple #tinierinperson), I'll obviously take with a 10-lb bag of salt.

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    16. I just love #tinierinperson. They should jump on that one.

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    17. Lol, OC, well I took that from the interview they did a few weeks back. It's what the lady said about them...she may have meant it as in a "larger than life" persona thing, but it definitely made me raise my eyebrows.
      She was also the one that went on about how them being a couple is NOT going to happen though, so...

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    18. I must say, one of the things I love most about Scott is for seven years he's been in a committed, hot'n'heavy relationship without so much as taking a breath in between lest the gay gets him. He's vigilent.

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  11. I think they are mentally ill or something because really, they can't be so focused on shamming all day long. WTF is their problem? I started wondering if they were using photoshop when Tessa did her Ice Bucket Challenge video, where her belly shape was quite unnatural.. I bet they used some video editor there as well.

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    1. There was something bizarre about Tessa's ice bucket challenge, but I don't know what video they used, phone or other, and some apps just have dissolving pixels. Tons of color saturation, no definition. That's why I said Tessa looked like Gumby.

      I don't know how much of their time they spend shamming. I do know they began this when they were teen-agers, and the idea resonated with everybody who knew them, considering the goal was always Vancouver gold, and the goal was always to marry young. The combination seemed as if it warranted protection.

      Since then, common sense has flown out the window. I suspect (it's based on stuff, not a strict assumption) they anticipated coming clean way before this, chickened out and procrastinated, and that's how thing ended up where we are today. Everything now just goes to protect and defend prior egregious, unnecessary lies, and they're also completely chickenshit. Anytime it appears it might be a logical opportunity to sort of come clean and slide back out, they instead recommit big, and crawl further out on a limb.

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    2. Yeah, there was that famous statement by Scott "That's the first time I got a maybe" in 2009. Yes I also think they wanted to come clean right before or right after Vancouver. However, what they're doing today is completely insane, and what scares me the most is they feel like they are entitled to do so, it feels so normal and common to them. Manipulating things as they do is quite crazy. People come here and say the blog is crazy because what they do is really absurd, but at the end THEY, TS, are the craziness, and there are two possible options: they don't realize it or they enjoy it. Both terrible I would say.

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    3. I think the blog's existence has played a role in the sham's continued existence and as long as the blog is active they'll continue fighting back with this stuff. Of course they're too stupid to realize that while they think they're winning against the blog, they're really obsessing over a few fans' opinions and giving them some real power over their decisions. That's beyond sad.

      I think on some level they realize how ridiculous this is but a) Tessa appears to enjoy the game and b) they feel trapped, like there's no getting out of this hole and the only thing to do is to dig deeper. Except they're going to have to get out of the hole at some point and the deeper they dig, the more they put it off, the harder it's going to be. And the more damage they'll most likely do to their kids and their relationship. Part of me actually feels sorry for them, they've created such a huge mess, but at some point they need to grow up and reevaluate what really matters. Because if one of your major goals in life is sticking it to a blog on the Internet then you're leading a pretty sad life.

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    4. Scott and Jessica did a huge spam of Christmas and New Year's Eve photos just as Scott and Tessa were about to have their first child. The blog wasn't around. Jessica rode in the buggy down Ilderton's Maine Street prior to the blog. It is a fact that many people around them understood they'd come clean after Vancouver; they decided to keep shamming during her pregnancy, which included spamming the web with Jessica. Look at the egocentric, narcissistic overkill of the Dominican vacation photos and photoshoot. I think people work too hard (including at times, the blog) looking at exterior reasons for this. They were motivated before the blog. If the blog didn't exist, they'd find another excuse/reason/scapegoat for it. They always do. Not that I believe the blog motivates them. I think the blog is basically a reliable way to get their sham efforts centralized and seen.

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    5. I think the longer they put it off, the more pathetic they look, but it's also true that fandoms tend to back off real stuff, and the reaction would be pretty muted, IMO, at least publicly. If they'd come clean four years ago it would be done by now.

      Also, OBVIOUSLY they enjoy it. It's part of their imagined branding. They haven't given an interview in six years that doesn't trod the same tired ground - first call out the fans for wanting them to be together, as if fans don't even know they skate. Yet every single sham post on this blog that has an active comments section always ends up talking about skating. Whereas skating comments sections will only make "asides" about the sham, and those lamenting that Virtue Moir don't care that fans are interested in the skating, or pointing out the parallels between the corrupt culture that gave Davis White a fraudulent Olympic gold, and the corrupt culture that allows Virtue and Moir to hoax and scam the public. I don't think the reality show had anything to do with the blog, this shit with Kaitlyn Lawes doesn't. I think Tessa is absolutely deluded and possibly the sham piously makes her believe she's protecting her children and family even as her husband is all over the internet kissing other women, and Tessa and Scott aren't such freaking huge celebrities that they need to protect their kids from fans, when they go unrecognized most of the time, and when everybody in their hometowns already KNOWS they have a daughter, and know they're married.

      Delete
    6. OC 4:00, the blog wasn't around but there were discussions on FanForum, as I'm sure you know. I'm not saying it's your fault VM reacted like idiots, and we can't know for sure what would have happened if that discussion had never happened publicly. But there was an obvious reaction from them so things would have been different in some way or other and I don't think it's crazy to think the sham would have been over by now.

      Delete
    7. I don't think it's crazy, after all, we do speculate here, but I think it's a huge mistake to believe Scott and Tessa are doing this for some external reason. They do it because they're looking for reasons to do it. I don't think the sham would be over by now. They went so unnecessarily huge with it before there was a blog, they did a reality show that had nothing to do with the blog, so that's where I disagree. I do not think it would be over by now, and I don't think what fans ACTUALLY do influence them. I think they pretend fans influence them - IOW, scapegoat fans. The blog is useful in that regard. But as the actual reason, and if this discussion never happened? It wouldn't be over. They'd find another reason to dig deeper.

      Delete
  12. The "ribs" in Tessa's right hand are her sunglasses.

    Her front looks jagged because her dress is wrinkled, you can see the wrinkles on the back too.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Her front looks jagged because they photoshopped the shit out of it, and in the back you can see the line that was erased from her back. Her left elbow is behind the print on the poster, and Johnny Weir was added as a layer.

      Delete
    2. This is getting ridiculous. No one would edit and post Tessa's photos, this is TOO MUCH

      Yes, her dress is just wrinckled. And, no, her elbow is not behind the print if you look closely, it ends a millimeter above the print (plus the overall blur of that poster).

      To the person who goes to twitter with all of this - you better stop. The edit in this photos is not as obvious (or there is no edit at all) as you try to make everyone think. And, thanks, I know what a photoshop is

      Delete
    3. There were some photoshops of Beyonce recently where her Iphone on the table was warped and the wine glass next to it was distorted, and the shadow to her right was bent. Some of her fans claimed the phone was warped from the reflection of a pillow (????), the wine glass was stretched and distorted by the glass next to it. I've also seen fans claim doors and dressers were warped by design.

      Delete
    4. Wow, the photo comparison of the W&P and VM choctaws is something else.

      Both articles are so so hard to read - how VM were set up with Carmen and then set up with Seasons, and what the HELL are judges doing going to Marina. As I'll bring up in the skating posts to come that use/link this material (thanks to you and canadablue), WHAT judges? How many judges are there at international level? When do they all get together, either via some email list, teleconference or seminar, all of them, reach a consensus that they want Virtue and Moir to skate THIS menu item, and then send a delegation to Marina to inform her? Do they go through this process for all the ice dance teams at international level? I suspect by "judges" Marina means "officials" and that is still not the job of judges.

      Here's the other thing - NOBODY ASKS. If you're writing about football, or basketball, or a real sport, journalists ask. Here, a coach says "judges came to me" and the reporters don't ask - wait - what? What judges? There are tons of judges in this sport - did they ALL come to you? Why do judges proscribe the sort of program a specific team ought to skate? NOBODY ASKS. The journalists just enjoy the whole cosa nostra vibe and take it for granted when skaters get their elements pulled at the last second because they heard it through the grapevine. Nobody asks about the hierarchy. Where are these dictates coming from?

      Delete
    5. cuteiceprincessloveOctober 5, 2014 at 4:55 AM

      Exactly.. no one asks.. why?? It's ridicolous..

      Delete
  13. So did Tessa actually go to Montreal or....? If they're photoshopping her and have been for quite some time, we have no idea what she actually looks like but I'm going to guess it's pregnant. The event in Montreal wouldn't have been populated with Tessa's usual crowd, aside from Ryan and some of his buddies. Who's to say that the Montreal socialites wouldn't start uploading multiple pictures of her looking very pregnant and very awkward with Ryan. She's probably much safer in Toronto with a group of fellow Olympians and one marketing person willing to play the part of a fan.

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    Replies
    1. I'm sure Tessa is equal to the challenge. She's a competitor, remember. When it comes to the sham, she's a REAL competitor.

      Tessa has been to a million events, nobody's "oopsed" a photo of her yet.

      In her Montreal photo in the plaid dress, she's ditched the right side warping and is warping her center instead, which doesn't create as much background distortion. The down side is she ends up wider than the Sliver Tessa she's been instagramming, the plus side (I GUESS she thinks it's a plus) is that her center is distractingly hollow. All of a sudden her clothes cave in.

      All of this photoshopping certainly explains Flat But Wide Tessa from some of the All That Skate L.A. screencaps, and a couple of absolutely ridiculous ones I just found.

      Delete
    2. Not to mention, they know legions of photographers. It's a well-trodden beat. They know legions of publicists. And they know all kinds of free lancers. That community is small in Canada - it's small anywhere.

      Delete
    3. I'm not saying they couldn't have other people helping them last night, but I'm not sure they did. We'll see. If pictures suddenly appear, it wouldn't surprise me, although I would treat them with great suspicion that either she was photo-shopped in altogether, or by now they've had hours to adjust and mess with them. If no pictures show up, I'm going with she didn't want to go for whatever reason, and they're counting on her Instagram (and maybe a few Twitter "sightings" will pop up too) to legitimize her travel/location.
      (btw, I'm not 8:44 anon)

      Delete
    4. Oh well of course they're going to be photoshopped - she hasn't been seen in anything that wasn't. Even the images from TWIINs where we can see she's pregnant have been shopped, just not as industriously.

      I do admire Tessa's very artsy way of warping only one side of the frame, angling her body slightly back to the warped side to encourage the eye to read it as natural, then washing it out to get both high color saturation and extremely low detail. She's been doing that from the time she began on twitter with her torso images. If though, you just look at the right side of the image, and then at the left, you can see big differences in scale and color tone. The person who does her instagram manipulation could give some of the celeb instagram photoshops lessons.

      As to photoshopping her in, I would have dismissed that idea awhile ago, but after revisiting some of the Cassandra stuff, particularly the bizarre "concert" image, it can't be dismissed.

      I think Tessa's mostly just going to whack-a-mole. She doesn't have that much longer to go. She's called out on the right-side warping, she's called out on the red carpet photo shopping and aspect ratio changing, now she's wearing a busy fabric and focusing on the image as a whole, particularly the pregnant parts, while doing less with her outline in total. I want to do the skating posts before I do another long photoshop post (if that ends up being a thing), but if there's sufficient examples of "busy fabric, warp the middle" and the traces/pixel streaks are obvious, she'll do something else.

      I swear, they're gonna be like Torvill & Dean, who still creak out the old did they or didn't they every time they're interviewed. Virtue and Moir will be grandparents saying they have a unique bond nobody can understand. I think Tessa is just that stubborn.

      Delete
    5. ^Although at some point, Tessa and Scott are either going to still be officially unmarried and child free as they hit middle age, or they're going to have to get themselves some fake spouses and maybe fake kids. That's a wrinkle Torvill and Dean never encountered. As far as we all know, Torvill has an actual husband, and as far as we know, Dean's had a couple of wives and some kids that are actually his. If Tessa and Scott keep playing this unto eternity, it's going to look pathetic even if people take it as real.

      Delete
    6. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BzH83xfCIAENqa3.jpg:large

      Here's her pic from last night, (if it's from last night.) Posted hours later.

      Did she go find her other friends to hang out with because she didn't want to pose with RS again, haha.

      Nice stance. More black. Folds in the midsection of the dress?

      Take it as you will.

      Delete
    7. Anon at 12:58 pm - that's Erik Guay - skier and his wife Karen Guay...as stated earlier this event is associated with a lot of elite young professionals from Montreal, Ottawa and Mont-Tremblant...Erik Guay - most-decorated Canadian skier - who knows Semple from way back...surprise surprise another skier who loves fast cars...hahaha...

      Delete
    8. Yep, I know who it is. Just find it funny she's posting pictures posing and hanging with them, instead of her "boyfriend". But that's how she's been running her social media accounts. No pictures, no name. Just association and implication. The only place he appears is that she follows him on Twitter.
      Also means less actual contact with Semple on her part.

      And yes, I'm also aware Erik was there last night. While she certainly could have been, from what I've seen lately, that doesn't necessarily mean she was as well.

      Delete
    9. Whoever did that picture gave her a mastectomy. Soon she's just going to be a floating head.

      Delete
    10. It's also bizarre at this point, because her poses look like she's hiding, even when they completely wipe out everything from the shoulders down.

      Delete
    11. Anon at 1:32 pm - anon at 1:21 pm here - fairly certain that Tessa was at the event. Tessa is not only supporting RS but she is certainly interested in growing her image/marketability/connections outside of figure skating. There other female Canadian olympians who have retired like Clara Hughes, Joannie Rochette, Marnie McBean, Jennifer Botterill, Heather Moyse, Tessa Bonhomme, Cassie Campbell etc who have made a decent living doing appearances at charities, endorsements, giving seminars, or gone into media etc and I think Tessa is working the business connections. That's fine - but I think one of the advantages that the female hockey players have is that many of them have their own hockey camps and they are giving back to the sport - whether female or male. Clara Hughes just did the cross country cycling. Hell - if there is anyone who has done anything to increase mental health awareness in Canada - she has before it became a fashionable charity...charities are necessary but they are also a business...I get the impression that Scott wants to give back to the community but on a more selective basis - which is fine.

      Delete
    12. I get the impression "Selective" is - the ISC. Pump $$ back into his own family's business. He and Tessa are the ISC's biggest commodity.

      Delete
    13. Tessa's stance makes her look like a creeper, but she's basically trying to limit the work for the photo editors.

      Delete
    14. What the hell happened to her hand...did she get into a fist fight? LOL

      Has she been helping Scott with the house renos? Or is that a side-effect of photo shop...additions here or omissions on previous pics?

      Delete
    15. Oh geez, teensy, slyph-like Tessa with giant bruised monster hand. Oh well, certainly there's a reasonable explanation.

      Delete
    16. 2:42 I don't think Tessa's doing this event because she cares greatly about mental health, I see it more as a shamming and marketing tool. She apparently wants to market herself separately from Scott and I don't know if there's more to this strategy than just sham but I think it's misguided.

      Delete
    17. I can't find a rationale for the juxtaposition, but there's an image of Nicole Richie, a bikini, jogging on the beach, that predates the birth of either of her kids. 5-6 years ago the tabs ran that photo incessantly, suggesting she had an eating disorder. Slap that beach photo next to Meryl in Hawaii, same deal, and remember real, pro photoshop has had a whack at it first. Jutting iliac crests (hip bones). Jutting sternum. Elbow and knees the widest part of the limbs.

      I honestly do not believe Meryl has an eating disorder. I think her physique is a product of ambition.

      Delete
    18. Anon at 6:46 pm - I agree with you that the way Tessa has used her twitter and instagram to market herself separately from Scott and figure skating. You almost get the sense that by avoiding skating tweets that the perception is it was a burden and it did not allow her to do anything she enjoyed. Before twitter and before the reality show, we rarely got off ice pictures of Tessa or Scott during Stars on Ice Tours, banquets, etc and now it's like Tessa needs to document her life to the world on a daily basis. A complete 180. Why?

      Delete
    19. Let me start by saying I don't think she's *only* doing this for the pregnancy.
      However, I also think that it is interesting that she has never taken part in public social media before now. (By this, I mean her personal account, not her likely participation in others accounts/shamming). I don't think it's because it was recommended to them by a management, because since when do they listen to good marketing advice. They decide to do what they want to do. Therefore, this was their decision to have her on here. While I do think she's using it as a marketing tool to some degree, I think the primary focus is for shamming (which includes all aspects of covering up her real life).
      If this is the case though, then why hasn't it been used by her before? What made her decide to put herself out there all the sudden? She watched/participated/controlled Scott's (others?) Facebook. Other skaters, Olympians, celebrities, her friends have been using it forever, so she knows it's been available to her. I know she was busy with training and being a mom and school, but it really doesn't take that much time to post a picture, or give a quick status update. I know plenty of extremely busy working parents, who also have frequently updated social media accounts.
      The more we see that she's posting all these photoshopped pictures of herself, and then see one or two that suggest she is showing more than her first pregnancy, I think that it was set up as a tool for her to hide it. It's something that makes her appear very visible during this time. More "visible" than she's ever been. We get *daily* updates and pictures. But we're not really seeing her. It gives the impression that she's out there and available, doing all these crazy, busy things (yes, shamming and completely separate from Scott), but obviously in reality we're not really seeing her as she is.
      So, while I don't think it's sole purpose is to cover the pregnancy, I definitely think the tip the scales was that... knowing this would allow her to make herself "seen", looking a very specific way over these months. Once again, they control the narrative. If it was only for the shamming and marketing aspects, I think it would have been used before.

      Delete
    20. Remaining "visible" to offset this pregnancy is more of an issue because V/M are not competing. During the first pregnancy, surgery and hunkering down to get back in time for the second half of the season were perfect official excuses for why V/M laid low. Laying low wouldn't fly now (well actually it would fly, but it wouldn't allow V/M to continue trying to control what the public thinks about them - the thing they seem more obsessed with than anything).

      Delete
    21. ^Yes, I agree that not competing left them without a cover story; hence social media.

      BTW, look at Tessa's long long thin spaghetti arm (her left) dangling beneath Karen Guay's elbow and try and make it work with the bruised hand on Eric Guay's shoulder, even factoring in angle of the body and close to the lens. The bottom half of the photo is intentionally dark/obscure to conceal a very sloppy, overdone job a hack job, really, and the fact that whoever did the photoshop squeezed Tessa into the size of a strip of bark. Just run edge detect filters over that photo and look at the bottom.

      They also did a major job on the neckline and then used paintbrush/bucket around the border. If that photo had any light/contrast her neckline, the edge, and the black fill would look like a cartoon.

      It could be a bruise on her hand; in her nerd photo she has a cut on her arm.

      Delete
    22. I'm also curious if Moirville needed a breather, take the heat off them, so Tessa stepped up with her of course completely different social circle/social calendar. The flip side of being the big fish in a small town, being celebrities, is that some people hate you, and while many many people love to kiss ass and suck up, I imagine quite a few dislike the boorish way Moirville conducted itself up to now.

      Delete
    23. Hmmm so far no Scott and Lawes sightings over the weekend...I guess no Cowboys bar for Ms. Lawes, lol...at the rate this is going I don't think Scott will even be seen at any London Knights games...not that I am complaining - I actually prefer it this way....

      Delete
    24. "'It could be a bruise on her hand; in her nerd photo she has a cut on her arm"
      Yeah, that's why I was wondering if she's been helping out with the house, lol.

      @10:28AM, doesn't Scott have an event tomorrow night in Toronto that's already been specified sans Tessa? I'm anticipating a KL sighting, or her to tweet about heading/being in the city, and that's when the pictures will come (and probably some later with his extended family, leaked closer to when Tessa gives birth).
      Of course I wouldn't be upset in the least if they've switched the tactic on these shams. It would be nice if they spent the summer doing the leg work, and now only plan to say they're in the same locations as the "significant others" and let presumption and fan narrative go from there.
      I don't think we're that lucky though, especially as we closer to go time.

      Delete
  14. http://assets.tangeroutletsca.com/PDFs/Ottawa_GrandOpening_Flyer.pdf

    Hi, maybe someone from Canada can attend this event and get a picture?

    ReplyDelete
  15. Thanks anon at 11:02 am - solid skating from the Shibs - nice way to start the season. I think one thing comes to mind with all the teams that we have seen so far this year - even with the Shibs compared to VM - there is space between the skaters. VM truly skate as one and the power these two generated was nutso..
    Canadablues welcome back and cutieprincesslove thanks for the two links - your english is great considering that your first language I assume is italian...
    At this point for me VMs personal life has become secondary....

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    Replies
    1. I am going to die this Nationals. The Shibs have always been strong, but these two programs kick ass. It's a slam dunk between them and Chock and Bates, to say the least, and as soon as the season officially kicks in it's going to be scored exactly opposite.

      Delete
    2. Marina keeps prepping her best skaters (best skaters, not "top" skaters or highest ranked) - which as of now is the Shibs - so that the skating answers all questions and trumps politics, and trumps "things you can and can't say and must say". The Shibs have come out and showed Chock and Bates can't touch them, just as when Carmen came out and showed Davis White hadn't a prayer.

      Delete
    3. I had posted the Shibs link and my comments in the other post, but I'll repost them here since the discussion seems to have moved, lol.

      I know it's still early, but I didn't care for this as much as their SD. I actually found it extremely boring, with the exception of the magnificent twizzle pass, but their superior skating skills cannot be denied. Even as blah as it is, I can still appreciate the dance for the edges and posture and purposeful movement, over some of the other programs we've seen this year, thus far.
      I know it's comparing across competitions, but the scores have them pretty much neck and neck with C/B, with the slight advantage to C/B by 3/4 of a point. Shocker, I know. I expect that gap will widen.

      Delete
    4. Curious what you think is "boring" about it, 12:44? I notice that description is often used to describe certain programs but I don't understand how it can be uttered at the same time as "their superior skating skills cannot be denied" or as you're also praising the edges, posture, and purposeful movement.

      I don't get the disconnect. I don't find masterful skating boring. It may be that I don't always love the music selections or movement vocabulary a team is using based on my own tastes, but the Shibs do a fantastic job of using that music. OC is right that they have musicality for days. They're doing everything right. It is a gorgeous waltz done in the way a waltz should be done. Good music selection, they're working with the nuances as they build up from their incredible edges and stroking, smooth interconnected movement, and difficult transitions (speaking of stroking, someone should compare the number of strokes it takes the Shibs to get across the rink with C/B because, well...it cannot compare. The Shibs take fewer strokes because there's are smoother, more powerful, and quieter. Like a knife through butter).

      There's a kind of transcendent quality V/M have in a waltz that the Shibs can't quite match, but no other team can either. That said, in this season's ice dance field, I don't think there are better waltzers than the Shibs.

      Delete
    5. I don't particularly care for the music. Personal preference, which may change. Seasons did.
      The choreography was just meh for me, but like I said, it's early, so that might change as well.
      Their footwork sequences were spectacular, and as I said, I loved the twizzles. Because they actually skate and dance, use their edges, cover the ice spectacularly, skate well when they are close together and independently, stay down in their knees, have appropriate expression, and convey the feel of the music (even if I don't care for it), I can enjoy the skating quality without caring for the program.
      It wasn't as bad as some other programs this season where I've actually looked at the clock multiple times to see how much was left (or turned off). I can just remember many of their other programs that I've been hooked the first time I saw it, and I wasn't there with this one.

      Delete
    6. I love that the step sequence was done to the Blue Danube. I love when expected dynamics are flipped - when it gets quiet for twizzles, for example. I love the choreography here. Like you, I love the twizzle sequence - the pattern is unexpected for this program but works beautifully. Of course I was also taken by how Maia can exit a lift and they both keep skating. I didn't see knee slides, standing still and jumping up and down in place, and I didn't see one stop in one spot and gesture to the crowd like a ringmaster while the other did something spectacular like, say, turn. This is skating.

      Delete
    7. BTW, even though W&P's fd is a work in progress, they still cleaned Chock & Bates' clock. But of course, Chock & Bates won the free dance, because it's all about the narrative. Oh look, Chock & Bates defeated last season's champs and World silver medalists in the free!

      I wonder what incentives the ISU and the USFSA gave Skate Canada to roll over this time. Particularly the Western Ontario Division, where Virtue and Moir are from and I *think* Weaver and Poje as well. SC Western Ontario wasted no time inducting David Dore into its Hall of Fame the second Sochi had concluded.

      Delete
    8. Obviously we have a long ways to go and haven't seen everyone yet, but I so far I would have it Shibs, W/P, H/D.

      Delete
    9. I think you mean hb. We won't see hd until Skate Canada. I agree with your rankings for what we've seen so far this season with only a handful of notables left in HD, PI, and CL. CL I only include because they're reigning world champions.

      Delete
    10. Me too. The Shibs threw down like nobody's business. Both programs - stunning. Both skates - stronger by miles than any of the others.

      I hate this "sport."

      Delete
    11. I should probably wait until we've seen PI and HD, but I feel like there is a good chance that those two teams and Shibs could end up being the teams that should be the world podium this season. Unfortunately, none of the three will be on there because of politics.

      My hate for this "sport" is high.

      Delete
    12. I find it way too early to be calling the world podium when we haven't even seen any of the top European teams yet. 5 of the top 10 at Worlds were from Europe. The highest ranked we've seen is the Germans who were 11th.

      Delete
    13. And I mean, it would be premature to be calling the world podium anyway based on pre-season minor events, but I'd at least like to see everyone's programs before I pick who I'm rooting for.

      Delete
    14. Yes, 4:26, my bad. H/B. They're too close, lol.

      Delete
    15. 5:41PM - I think the point is, if only the ISU waited until the programs were skated before deciding the World podium.

      Delete
    16. Yes, it would be great if the ISU could wait to decide the podium instead of doing it before we saw anyone skate. It's all storyboarded.

      Of the 5 European teams in the top 10, 1 has retired and 2 have split. That leaves CoomesBuckland, who we have already concluded to suck, and CL. CL are good dancers, but they are poor skaters and this is ice dancing where teams are supposed to be able to skate. I doubt CL are going to suddenly have amazing skating skills or that CB are going to have improved everything by a considerable amount. We know ChockBates suck. We saw gp's programs at thornhill and we know they suck. Of the rest of the top 10 at worlds, that leaves Shibs who are the best we've seen at this point and WP who are fine, but HD and PI have more talent. I don't think it's premature to say it's a possibility that these three teams could skate so that they should be the world podium. I didn't say that they would be the three teams who should be on the podium. I only said it was a possibility.

      Delete
    17. FSU does not disappoint on the hilarity scale. The newest debate is whether the Shibutanis should have left Zoueva years ago because it's OBVIOUS they aren't her top priority.

      Apparently when a coach gives a team excellent programs chock full of difficult content that facilitates and works to expand their exquisite skating skills (netting them high scores on their first outing) that somehow indicates the coach hates that team.

      That's some A+ logic, there.

      Delete
    18. FSU is truly demonstrating the power of narrative over reality. I don't think either of the Shibs' programs are masterpieces but they are clearly superior to CB's material and their performances were impressive for this point in the season. So what do people focus on? How they're never going to get anywhere, how they suck, how terrible Marina is. It didn't matter what they did this week, the storyline was already set (sound familiar?) Good luck to the Shibs, they're going to need it...

      Delete
    19. There's nothing FSU hates more than skating. They hate skating over there. They love theatricality, they love pantomime, and they become attached to different personalities. When a program is chock full of beautiful skating, nothing, nothing, NOTHING bores them more. Some of it is because very few of the regular participants know anything about skating, and that's why they can't appreciate it.

      Delete
  16. Haha Marina kills me. Look - it's Die Fleudermaus only this time with skating!!

    They could use more speed, but that will build. Audiences are going to love the program. The skating is great, the Shibs are musical for days, and there's a wonderful relaxed and natural energy in their bodies singly and as they connect.

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  17. And that's another thing that just hit the agenda, unless canadablue has room on her plate, and I wouldn't presume. Die Fleudermaus versus Strauss Shibs.

    ReplyDelete
  18. That Meryl Davis picture you posted looks scary. Especially her arms and hip bones. There's no way this is healthy.

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    Replies
    1. I think the point is, there's no way it's not photoshopped to some extent. Her proportions are all off, especially her chest (it's magically expanded) and waist.

      Delete
    2. *I* photoshopped it in two seconds as a joke! And I have no idea what I'm doing. I used one tool and some picasa filters after that. There's so much stuff you can do, easily and quickly, to not just alter shape, but stablize everything else in the photo.

      Delete
    3. The sad thing is, even after showing how easy it is to do, there will still be people out there who refuse to accept that photographers or editors would deliberately photoshop pictures of Tessa Virtue at a public event and post them through official media outlets, or that she would do it herself and them post them on her social media accounts. Even though at this point V/M are connected in the entertainment world to people who can do that in a heartbeat (and do it for celebrities famous and only slightly-famous all the time), and she is CLEARLY pregnant. Specifically, I'm thinking of the tumblr people who looked at the one photo of Tessa looking obviously pregnant and said "I like that dress but it does something really strange to her shape."

      LULZ. You know what else does strange things to a woman's shape? When she carries a baby in her womb.

      I appreciate how this blog works to try and dispel a lot of the unfortunate myths the public has about athletes and the entertainment media and everything that entails.

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    4. Did you know that Meryl fans loved that pic? They think she is the sexiest woman in the world and this is proof of that. It is hilarious that the people calling her sexy are mostly middle aged women and tweens. I think most guys would run from that specimen of nature.

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    5. Specimen of nature? Seriously? How old are you?

      That said, the worship of Meryl Davis is ridiculous. So is the worship of Tessa Virtue. I would think most people above the age of 12 would not refer to Tessa as "Queen Tessa" in such a fawning manner, but I guess age/gender means nothing when it comes to the public worshipping celebrities/public figures.

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    6. I sincerely hope the poster talking about no man wanting Meryl Davis because she's a "specimen of nature" is the same person defending Tessa Virtue's pro-feminism posts because if so, the hypocrisy is rich.

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    7. There's a reason why Tessa is so 'worshiped'; shes one of the best female ice dancers of all time with qualities that can't be duplicated. That and her genuine beauty make her a star.


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    8. No one needs to be worshipped, that's ridiculous. I have great respect and admiration for Tessa Virtue's talents on the ice. I also think she's a lovely woman but that has no bearing on my impression of her as a great skater, nor do I believe criticizing Meryl Davis' looks by saying things like "I think most guys would run from that specimen of nature" does anything but make the people saying that sort of thing look like big fucking idiots.

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    9. 7:06, I'm the pro-feminist defender but I didn't write that Meryl comment. Sorry to disappoint and I agree that type of comment is unnecessary and idiotic.

      Adding to the topic of celeb worship, a lot of it is tumblr culture and fandom - which is not a negative thing. But it shouldn't mean a fan blindly follows and supports their faves.

      OT but it was super bizarre when Meryl fans were tweeting health magazines trying to convince them to put her on the cover. Not that it would be odd for her to be on a cover of that type of magazine but I've literally never seen fans attempt something like that.

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    10. @8:25...her beauty is NOT genuine, she had a nose job. Yes she's beautiful --just sayin' it ain't genuine

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    11. This is what gets me when VM fans make fun of Meryl's looks. Are they saying she should get plastic surgery? Because Tessa's nose was different from the usual beauty standard and she changed it. If every woman did that we'd all end up looking the same and what would be the point in that? There's beauty in diversity.

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    12. I don't really know of a type of plastic surgery that would fix the things about Meryl's looks that I don't find attractive.

      Here's my honest answer to your question, for whatever it's worth:
      1. Meryl has, at least, a unique look, one that a lot of people seem to find strange, so the constant barrage of DW posters saying how especially beautiful she is always came off to me as try-hard and as fake as the hype surrounding DW's skating. I found them to be a nice parallel actually.
      2. Meryl's extreme thinness looks unnatural to me and contributes to my overall negative perception of her looks (the lollipop head effect). Like OC, I believe this is intentional to keep her light because she struggles with basic moves, so it was always galling to see Meryl declared fierce and fit while Tessa was decried as too fat. I guess Tessa could have starved herself and lived off protein shakes, but I'm glad she didn't because her skating would have lost power and VM would be slow across the ice.

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  19. Oh, that was a foregone conclusion the minute the Shibs announced they were doing a waltz FD ;) But I'm going to wait until we get Grand Prix quality footage, as that will make for a much better comparison.

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  20. Looks like Tessa really was in Montreal.
    Coincidentally tje pic is too dark to see her body.

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    1. They chopped off her chest, too.

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    2. Also, is that supposed to be the same dress from the other night? If it is, they did a number on that neckline. When you zoom in it looks like brush strokes along the sides, and it dips way lower than it did before. It may be why her boobs appear erased and redrawn (her right in particular), and her sternum looks like a topography map. Still trying to figure out what is wrong with her hand.

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    3. Well, that video she posted isn't from today... (or that picture from the other night is not from the other night), because her hand is perfectly fine now. Based on how she looks in the video, I'm going to say she's been saving it up.

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    4. Hmmm - just saw the video - some people might find it cute - and we can all have fun...but to me - it screams oh look at me being silly...whatever...at this point if the sham is not real - I would say...Scott run Scott....

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    5. More than likely he filmed the thing for her a few months ago. It's all part of the plan. "Ironically", I believe a comment on this blog just talked about how we haven't really had video of her this pregnancy, only pictures for them to manipulate and how that was easier. And bam! Within a day or two, look at this video of me I just took today, on Sunday, in my flannel, watching football! It MUST be recent! (Nothing in that video even has anything to do with football, fwiw. It's just dancing.)

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  21. Yes it will, and I'm excited. Well, excited to see the Shibs blow out the lights. Bearing down for icenetwork and the USFSA to say it's almost as good as Die Fleudermaus or evokes Die Fleudermaus or the Shibs at times are almost as good as Davis White.

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  22. What's interesting is if you take the picture from TIFF you really zoomed in on and follow the scattered pixels with paintbrush, she becomes a very different shape. I don't know if that was all her they took away, including part of her right boob, but if it is she looks much closer to the shape she appears to be now, (based on the pic from TWIINS w/Scott, which I think is the closest we have to reality). Unless she has suddenly popped out in the last few weeks, which is also possible. All the TIFF pics are definitely manipulated either way.

    In light of this post, I wanted to see your take on this picture. The first time I saw it I was curious about the white parts on the side. Even if she has popped lately, this picture was clearly altered (at least they left her boobs this time), but do you think those are a part of the seam, or a product of the photoshop?
    https://31.media.tumblr.com/9c3f07cb2f80d599850f64222fff3c37/tumblr_nbnh6ok9Rh1tb0xqjo1_500.jpg

    As an aside, I think this picture is absolutely hysterical. I love how he's "holding" her here. No more waist for you, buddy! Not to mention it gives off the, "Hurry up and take the picture so we don't have to touch each other anymore" vibe. She's overcompensating with the crazy face, and he looks like he's reluctantly posing with a fan, trying not to wince. (Does he have fans? Not trying to be facetious.)

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    1. Tessa should probably stop having babies. Seems with each pregnancy her body becomes more distorted and pixelated. At this rate, by the time she gets to the next kid she's gonna look like this:

      http://www.decalninja.com/images/dn-smb-princess-1-smb2.jpg

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    2. Haha. Or her body will disapparate completely and she'll just be a floating head poking out between other people's shoulders.

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    3. I was going to use that picture, actually. When I zoomed at the time, at first I thought they bloated Ryan's shirt in two places, and the dark margin between them is the left panel of her shirt. But just quickly looking at it again, I think they also worked directly on her body. The blouson cuff on her right wrist changes color/is a different color than the rest of the body. Everything's too flat. It looks to me as if they warped her, then used the color picker tool to go over her body and make the color uniform/hide the pixel litter. The flatness comes from the color being "too" uniform, especially up close. That's what happens with the paint tool.

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    4. I just looked at the picture super close up and I think I'm right about the color picker tool. With the color picker tool, you pick a color with the mouse, then use the paintbrush or bucket to fill the area with that color. There's options within that, but they're just clicks and sliders. When you go super close up on the torso part of Tessa's bodysuit, it doesn't pixilate even when it fills the screen. It's just a uniform, flat color that appears to have been applied in photoshop. There are things that can be done to soften the effect, such as adjusting opacity, or working with several layers, all of which is just click click click. There's tons and tons of noise around her boobs and her entire chest. A piece of the flesh on her left shoulder just about dissolves.

      I think color picker is one of the ways Tessa united the left and right side of herself in photoshopped pictures when she warps one side. Then run filters and light effects and voila.

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    5. OC - I am going to ask a stupid question - with regards to Tessa's picture with Erik Guay and his wife - what's up with the black shadows covering Erik's nose and mouth on the left had side - it almost looks like a half painted on moustache?

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  23. Tessa looks beautiful, fit and non-pregnant in her instagram video. Or are you telling me she also photoshopped that? God

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    1. Because obviously that video was taken just moments before she posted it! Who the hell knows when it was actually filmed. She has looked nothing like that for months. God, it's no wonder Tessa and Scott have gotten away with so much shit for so many years. It's people like you.

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    2. That video is not from today. Other than the fact she looked nothing like that a few days ago, her hand is completely clear. In the picture from Friday, she had cuts all over it.
      Unless those weren't real, and THAT was an old picture. Or a photo-shop fail.
      *Any* of those things though means she's lying about something. They can't all be true.
      I'm sticking with it's an old video.

      Oh, and btw, she DOES looks incredible, beautiful and fit. And she also happens to be pregnant. Even if that video is a few months old, she was still pregnant. And in the more recent pictures, where she doesn't look like she does in that video because she's further into the pregnancy, she *still* looks beautiful and fit.
      Are you saying she can't look beautiful and fit and be pregnant? If she were pregnant, she would suddenly become way out of shape and look like a hag? Seriously people.

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    3. That video is fantastic. I'm actually pausing the skating post (canadablue and iceprincessblog's material) to do a post with it. Why not look at the door behind Tessa and also see if you can find her ghost boobs.

      Just remember, there's such a thing as aspect ratio, and there's tons of video manipulation software out there, and most of it is geared towards the market that wants to look long and skinny.

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  24. so how many months pregnant is she? this speculation has been going on for months.once any woman hits 6-8 months they show. so lets focus on the skating and the other kind of shamming they really do.

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    1. Tessa is spending most of her time shamming by digitally manipulating her images and videos. The blog covered Scott's facebook all the time, and the facebook of his family, when it intersected with skating or the sham. Now Tessa's the one, and she's churning out the manipulation on her instagram and twitter; that's why it's covered. It's not a side issue.

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  25. Here's that link again:

    http://allthatskate.com/2010LA/data/gallery/1296205083.jpg

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  26. Oh wait---it's probably just a bad angle. Poor fat Tessa (as if!!) people need to realize that people like Tessa don't get fat because they are so friggen serious about their game ---hello, that why we love her...she is a nice dancing goddess. Please please please connect the dots, use some logic

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  27. Supposed to say ice dancing goddess lol

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