ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Wednesday, March 20, 1996 TAG: 9603200083
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A-6 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: PHILADELPHIA
SOURCE: |By TANYA BARRIENTOS KNIGHT-RIDDER/TRIBUNE
ADIOS, WHITE BREAD; the icon's image has become seven-grain.
Take a gander at the new face of Betty Crocker. She's the spitting image of nobody. And the fuzzy reflection of all of us.
In an effort to redesign the famous cake-box face into a multicultural mug, General Mills decided to mix things up.
So they took a cup of Caucasian, a pinch of African- American, a touch of Latino and a sprinkling of Asian and cooked up a 75th anniversary image.
Then, after letting the creation simmer for a few months, General Mills served up the new Betty Crocker at a portrait unveiling Tuesday in Manhattan.
Say so long to white bread. This Betty Crocker is definitely seven-grain. She's brunette, has almond-shaped eyes and a broad nose and is slightly tan. She looks exactly like a swirl of various ethnic and racial traits. You'll begin to see her smiling visage at the grocery store within a few weeks.
In reality, the portrait is computer-generated morphing of the faces of 75 real women who won an essay contest. All 75 images were fed into a computer, which spit out three or four options for the new Betty Crocker. General Mills sent its pick to portrait painter John Stuart Ingle.
Betty's had seven makeovers before. But this is the first time she has not been (completely) white-skinned.
LENGTH: Short : 36 lines ILLUSTRATION: PHOTO: ``Betty Crocker''\Mixed-up cyber morph.by CNB