October 12, 2013 12:11 PM UTC

How Amy Stephens Might Become A Meme

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• by: Colorado Pols

SUNDAY UPDATE: A few great emailed examples after the jump. Send yours to webmaster@coloradopols.com, or post them in comments below.

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Visiting the website of newly declared GOP U.S. Senate candidate Amy Stephens, we were immediately struck by the initial "splash page's" image:

Looking closely at the site's cover portrait of Rep. Stephens, obvious signs of Photoshopping are visible. The setting is outdoors, but the neutral interior lighting of the photo of Rep. Stephens doesn't match the background at all. At the edges of Rep. Stephens' likeness, telltale "scalloping" and jagged edges consistent with Photoshop editing are easy to see.

As it turns out, looking at the source code of the page, there's a very straightforward reason this image looks fake:

That's because the site's designers produced a cut-out Amy Stephens we can all easily place in any setting we like! No doubt this was convenient as hell for the purposes of web design, but the joke fodder of placing her on a fake "natural" background, or for that matter any background, means we would have definitely not made this ready-made object of ridicule available to the public. To wit, click either of the above images for their full-size originals. Once you've downloaded your own Amy Stephens Anywhere™ (we want credit if this takes off) image, and opened it up in Photoshop or your favorite image editor, the real fun begins! Where would you like to see Amy Stephens?

As you can see, the possibilities are endless. On the internets today, it's perilously easy to fall victim to the most unforgiving sense of humor of the online masses, sometimes even becoming what is known as a "meme." By taking an image of a person or object and placing them in all manner of odd locations, or putting whatever words you like into someone's mouths, millions take acontextual delight in totally random acts of denigration.

This concludes today's lesson on how not to design your campaign website.

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