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And only the photographer himself knows the effect he wants. He should know by instinct, grounded in experience, what subjects are enhanced by hard or soft, light or dark treatment.

Bill Brandt

We are most of us too busy, too worried, too intent on proving ourselves right, too obsessed with ideas to stand and stare
BILL BRANDT

Busy Most Obsessed Ourselves Satre Worried
Very rarely are we able to free our minds of thoughts and emotions and just see for the simple pleasure of seeing. And so long as we fail to do this, so long will the essence of things be hidden from us.
BILL BRANDT

Emotions Essence Hidden Minds Most Pleasure Simple
Photography is still a very new medium and everything must be tried and dare.
BILL BRANDT

Dare Mediums Photography
Photography is not a sport. It has no rules. Everything must be dared and tried!
BILL BRANDT

Everything Photography Sports Tried
No amount of toying with shades of print or with printing papers will transform a commonplace photograph into anything other than a commonplace photograph.
BILL BRANDT

Paper Photography Shade
Photography has no rules, it is not a sport. It is the result which counts, no matter how it is achieved.
BILL BRANDT

Matter Photography Sports
A feeling for composition is a great asset. I think it is very much a matter of instinct. It can perhaps be developed, but I doubt if it can be learned.
BILL BRANDT

Asset Develop Leamed Photographer
Indeed, I feel the simplest approach can often be most effective. A subject placed squarely in the center of the frame, if attention is not distracted from it by fussy surroundings, has a simple dignity which makes it all the more impressive.
BILL BRANDT

Approach Dignity Indeed Place Simplest Surroundings
Photographers should follow their own judgment, and not the fads and dictates of others. Photography is still a very new medium and everything is allowed and everything should be tried and dared…
BILL BRANDT

Photography Sports
Andre Breton once said that a portrait should not only be an image but an oracle one questions, and that the photographer’s aim should be a profound likeness, which physically and morally predicts the subject’s entire future.
BILL BRANDT

Oracles Portraits Profound
I am not interested in rules or conventions. Photography is not a sport.
BILL BRANDT

Conventions Photography Sports
Sometimes they are a matter of luck; the photographer could not expect or hope for them. Sometimes they are a matter of patience, waiting for an effect to be repeated that he has seen and lost or for one that he anticipates.
BILL BRANDT

Patience Photography Waiting
I am not very interested in extraordinary angles. They can be effective on certain occasions, but I do not feel the necessity for them in my own work.
BILL BRANDT

Occasions Often Photography Simple Work
The photographer must possess and preserve the receptive faculties of a child who looks at the world for the first time.
BILL BRANDT

Children Looks World
If there is any method in the way I take pictures, I believe it lies in this: See the subject first. Do not try to force it to be a picture of this, that or the other thing. Stand apart from it. Then something will happen. The subject will reveal itself.
BILL BRANDT

Believe Lying Photography
It is part of the photographer’s job to see more intensely than most people do. He must have and keep in him something of the receptiveness of the child who looks at the world for the first time or of the traveler who enters a strange country.
BILL BRANDT

Country Jobs Photography Receptiveness

And only the photographer himself knows the effect he wants. He should know by instinct, grounded in experience, what subjects are enhanced by hard or soft, light or dark treatment.

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And only the photographer himself knows the effect he wants. He should know by instinct, grounded in experience, what subjects are enhanced by hard or soft, light or dark treatment.

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Popular Authors

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