ORIGINAL IDEAL

Scott Chasserot is a freelance photographer and artist from London. His work combines portraits and neuroscience.

The purpose behind this experiment is to investigate our subconscious beauty and display the gap between how we look and how we would like to appear. After taking an original portrait, Scott creates 50 more images by making small adjustments using Photoshop, altering anything from the eye size or eye color to the tone or shape of their skin and lineaments. From there, each picture is shown to the subject while wearing a brain-monitoring electroencephalogram (EEG) device which records their reactions in order to determine the version they deemed the most desirable. Finally, both portraits are compared. The image on the left shows the original portrait and the right one shows the subject’s ideal.

Images and Video: Courtesy of Scott Chasserot