Alt, Engadget's Photoshops: a retrospective
By Tim Stevens 
posted July 5th 2010 12:07PM
posted July 5th 2010 12:07PM
CEOs gone wild (aka Ballmer's Best)
Trademark tweaks
There's nothing like a little logo tweak to get your point across, whether it's an unexpected delivery method for the MacBook Air, the ever-popular one logo eating another motif, or having a lot of fun with Google's Android logo. (An awful, awful lot of fun.) However, few images have said so much with so little as poor 'ol Sadmoto, unfortunately one of our most-used images.
The subtle chops, and the non-chops
Sometimes a dose of subtlety is what's called for, and if you don't look closely in these modified pics you might miss what was added, like Julius Genachowski stealing from the rich, the discovery of a section of the brain that controls combo breakers, the QUE proReader hand model getting a bit tired, or a few Walmart shoppers stopping by for the Microsoft Store opening.
And, sometimes we don't change a thing, like in these curious images that were used without a single modification being made -- at least not by us.
HD-DVD vs. Blu-ray
Few topics were more fertile for Photoshoppery than the HD-DVD vs. Blu-ray battle. We all know how that one ended, but it was sure fun while it lasted.
Culture chops
Yeah, we watch TV. And movies. And play videogames. In fact we all did rather too much of all three of those three things when we were younger, so it's no surprise that these cultural relics appear from time to time in our creative imagery, whether it's the Polymer Vision Readius rising from its grave (before being promptly sent back to it), a retired T-800 getting some work at Heathrow, or FoMoCo taking us back to 1984.
Too many to list
The fact is, there are too many great custom images for us to try to categorize or to highlight. Every day more are hand-crafted for your browsing enjoyment, spicing up posts like a dash of freshly cracked pepper, each one tastier than the last. We leave you with a selection of other images to peruse, with the hopes that you've enjoyed this look back at some of our highlights and look forward to the next round... coming soon to a post near you.
[Thanks to sockatume for the idea]
Anyone else at work today? :)
@One Love Nope!
@One Love
yup.
@One Love
Lololololol
@One Love sadmoto cracks me up
@One Love
yea ... :(
@One Love : ...although I wouldn't classify what am doing today as work. :)
@okok only Apple Fanboys bought i
If anything it's free advertising. BTW, it's in the webster dictionary as a transitive verb, so they have every right to use it, and as journalists could use it even if it wasn't. http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/photoshop
@One Love ye.. all summer.. joy of starting at a new place and having holidays burnt by that..
@One Love
Yep - "work work work, all day long, work work work while I sing this song..."
By the way, the HD-DVD vs Blu ray one is classic.
What about the "I'm chargin mah lazer" ones?
Excellent post. This is why I love Alt.
http://www.engadget.com/photos/executive-chops/#3144536
slays me every time
@NoOrdinaryMSFT
A reader actually did one of lightning coming out of Ballmer's fingers, a la Emperor Palpatine. That's a good one, too.
This is awesome
@Rick
Agreed. The photoshops are what really make Engadget fun . . . even the "bad" ones. :)
I always liked the movie poster for T-Mobile's HSPA+. It just seemed... perfect.
Always appreciated Engadget's photoshopping, especially the culture chops.
We are the knights who say ni!
You must cut down the mightiest tree in the forest with a BLU-RAY DISK!
Ahh, nostalgia... although that Linux Penguin Portal one is a little too recent to be nostalgic about, but it did get me to chuckle.
I love Engadget, but its Ps skills are nothing compared to Gizmodo's.
@Friko
Is say they are close. Gizmodo does make about 183757854 times more if them each year that engadget.
I also want to see a rivalry basketball game between them. Streamed live
the donkey ballmer one just wins it all :)
the moment i saw it i just had to burst out laughing. then explain to my lecturer why i burst out laughing in class.
sadmoto is the best
great job! Respect to the Engadget image editors :)
Excuse my ranting, but I hate it when people use Photoshop as a verb....
@taylorsmith246
Me too, now excuse me, I need to go Tivo the View.
You left out my absolute fav: Grandma answering her DTV converter box.
http://www.engadget.com/2009/01/26/digital-tv-transition-officially-delayed-until-june-12th/
Actually, that may not qualify as "Photoshop'd" but it sure is priceless.
Galleries are not working on the android app. :(
Nice.
Haha remember how pissed Truthteller would get at the hddvd vs blu-ray fights!? Classic pics.
Engadget should have photoshop contests, not about quality, but about how funny, sort of like how Cracked does it
I always liked the Alien ones with the rogue satallite
lol... sum good stuff...
I like the one where the Nokia fish eats Apple.
Thank you, Engadget. I loved going back through all the photoshops, including several I had never seen before (wish there was a link to their article!). You're absolutely right: sometimes your created images are worth 1000 words, and compel me to click to read more based purely on how awesome the intro graphic is. I was just remarking via Facebook the other day how excellent it must be to work there, after the subtle addition added to 'What Killed The Kin?'. Exceptional work, and I always enjoy both the tech coverage and the clever visuals.
I know the width ratio would be totally screwed up, but I would seriously love some of these as my background image. :)
I can't believe there isn't more comments here... I guess everyone is busy trolling other articles.
I still remember of those Friday the 13th photoshops... Jason-proof external hard drive...
Quite the back-patting post. Thanks for the compilation!
My favorite was the Steve Martin/John Candy poster from Trains Planes and Automobiles shopped onto the iPhone/Pre... how could you guys forget that one?!