A brush too far for L'Oreal

An image of Turlington was digitally touched up for this Maybelline advert. Photo / Supplied

Every woman can enjoy flawless skin like Christy Turlington and Julia Roberts, the L'Oreal advertisements promised.

But the cosmetics giant has been forced to withdraw the claim in Britain after a watchdog found the public had been misled by manipulated images.

One advert featured supermodel Turlington promoting Eraser foundation, created by L'Oreal brand Maybelline. The other used an image of actress Julia Roberts to promote Teint Miracle foundation from L'Oreal's Lancome label.

The adverts both ran in New Zealand but were no longer in circulation, L'Oreal New Zealand spokeswoman Tanya Abbott said.

"In the case of Maybelline, they haven't been [in circulation] since last year and [the] Lancome [adverts] haven't been since February this year."

The Maybelline advert promised to conceal crow's feet and leave "flawless-looking perfection".

Maybelline admitted the image had been "digitally retouched" to lighten the skin, clean up make-up, reduce dark shadows and shading around the eyes, smooth the lips and darken the eyebrows.

Maybelline argued that despite the techniques used, the "image accurately illustrated the results the product could achieve".

The British Advertising Standards Authority found the advert was "likely to mislead".

It reached the same conclusion for Lancome's Teint Miracle foundation advert which features a Mario Testino image of Roberts.

The product promised to be the "first foundation that recreates the aura of perfect skin".

Lancome said the flawless skin in the image was in part due to Roberts' naturally healthy and glowing skin, and it supplied pictures of her on the red carpet to support that claim. But L'Oreal refused to supply the original image of Roberts to the watchdog.

The authority found the "image was produced with the assistance of post-production techniques" and both misleading adverts must now be withdrawn.

Ms Abbott would not say whether the adverts used in New Zealand had been digitally altered.

"We are sent creatives which are sent and generated out of Paris. We run and execute them as we're told."

When asked whether it was fair to claim that it gave the "aura of prefect skin", Ms Abbott said: "Well I believe it does and it's scientifically proven that it does, so what more can we say?"

New Zealand Advertising Standards Authority chief executive Hilary Souter said women had begun to expect a level of airbrushing in beauty adverts.

She could not recall whether the authority had recently received complaints about airbrushing but expected a few would come following the decision in Britain.