this is a collection of several really good quotes about photography, starting with my favorite...
"to me, photography is an art of observation. it’s about finding something interesting in an ordinary place... i’ve found it has little to do with the things you see and everything to do with the way you see them."~elliott erwitt
"one should really use the camera as though tomorrow you'd be stricken blind."
~dorothea lange
"creating a vision is the most important thing an artist and photographer can have. anyone can learn how to share information with f/stops and shutter speeds, but it’s the perspective of a person’s vision that i find the most interesting, challenging, diverse and beautiful."
~jamie beck
"time stands still best in moments that look suspiciously like ordinary life."
~photographer, brian andreas
"your photography is a record of your living, for anyone who really sees."
~paul strand
"in my view you cannot claim to have seen something until you have photographed it."
~emile zola
"while there is perhaps a province in which the photograph can tell us nothing more than what we see with our own eyes, there is another in which it proves to us how little our eyes permit us to see."
~dorothea lange
"as i have practiced it, photography produces pleasure by simplicity. i see something special and show it to the camera. a picture is produced. the moment is held until someone sees it. then it is theirs."
~sam abell
"there are always {at least} two people in every picture: the photographer and the viewer."
~ansel adams
"my portraits are more about me than they are about the people i photograph."
~richard avedon
"when i say i want to photograph someone, what it really means is that i’d like to know them. anyone i know i photograph."
~annie leibovitz
"you don't take a photograph. you make it."
~ansel adams
"you don’t take a photograph. you ask, quietly, to borrow it."
~author unknown
"i am not interested in shooting new things—i am interested to see things new."
~ernst haas
"the camera is an instrument that teaches people how to see without a camera."
~dorthea lange
"i wonder if the two go hand in hand? writing. photography. using words to convey what you cannot see and photos to convey what you cannot say... hmmmm... i like it."
~lisa morford
"there is only you and your camera. the limitations in your photography are in yourself, for what we see is what we are."
~ernst haas
"we look at the world and see what we have learned to believe is there. we have been conditioned to expect. but, as photographers, we must learn to relax our beliefs."
~aaron siskind
"a portrait is not made in the camera but on either side of it."
~edward steichen
"the camera's only job is to get out of the way of making photographs."
~ken rockwell
"it's one thing to make a picture of what a person looks like, it's another thing to make a portrait of who they are."
~paul caponigro
"when words become unclear, i shall focus with photographs. when images become inadequate, i shall be content with silence."
~ansel adams
"i’m not a particularly verbose person. i think that’s why i like taking pictures... they speak for themselves."
~jeb dickerson
"if i could tell the story in words, i wouldn’t need to lug around a camera."
~lewis hine
"look, i’m not an intellectual...i just take pictures."
~helmut newton
"the camera can photograph thought."
~dirk bogarde
"don’t shoot what it looks like. shoot what it feels like."
~david alan harvey
"whether he is an artist or not, the photographer is a joyous sensualist, for the simple reason that the eye traffics in feelings, not in thoughts."
~walker evans
"photography records the gamut of feelings written on the human face, the beauty of the earth and skies that man has inherited, and the wealth and confusion man has created. it is a major force in explaining man to man."
~edward steichen
"some photographers take reality...and impose the domination of their own thought and spirit. others come before reality more tenderly and a photograph to them is an instrument of love and revelation."
~ansel adams
"above all, i craved to seize the whole essence, in the confines of one single photograph, of some situation that was in the process of unrolling itself before my eyes."
~henri cartier-bresson
"a good snapshot stops a moment from running away."
~eudora welty
"a good photographer must love life more than he does photography."
~joel strasser
"a photograph must be more interesting than the thing photographed."
~gary winogran
"beauty can be seen in all things, seeing and composing the beauty is what separates the snapshot from the photograph."
~matt hardy
"skill in photography is acquired by practice and not by purchase."
~percy w. harris
"buying a nikon doesn’t make you a photographer. it makes you a nikon owner."
~author unknown
"no place is boring, if you’ve had a good night’s sleep and have a pocket full of unexposed film."
~robert adams
"there will be times when you will be in the field without a camera. and, you will see the most glorious sunset or the most beautiful scene that you have ever witnessed. don’t be bitter because you can’t record it. sit down, drink it in, and enjoy it for what it is!"
~degriff
"nothing happens when you sit at home. i always make it a point to carry a camera with me at all times…i just shoot at what interests me at that moment."
~elliott erwitt
"it's weird that photographers spend years or even a whole lifetime, trying to capture moments that added together, don't even amount to a couple of hours."
~james lalropui deivom
"photography, like alcohol, should only be allowed to those who can do without it."
~walter sickert
"we photographers deal in things which are continually vanishing, and when they have vanished, there is no contrivance on earth which can make them come back again. we cannot develop and print a memory."
~henri cartier bresson
"no matter how great your photographs, someone will find fault with them. no matter how bad they are, someone will like them."
~scott bourne
"photography records the gamut of feelings written on the human face, the beauty of the earth and skies that man has inherited, and the wealth and confusion man has created. it is a major force in explaining man to man."
~edward steichen
"at forty-two i decided to become a photographer because it offered a means of creative thought and action. i didn’t rationalize this, i just felt it intuitively and followed my intuition, which i have never regretted."
~wynn bullock
"at the end of my life, i want everything important to be documented with either a scar or a phtograph."
~unknown
"there are no rules for good photographs, there are only good photographs."
~ansel adams
"if i knew how to take a good photograph, i’d do it every time."
~robert doisneau
"your first 10,000 photographs are your worst."
henri cartier-bresson
"one photo out of focus is a mistake, ten photos out of focus are an experimentation, one hundred photos out of focus are a style."
~author unknown
"every time someone tells me how sharp my photos are, i assume that it isn’t a very interesting photograph. if it were, they would have more to say."
~author unknown
"i never have taken a picture i’ve intended. they’re always better or worse."
~diane arbus
"it can be a trap of the photographer to think that his or her best pictures were the ones that were hardest to get."
~timothy allen
"i am an amateur and i intend to stay that way for the rest of my life."
~photographer, andre kertesz
"i take photographs with love, so i try to make them art objects. but i make them for myself first and foremost—that is important."
~jacques-henri lartigue
"a great photograph is a full expression of what one feels about what is being photographed in the deepest sense, and is, thereby, a true expression of what one feels about life in its entirety."
~ansel adams
"i think the best pictures are often on the edges of any situation, i don’t find photographing the situation nearly as interesting as photographing the edges."
~william albert allard
"a ming vase can be well-designed and well-made and is beautiful for that reason alone. i don’t think this can be true for photography. unless there is something a little incomplete and a little strange, it will simply look like a copy of something pretty. we won’t take an interest in it."
~john loengard
"twelve significant photographs in any one year is a good crop."
~ansel adams
"which of my photographs is my favorite? the one i’m going to take tomorrow."
~imogen cunningham
"of course, it’s all luck."
~henri cartier-bresson
"when people look at my pictures, i want them to feel the way they do when they want to read a line of a poem twice."
~robert frank
"obviously we can see what was in front of the camera, but if a photograph is honestly made, it's a bit of a self-portrait. i think it's impossible for a photographer who is working honestly to keep this from happening."
~john sexton
