# Photoshop Bob Ross Photoshop Bob Ross is an exploitable built from a promotional still of PBS painter Bob Ross standing beside a blank canvas. Editors drop anything from mushroom clouds to explicit scenes onto that canvas, a format that grew out of forum photoshop battles in the early 2000s and became a staple of image board humor for two decades. ## Origin The earliest version of the joke traces to a Something Awful photoshop battle against Fark.com announced by Zack Parsons on January 21, 2002 under the theme "TV Shows That Would Never Be Made"[1]. One entry by SA user The Yellow Yell, titled "The Joy Of Furries," showed Ross painting a suggestive anthropomorphic animal, effectively kicking off the format[2]. The template picked up its now-standard name on September 17, 2004, when the British digital art community b3ta posted a challenge called "Photoshop Bob Ross," with over 11 pages of submissions in the first 24 hours[2]. - **Platform:** Something Awful (early edits) / b3ta (viral spread) - **Creator:** Unknown - **Date:** 2002 ## Overview The template uses the same promotional shot from The Joy of Painting: Ross with his signature afro and beard, palette in hand, standing beside a totally empty canvas[2]. The joke is almost always the same, whatever gets pasted onto the canvas should be something Ross would never actually paint. Common edits swap in horror imagery, explicit content, video game boss fights, or elaborate battle scenes far beyond a happy little tree. The humor works because of Ross's gentle, encouraging on-screen persona. His whispery narration and warm demeanor became a cultural shorthand, so imagining him calmly painting a warzone, a demonic sigil, or a crossover brawl gets a lot of comedic mileage[2]. Editors sometimes preserve the show's PBS-style border along the bottom edge to sell the fake still. ## How to Use Grab the base image of Ross standing beside the empty canvas from The Joy of Painting and paste any subject onto the white square. The bigger the mismatch between the subject and Ross's calm reputation, the harder the joke typically lands. Editors often keep the PBS-style framing intact or add captions written in Ross's soft-spoken cadence to complete the bit. ## Frequently Asked Questions ### What is Photoshop Bob Ross? Photoshop Bob Ross is a long-running exploitable that pastes any image onto the blank canvas next to Bob Ross in a promotional still from The Joy of Painting, playing on how absurd it would be for the gentle PBS painter to depict it[2]. ### Where did Photoshop Bob Ross come from? The earliest known version was a January 2002 Something Awful vs. Fark photoshop battle entry called "The Joy Of Furries" by SA user The Yellow Yell[1]. The name "Photoshop Bob Ross" came from a September 17, 2004 b3ta challenge that produced over 11 pages of edits in 24 hours[2]. ### What does Photoshop Bob Ross mean? The joke turns on the contrast between Ross's warm, wholesome painting show and whatever chaotic, violent, or explicit image editors drop onto his canvas[2]. ### How do you use Photoshop Bob Ross? Place any subject on the empty canvas in the base promotional photo, ideally something Ross would never paint, and keep the show's soft framing intact so it reads as a real Joy of Painting still[2]. ### Is Photoshop Bob Ross still popular? The format was a staple on Something Awful, b3ta, Fark, Newgrounds, Facepunch, and eBaum's World between 2002 and 2012, with ongoing use through Tumblr's "bob ross" tag as a classic image board template[2]. ## References 1. [https://web.archive.org/web/20020606002813/https://www.somethingawful.com/archives/news-archive-21-1-2002.htm]() 2. [https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/photoshop-bob-ross]() --- Source: https://meme.com/memes/photoshop-bob-ross Published by meme.com — The Internet Meme Library