The Impact of Images

The images we see around us — whether in photographs, on the big or small screen, in newspapers and magazines, or on social media — shape the way we see ourselves and others.

If we see those who look like us in personal or professional roles that we emulate, we can imagine fulfilling those roles; if not, it is far more difficult to believe we can achieve our dreams. If we see positive, heterogeneous, admirable images, we learn to believe in our own abilities and have confidence in ourselves. If we see demeaning, objectified, or stereotyped images, we find it difficult to imagine that we can ever be or accomplish more than those limited representations suggest.

That’s why it is so significant that the photograph of Lena Forsén, a Playboy model whose photo was used to develop the modern JPEG and whose visage has appeared in tens of thousands of journals and educational resources since the 1970s, is falling from favor. As SWE contributor Seabright McCabe reports in the article “Letting Go of Lena” in the News & Advocacy section of this issue, the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers will no longer accept manuscripts that include the image, and several technical publications and universities are following suit. The computer industry, McCabe writes, “is beginning to admit that using a sexually charged photo from a men’s magazine is a problem.”

In her Scrapbook article “Engineers Decry Use of Pinups,” also in this issue, SWE archivist Troy Eller English describes even more disgraceful images of women’s bodies used in the 1970s in campaigns urging the United States to convert to the metric system. SWE leaders of the day wrote angry letters and encouraged boycotts against the companies sponsoring these ads, but the impact of these images took time to fade.

In this era of deepfakes, when anyone can easily and seamlessly graft an image of any face onto an image of any body and use that false representation to humiliate someone, it is critical that women take control of the creation and distribution of their own images. And that is just what the women profiled by SWE contributor Sandra Guy in the feature “Showtime” are doing. By hosting television shows and starring in commercials and movies focused on engineering and design, these women represent strong, persuasive, diverse role models for all the would-be engineers and technologists in their audiences.

And these women on screen stand on the shoulders of women behind the camera who came before them, as McCabe describes in this issue’s cover feature, “Behind the Scenes — And Ahead of Their Time.” The article describes the nascent years of filmmaking as influenced by women inventors and innovators, including Alice Guy-Blaché, the world’s first known woman filmmaker; Tressie Souders, the first known Black woman to direct a film; and Natalie Kalmus, who led the Technicolor color consultancy department that made the Wizard of Oz so astonishing.

SWE cares very much about how women, especially women engineers, are portrayed — but even more about how they contribute, collaborate, manage, innovate, and receive the recognition they deserve. That is why SWE is proud to introduce the fiscal year 2025 SWE president, Karen E. Roth, P.E., and the SWE Board of Directors in a special section in this issue. The very picture of modern women in engineering, these accomplished leaders bring decades of experience, expertise, and insight gleaned from trials and triumphs in their fields to guide SWE into its 75th anniversary in 2025. With their vision and leadership, the coming year looks picture-perfect.