The Nikon D850 is quite the beast of a camera. It holds a massive 45.7-megapixel full-frame sensor that can record 4k video and create 8k time-lapses. It can shoot at a blazing fast seven frames per second and has an enormous 51 image buffer when shooting 14-bit raw images. The focus speed is insanely fast, deadly accurate, and offers 153 focus points with 130% more frame coverage than the older Nikon D810. The only problem with such an amazing monster of a camera is that Nikon thinks it’s too much for women to handle.
I know what you are thinking. No way Nikon would ever make such a claim. It seems absurd that only men could handle the D850. I myself can think of a large number of women photographers that would be more than capable of producing spectacular images with any camera, let alone this camera. But when Nikon created a team of 32 professional photographers to be the faces of the Nikon D850, they didn't choose a single woman photographer.
When building a list of 32 photographers, you basically have to go out of your way to not include a single woman. The problem here though is not just with Nikon, but instead with the entire photo industry. Brand ambassadors are filled with mostly men and entire conferences are filled with only male speakers. It would seem that the majority of photographers are men or maybe it's just too hard to find a woman that's not busy cooking and cleaning.
Or is it feasible that the D850 is in fact for men only and Nikon plans to release a pink and sparkly D850w for women to use?
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193 Comments
Hear! Hear! Sick of whiners crying because they didn't get a trophy for participation. Call me what you will.. Thank you Lisa
It seems to be an industry problem, and Nikon actually appears to be doing better out of all the major brands (with Sony being the worst):
Sony - http://imagingambassadors.sony.net/ambassadors/
50 Men
8 Women
14% Women, 86% Men
Canon - http://learn.usa.canon.com/dlc/contributors/explorers.spr
32 Men
8 Women
20% Women, 80% Men
Nikon - http://www.nikonusa.com/en/learn-and-explore/nikon-ambassadors/index.pa…
17 Men
7 Women
29% Women, 71% Men
Olympus - http://www.getolympus.com/us/en/visionaries
10 Men
2 Women
20% Women, 80% Men
@Ben, you're in denial. Casual (and occasionally overt) sexism in the industry is pervasive and obvious to anyone who cares to look.
I guess she missed picture day.
This article is total nonsense.
Why? Because it doesn't affect you one way or the other?
Assume too much. D850 is an intellect piece of photographic kit, unfortunately I cannot say the same about the argument put forward by this article. What ever view I have, I will pass it on to Nikon....the right place for complaints.
Because your gender is represented 32 times?
By all means discuss that point intelligently. What has women being "too busy cooking and cleaning" has anything to do with it. And since Nikon's explanation is missing in this discussion, we are all left with the perception of the said photograph.
I spend 25 years raising these types of issues. Had this article been written by a woman, we would have had a different prospective.
"It is vital that we have women's voices heard on women's issues." British Member of Parliament.
As a woman photographer, I wholeheartedly agree with this! We are completely guessing at how the list was chosen and who was invited to participate and who declined. I personally would want to be chosen based on my ability, not my sex to make a quota.
It is not at all difficult to find amazing women photographers. Nikon chooses it's ambassadors - to suggest that there are not enough women to choose from, or that the very few that are are chosen are to fulfill a quota is all sorts of ridiculous. This is a conscious choice by this brand and other camera brands to be exclusionary.
same point as below....
A conscious choice implies a deliberate act. In the absence of direct information, one cannot be sure of this. We can only speculate.
Calling someone's views "ridiculous" is not helpful.
A sub 4-minute mile is for men only too.
and child bearing is for women only - does either of those make one gender better at testing a camera?
http://www.nikonusa.com/en/learn-and-explore/a/ideas-and-inspiration/d8…
look female photographers. Cherry pick your information much?
Shame on Nikon! At least Fuji had a woman at the debut of their "Medium Format" camera. Oh, wait...she was a topless "model". Nevermind. Carry on.
That's why I said, "The problem here though is not just with Nikon, but instead with the entire photo industry."
Thank you for writing this and making that comment.
I'm curious whether you consider this site to be part of that problem?
Many of the fstoppers "editor's picks" feature models more scantily clad than the one that got Fuji into trouble. The shots Fuji ambassador Wayne Johns took to demonstrate the GFX at that workshop would be really tame compared with the NSFW content found here.
nikon had women in the role out of the camera and in testing. So that isn't a fair statement. They just aren't in this group listed above
I find that comment interesting considering the photography you produce. Your gallery contains models in a similar state of undress, and from the look of it you run workshops with similar content to the one that caused so much anger when the GFX was demonstrated.
Would you turn down the opportunity to be an ambassador for a camera company, and refuse to demonstrate their new products, because of the "problematic/sexist" content of your own work?
I was being sarcastic. I'm totally fine with a woman, or man, agreeing to shoot in various states of undress.
Anyway, looking at the photos below, it would hardly seem that this is the site to get all excited about women's rights. It's more about objectification....
yeah, those silly women and their request for equality...
yup
...
Reads like clickbait to me especially as the group is focused on Asia, the Middle East and Africa - call me crazy however I suspect the pool of active professional female photographers is very low in those areas of the world - be careful not to apply the morals and social norms of one society to others. I'd say this is newsworthy in the US or Europe but the cold hard fact is that the context is different. The world isn't comprised of one homogenous group.
Overall, there are a number of Nikon ambassadors for other regions out there out there that are women and there are many representing the launch on panel discussions. I'm not sure this is a worthwhile story at this point. If it is, then why not look, for example, at the predominance of male photographers/female subjects on Fstoppers. Now that's possibly something closer to home to look into!
"Those areas of the world" represent TWO SEPARATE CONTINENTS. How can you be serious? We aren't talking about Saudi Arabia. If you honestly think that the "cultures" of two ENTIRE continents = completely homogenous, you are incredibly ignorant.
How many Pro Nikon photographers from Nigeria do you know? How many are men and how many are women? Now compare that with the sheer number of Pro Nikon users from the UK, a country with 2/3 the population. What I think you are missing is that in many ways I am talking about Saudi Arabia. It is far from the only country that suppresses women. Having lived on four continents, 17 countries this is still endemic. I suspect that even in comparatively modern Japan, women are far from being represented equally in society. In my opinion this has a big impact on jobs such as photographers in terms of opportunities to be at the top of the field. To be clear, I'd much rather have as many Pro female photographers out there as possible as it's enriching to see things from different viewpoints. I just think this is less likely in most parts of the world outside the US/EU. Ok here's a bit of quick primary research. I just googled 'national geographic photographers' and at the top of the list of returns google lists 18 photographers. 15 men, 3 women. Shocking to see only three and while the list is obviously not exhaustive, this is an organisation which exists in a comparatively egalitarian environment. I'd say that in other regions, proportionally there are even fewer women in the field.
4 of the photographers are from Australia - are there no opportunities culturally for female photographers there?
As a proportion of Asia/Africa pro photographers? I'd have to check to see how many Nikon shooting female AP/NG photographers exist. Again, industrywide I'm just not seeing a huge surge of renowned female photographers shooting Nikon. Wish it were different and women like Ami Vitale are huge inspirations.
Maybe the tectonic shift away from NG/AP photo work to more lifestyle photography meant that Nikon missed a trick and isn't looking in the right places for their ambassadors.
So if they are from Asia and Middle east women don't deserve gender equality? Wow....
This has nothing to do with what people deserve. The fact is that you simply don't know what the overall pool of Nikon pro photographers looks like. Given the gender mix of Nikon ambassadors Inc other regions, it's a bit of a stretch to make a blanket statement about Nikon. Again, I'd prefer for there to be a good balance of photographers genderwise. My primary point is that the article doesn't even bother to mention the context of the region and one therefore assumes Nikon is only selecting photographers from a global pool.
quick leaps to judgement is much more fun though :).
ughhh these political posts are getting tiresome. please learn the difference between equality of opportunity and equality of outcome.
So, your premise is that women are inherently less qualified to evaluate a professional camera in a context like this (inequality of outcome)?
no, apparently just not able to call people out on their shit.
PS when a white male sighs all alone with his computer, does it make a sound?
Awwww. James has a sad. He has to read about sexism! Imagine how he would react if he actually had to live with it.
"ughhh these political posts are getting tiresome. please learn the difference between equality of opportunity and equality of outcome."
Amen! I whole heartedly agree!! There's no winning this argument though...even if the qualified pool was selected based on portfolio and resume, with no mention of who/sex of the photographer...if it wasn't 50% women, it would be sexist...And yes, I've worked in male dominated fields prior to photography, I was harassed and saw both men and women held back because of their sex/race with promotions. What I saw, (though I know it's not the all cases, but it did affect my personal feeling on the matter) was the persons who were least qualified for the positions, were the ones that filed a complaint when they didn't get the job, claiming either racism or sexism. The sad thing is, it leads to skepticism on the valid claims. This article is not a valid claim, there is not facts on what criteria was used to chose the team.
Quick, call the United Colours of Benetton ad execs!
Wow. SJW's are out of hand. I came here to learn about photography, instead I get armchair justice warriors looking for things to complain about. Kinda sexist in itself, seeing as how many of us wouldn't have trouble if it was 20 women, so he's just assuming women will care.
That's great. Get inside the mind of a woman. See how that works for you. Virtue signalling leftie social justice warriors. Ugh.
Nope. Women don't care at all.
Women do care. I didn't come up with this article on my own. It was brought to my attention by the countless posts and comments about this very subject in my Facebook feed and the comments on the Instagram posts linked here in the write-up.
thank you so much for writing it and bringing more attention to this issue. Sorry it draws out the bro trolls. There is also a complete lack of interest in including more women speakers (that aren't a part of a husband/wife team) and speakers of color in this industry which has fostered and encouraged a disgusting level of misogynistic male photographers. we are SICK. OF. IT.
The issue here is that you (and everyone else) are complaining about an ad campaign in Asia, as if it has bearing or relevance here. It's as if you're being deliberately obtuse, just to have something to complain about.
Nikon is an international brand - this press release is in English and includes several photographers from Australia. They have not done a similar test (as far as I can tell - I've looked around) targeted at the US or Europe. The closest is that they have 4 global ambassadors (one of whom is a woman) talking about the D850. This big roll out test is clearly trying to show the versatility of the camera for a variety of genres.
Here's another interesting quote -
https://www.nikonrumors.co/new-nikon-mirrorless-camera-confirmed-again-…
I like how you start off by saying you don't want to bring politics into photography, but then continue to spew partisan nonsense. I'm not sure what is so difficult about debating the claims instead of resorting immediately to hyperbole and insults.
I haven't been to a ton of photo conferences, but I have seen a good balance of genders in terms of presenters in my limited experience, so I can't say that I would agree that conferences are completely male dominated. At the very least it strikes me as odd or maybe tone deaf to not include even a single woman. Not saying you need to be up in arms about it, but that doesn't seem the slightest bit off to you?