Wednesday, January 7, 2009

Men are from Mars and Women are from Venus. It applies to photography as well.


Photo of me taken by my Wife.




Photo of my wife taken by me.



Photo of my grandaughter "Ayla" taken by my daughter "Marisa".



Photo of a flower taken by my wife.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

Hi Pentaxian friends,

There are so much differences between men and women, that sometimes I wonder how we manage to live together. Actually I do know. The "BIG" difference is what attracts us to each other. N'uff said. When we're cold - they're hot, we laugh at silly sad movies - they cry, we watch sport - they watch Oprah, they have 25 pairs of shoes - we have one, we like black and white - they like lots of colors, we like the way they are and want to keep them that way - they like us the way we were but want to change us, we fix problems - they just want to talk about it. I could go on and on, but by now you must get the idea . We are different.

When it comes to photography, the differences between our genders are almost opposite. Don't take that as a bad thing, it is what it is, but we are different. We approach taking pictures differently. I'm no psychiatrist, so I don't know the reasoning behind it, I just go by my observations.

Women seem to prefer shooting in portrait format while men prefer shooting in landscape format. I observed that with my wife and my daughters. There's a Canon ad in most photographic magazines showing a bunch of photographers shooting a sport event with the recognizable white Canon telephoto lenses , the men are shooting landscape and the women portrait. Most of my wife's photos are portrait.

Women are better people photographers in most cases. I guess that because they are predisposed to be gatherers, their instincts guides them to take people, family, children pictures rather than object and places. Men because we must be predisposed to be the hunters, we like to take pictures of objects, places, and things that have nothing to do sentiments.

We are gadget freaks and think that we need to have this and that in order to take pictures. They only need to know where the shutter is.

We like Black DSLRs only and they are so much more open to white and colorful DSLRs. The introduction of the White Pentax k2000/Km is proof of that.

I must agree that Advanced Amateurs and Professional photographers do not fit the categories above. That's because they have studied, practiced and learned the art of photography. They know the elements of good composition, the rules of thumb, the meanings of Aperture, Shutter Speed, Sensitivity and so on.

If you're a woman reading this blog, watch men taking pictures when you have a chance. If you're a man reading this blog, watch women taking pictures when you have a chance. Observe the opposite gender's natural instincts at work and I bet you will come to the same conclusions than me.

This is in no way an attempt to stereotype genders, it's not a scientific study, it's just for fun .

Thank you for reading,

Yvon Bourque

3 comments:

robin said...

Oh man, Yvon, where to begin? (And yes, I use "oh man" ironically.) If you are going to write a piece portraying gender stereotypes please do not be so disingenuous as to write "This is in no way an attempt to stereotype genders". And please do not write off gender differences as "instinct". None of us have instincts when it comes to cameras, and few of our supposed "instincts" are anything other than culturally-determined bias.

My wife is female and prefers black, not colours. I get emotional when I watch an intense movie. I am male and do not like sports. Obviously there is lots of room for individual variation, and it is these variations that are most interesting to me. Though it can readily be observed that most team sports fans are indeed male, perhaps that is only because men are told they should like team sports from the time they are boys. If mom took daughter out to play with a bat and ball, wouldn't things be different?

The core of your post is that "Women seem to prefer shooting in portrait format while men prefer shooting in landscape format." This is an interesting observation -- I wish you had investigated further.

As for the white Pentax model: many men have also said they like it. And I imagine it was designed by men. When women start designing cameras then we might start seeing some real changes.

Unknown said...

Robin,

I don't like sport either and I like colors as well. don't forget this line on my post "it's not a scientific study, it's just for fun".

I speak from my observations of my wife and daughters mainly, but start watching how women and men take pictures and you will see that women are more sentimental and tend to take a lot of pictures about family, children, people in general, places they visit, all to be shared as memories in the future. Men tend to take pictures of things that don't necessarily have a future as "memories" but just because they like whatever they are shooting at the time, whatever that may be.

Cheers

Marisa said...

I'm glad that you are honest and open with your opinions on your blog. I think the whole world needs to lighten up a little bit.

I love colors and I love to play baseball, but there isn't a major league baseball I could play on... go figure.

I think if you had done any further "investigation", it would no longer be so much fun...which is the idea to begin with isn't it?