Phrases for photographers

Surely, you have heard a phrase related to the world of photography and it will have caught your attention. If you are a photographer and you like photography, either analog or digital, you will like to know that there are thousands and thousands of phrases or tips that can increase your creative level and inspire you at the same time.

Many of those phrases are written and said by some of the best photographers in history, and it is interesting to know what they thought about what we like the most. It is incredible that each of them thinks in a different way depending on the time in which they have developed their work.

But since we don't like to keep you waiting, let's get started.

The photograph

This technique is defined as one of the ways to create and capture art through light. The main thing you should know is that photography would be nothing without light. This light is projected and fixed in the form of images on a sensitive medium, which can be physical or digital.

Long before digital and even analog cameras existed, the first camera called dark camera. The camera obscura consisted of an optical instrument that, together with a totally dark compartment equipped with a small hole in one of its ends, entered the light and this, the images were projected, on a darkened background, although they were done in a inverted.

The same occurs with current photographic cameras, except that these are equipped with lenses to sharpen the focus where the images are projected, mirrors to reinvert the projected image and finally a photosensitive tape (or a similar digital sensor), which captures the image and saves it, to be able to later reveal or visualize it digitally.

What is it for

What characterizes photography is undoubtedly how it is projected in the cinematographic or documentary world, in addition to the artistic one, since allows you to capture real images and reproduce them on physical or digital media.

To all this, the astronomy and science, who have seen in photography the opportunity to capture and enlarge the image of extremely distant or infinitely small objects, thus being able to disclose them later.

Types of photography

Depending on the type of lens you carry by hand or your photographic style, photography has a series of very different types:

• Advertising Photography. It is undoubtedly the one that serves as advertising or promotion of consumer products. It is often the target of digital interventions and other strategies.
• Fashion Photography. It is the one that accompanies the parades and other fashion events, emphasizing the way of dressing or wearing or combing hair.
• Documentary photography. Also called historical or journalistic, it is done for informational or educational purposes, that is, as part of the transmission of a message.
• Landscape photography. The one that is taken to show nature in its fullness, such as aerial or underwater shots, usually very open and full of color.
• Scientific photography. The one that students of nature take through telescopes, microscopes and other tools, to show what can not commonly be observed with the naked eye.
• Artistic photography. The one that pursues aesthetic purposes: portraits, montages, compositions, etc.

The most inspiring phrases

The time has come for you to be inspired by some of the phrases that we have chosen from some of the best photographers in history. Many of them have helped to find the photographic style of each one of us and above all to continue developing our creativity.

Henri Cartier-Bresson

"The camera is a sketchbook, an instrument for intuition and spontaneity."

"Photography is, at the same moment, the simultaneous recognition of the significance of a fact and the rigorous organization of the visually perceived forms that express and signify that fact." 

"Your first 10.000 photos will be your worst photos."

"The photographer cannot be a passive spectator, he cannot be really lucid if he is not involved in the event."

Manuel Alvarez Bravo

«The main instrument of a photographer are his eyes. Oddly enough, many photographers choose to use another photographer's eyes, past or present, instead of their own. These photographers are blind ”.

"If the impossible has not yet been achieved, we have not done our duty." 

A

“Photography is more than a means for the effective communication of ideas. It is a creative art ”. 

"There is nothing worse than the sharp image of a fuzzy concept."

“In my mind's eye, I visualize a detail. The view and the sensation will appear in a print. If it excites me, there is a good chance that it will make a good photograph. It is an intuitive sense, a capacity that comes from a lot of practice ”.

"A good photograph is obtained by knowing where to stand."

"You don't take a picture, you take it."

Berenice Abbot

"The picture only can represent the present. Once photographed, the subject becomes part of the past. "

“I took photography like a duck to water. I never wanted to do anything else. The enthusiasm on the subject is the voltage that pulls me over the mountain of servitude necessary to produce the final photograph. " 

“The photographer is the contemporary being par excellence; through his gaze, he now becomes past ”. 

"Photography is the appropriate medium to recreate the now, the living world of our days." 

"Photography (if it is honest and direct) should be related to contemporary life, to the pulse of today." 

“The challenge for me has been in the first place, to see things as they are, be it a portrait, a city street, or a ball. In a word, I have tried to be objective. I am not referring to the objectivity of a machine, but to that of a sensitive human being with his mysterious and personal criteria. The second challenge has been to impose order on the things I see, to provide the visual context and the intellectual framework, which for me is the art of photography. " 

Elliot erwit

«Nothing happens while you are sitting at home. Whenever I can I like to take a camera with me everywhere. So I can shoot what interests me at the right time.

“Photography is the art of observation. It's about finding something interesting in an ordinary place. I have realized that it has little to do with the things you see and a lot to do with how you see them ”.

Arnold newman

“Many photographers think that if they buy a better camera they will be able to take better photos. A better camera will do nothing for you if there is nothing in your head or in your heart. "

"Visual ideas combined with technology and personal interpretation equals photography." 

“Influences come from everywhere, but the shots come mainly from instinct. What is the instinct? It is a lifetime of accumulation of influences: experience, knowledge, seeing and listening. There is little time to reflect when taking a photograph. "

“Photography, as we know, is not something true. It is an illusion of reality with which we create our own private world ”. 

“We don't take photos with our cameras. We do them with our hearts and we do them with our minds, and the camera is nothing more than a tool ”. 

"What people do you like to photograph?" My answer is "those that I love, those that I admire, and those that hate me." 

Ouka Leele

“Photography is not as easy as people sometimes think. When they ask you for a photo, they demand a lot of hurry, they think it's shooting and that's it. A good photo takes a lot of time, for me it's like shooting a scene in a movie. "

"Nobody escapes the fascination that photography produces, it is like a magic box."

 Auguste Renoir

"The most important element in a photograph cannot be defined." 

"A photograph should be pleasant, cheerful and beautiful. There are already a lot of boring things in life. " 

"A photograph should be pleasant, cheerful and beautiful. There are already a lot of boring things in life. " 

Gervasio Sanchez

“Before, a bad photo was not published and today, the quality has dropped a lot. Technically they have improved because digital cameras focus on you alone, you don't have to worry about the light ... but another thing is the image quality. The characters come out sharper perhaps, but also more dead. The quality is falling because less is invested in journalism ”.

Minor White

"We can teach photography as a way of making a living, but what we have to achieve is that students see it as a way of life."

Peter Lindbergh

Be daring, be different, be impractical, be anything that secures your aim and your imaginative vision in the face of safe players, common creatures, slaves of the ordinary.

Carl mydans

“You become a photographer when you have overcome the concerns of learning and in your hands the camera becomes an extension of yourself. Then creativity begins. "

Emmet gowin

“Photography is a tool for dealing with things that everyone knows but nobody pays attention to. My photographs are intended to represent something that you do not see. "

Robert Frank

 "The important thing is to see what is invisible to others."

Alfred Stieglitz

"In photography there is a reality so subtle that it becomes more real than reality."

Conclusion

As you have seen, there are many phrases that have been written by some of the best photographers. Now is the time for you to be inspired and to create your own phrases.