Photographer/Photo-journalist Kim Raff is the photograher, I doubt that she did that, there's never been any evidence of her doing that in the past. The photos just look like good photos to me.

https://www.nytimes.com/by/kim-raff

https://www.kimraff.com/aboutme

Looks like a photo taken by a smartphone app with an AI enhanced vibrancy filter.

Either way, the article itself is more of an advertisement anyway, so it's all trash.

Am I crazy is this placement in NYT have a lot of AI added in people in it (hands and feet). I don't know why I would expect there placed article group to be better but this seems like a company trying to jump the cold-start demand by adding in people.