Ansel Adams Photography Quotations

A true photograph need not be explained, nor can it be contained in words.

A great photograph is one that fully expresses what one feels, in the deepest sense, about what is being photographed.

You don't take a photograph, you make it.

It is the photographer, not the camera, that is the instrument.

Twelve significant photographs in any one year is a good crop.

Not everybody trusts paintings but people believe photographs.

We must remember that a photograph can hold just as much as we put into it, and no one has ever approached the full possibilities of the medium.

I tried to keep both arts alive, but the camera won. I found that while the camera does not express the soul, perhaps a photograph can!

A good photograph is knowing where to stand.

Dodging and burning are steps to take care of mistakes God made in establishing tonal relationships.

A photograph is usually looked at - seldom looked into.

When I'm ready to make a photograph, I think I quite obviously see in my minds eye something that is not literally there in the true meaning of the word. I'm interested in something which is built up from within, rather than just extracted from without.

Photography is more than a medium for factual communication of ideas. It is a creative art.

When words become unclear, I shall focus with photographs. When images become inadequate, I shall be content with silence.

There are always two people in every picture: the photographer and the viewer.

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

In wisdom gathered over time I have found that every experience is a form of exploration.

It is my intention to present - through the medium of photography - intuitive observations of the natural world which may have meaning to the spectators.

There are no rules for good photographs, there are only good photographs.

Landscape photography is the supreme test of the photographer - and often the supreme disappointment.

Sometimes I do get to places just when God's ready to have somebody click the shutter.

Photography, as a powerful medium of expression and communications, offers an infinite variety of perception, interpretation and execution.

These people live again in print as intensely as when their images were captured on old dry plates of sixty years ago... I am walking in their alleys, standing in their rooms and sheds and workshops, looking in and out of their windows. Any they in turn seem to be aware of me.

In my mind's eye, I visualize how a particular... sight and feeling will appear on a print. If it excites me, there is a good chance it will make a good photograph. It is an intuitive sense, an ability that comes from a lot of practice.

To photograph truthfully and effectively is to see beneath the surfaces and record the qualities of nature and humanity which live or are latent in all things.

A great photograph is a full expression of what one feels.

In a strict sense photography can never be abstract, for the camera is incapable of synthetic integration.

I knew my destiny when I first experienced Yosemite.

It is just as important to bring people the evidence of the beauty of the world of nature and of man as it is to give them a document of ugliness, squalor, and despair.

I believe photography is a tool to express our positive assessment of the world. A tool to acquire ultimate happiness and belief.

The technique of 35mm photography appears simple. One is beguiled by the quick viewing and operation, and by the very questionable inclination to make many pictures with the hope that some will be good.

To the vast majority of people a photograph is an image of something within their direct experience: a more-or-less factual reality. It is difficult for them to realize that the photograph can be the source of experience, as well as the reflection of spiritual awareness of the world and of self.

Bad weather makes for good photography.

A photograph is not an accident - is a concept. It exists at, or before, the moment of exposure of the negative.

We make images to "honor what is greater and more interesting than we are."

I am probably afraid that some spectator will not understand my photography - therefore I proceed to make it really less understandable by writing defensibly about it.

All art is a vision penetrating the illusions of reality, and photography is one form of this vision and revelation.

I am always surprised when I see several cameras, a gaggle on lenses, filters, meters, et cetera, rattling around in a soft bag with a complement of refuse and dust. Sometimes the professional is the worst offender!

...one sees differently with color photography than black-and-white... in short, visualization must be modified by the specific nature of the equipment and materials being used.

The dismal half-baked images of the average "reportage" and "documentary" photography are self dammning... the slick manner, the slightly obscure significance, the esoteric fear of simple beauty for its own sake - I am deeply concerned with these manifestations of decay. Gene Smith's work validates my most vigorous convictions that if the documentary photographs is to be truly effective it must contain elements of art, intensity, fine craft and spirituality. All these his work contains and we may turn to his work with gratitude, appreciation and great respect.

The negative is the score, and the print the performance.

The term accessories has come to include a host of photographic gadgets of questionable value...

The sheer ease with which we can produce a superficial image often leads to creative disaster.

Black and white photography is truly quite a 'departure from reality', and the transition from one aspect of visual magic to another was not as complete as many imagine.

Image quality is not the product of a machine, but of the person who directs the machine, and there are no limits to imagination and expression.

The craft of photography is the key to good images.

I have often thought that if photography were difficult in the true sense of the term-meaning that the creation of a simple photograph would entail as much time and effort as the production of a good watercolor or etching-there would be a vast improvement in total output. The sheer ease with which we can produce a superficial image often leads to creative disaster.

Notebook. No photographer should be without one!

The ‘machine-gun’ approach to photography – by which many negatives are made with the hope that one will be good – is fatal to serious results.

A photograph is not an accident - it is a concept.

I know some photographs that are extraodrinary in their power and conviction, but it is difficult in photography to overcome the superficial power or subject; the concept and statement must be quite convincing in themselves to win over a dramatic and compelling subject situation.

It is easy to take a photograph, but it is harder to make a masterpiece in photography than in any other art medium.

Photography is an austere and blazing poetry of the real.

I hope that my work will encourage self expression in others and stimulate the search for beauty and creative excitement in the great world around us.

You don't make a photograph just with a camera

"Simply look with perceptive eyes at the world about you, and trust to your own reactions and convictions. Ask yourself: "Does this subject move me to feel, think and dream? Can I visualize a print - my own personal statement of what I feel and want to convey - from the subject before me?""

Photography is an investigation of both the outer and the inner worlds. The first experiences with the camera involve looking at the world beyond the lens, trusting the instrument will 'capture' something 'seen.' The terms shoot and take are not accidental; they represent an attitude of conquest and appropriation. Only when the photographer grows into perception and creative impulse does the term make define a condition of empathy between the external and the internal events.

How high your awareness level is determines how much meaning you get from your world. Photography can teach you to improve your awareness level.

This profession [photography] is deserving of attention and respect equal to that accorded painting, literature, music and architecture.

The single most important component of a camera is the twelve inches behind it!

You don't make a photograph just with a camera. You bring to the act of photography all the pictures you have seen, the books you have read, the music you have heard, the people you have loved.