Jay Maisel famous quotes

If you are out there shooting, things will happen for you. If you're not out there, you'll only hear about it.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Shooting

If the light is great in front of you, you should turn around and see what it is doing behind you.
-- Jay Maisel

#Light #Behind You #Should

Try to go out empty and let your images fill you up.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Trying #Empty

Always carry a camera, it's tough to shoot a picture without one.
-- Jay Maisel

#Cameras #Tough

Photography is an act of love.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Acts Of Love

If you're not shooting in the right direction, it doesn't matter how well you're shooting.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Shooting #Matter

Some have said that if you take a great picture in color and take away the color, you'll have a great black-and-white picture. But if you're shooting something about color and you take away the color, you'll have nothing.
-- Jay Maisel

#Black And White #Color #Shooting

If you want to make more interesting pictures, become a more interesting person.
-- Jay Maisel

#Interesting #Want #Persons

We have always wanted to find the 'it-ness' of anything we shoot. We want to get as deep into the subject as we can.
-- Jay Maisel

#Want #Photographer #Wanted

You will, in time, see and show others not just the superficial, but the details, the meanings, and the implications of all that you look at ...
-- Jay Maisel

#Details #Looks #Photographer

One color alone means nothing. I acts as in a vacuum, with no other colors to relate to. It is only when colors relate to other colors that the fun begins.
-- Jay Maisel

#Fun #Mean #Color

Gesture will survive whatever kind of light you have. Gesture can triumph over anything because of its narrative content.
-- Jay Maisel

#Light #Triumph #Gestures

The drama of light exists not only in what is in the light, but also in what is left dark. If the light is everywhere, the drama is gone.
-- Jay Maisel

#Drama #Dark #Light

Color is seductive. It changes as it interacts with other colors, it changes because of the light falling upon it, and it changes as it becomes larger in size.
-- Jay Maisel

#Fall #Light #Color

You cannot accurately remember color ...
-- Jay Maisel

#Color #Photographer #Remember

'Color' is quite different from 'colors.' In an image with many colors, we find that all the colors compete with each other rather than interacting with each other. The results" colors.
-- Jay Maisel

#Color #Different #Photographer

There really isn't anything that you could call 'bad' color. It all has to do with the amount of color you use and in what context it appears.
-- Jay Maisel

#Color #Use #Photographer

What you're shooting at doesn't matter, the real question is: 'Does it give you joy?'
-- Jay Maisel

#Real #Giving #Joy

Always shoot it now. It won't be the same when you go back.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photographer

You must not think of yourself as looking at the stage from the audience. You must think of it as theatre in the round and look at it from all sides.
-- Jay Maisel

#Thinking #Theatre #Looks

We don't experience light, color, and gesture in a vacuum. We experience it in contexts.
-- Jay Maisel

#Light #Color #Vacuums

If you don't have a camera, the best thing you can do is describe how great it looked.
-- Jay Maisel

#Cameras #Photographer

It's a lot easier to take pictures if you always have the camera with you.
-- Jay Maisel

#Cameras #Photographer #Easier

There is no bad light. There is spectacular light and difficult light. It's up to you to use the light you have.
-- Jay Maisel

#Light #Use #Photographer

The whole world is there for you. Gifts will happen, but only if you are patient with life itself, the shooting process, and your own limitations.
-- Jay Maisel

#Shooting #World #Photographer

If you're not your own severest critic, you are your own worst enemy.
-- Jay Maisel

#Enemy #Photographer #Worst

I don't see light as something that falls, but as a positive force.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Fall #Light

As people, we love pattern. But interrupted pattern is more interesting.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #People #Interesting

Never put lettering in your photos unless you want it read.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Want

I'm a New Yorker. I don't believe in air unless I can see it.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Believe #Air

Allow yourself to lose your way.
-- Jay Maisel

#Way

You have to have a lot of 'overage' so that your failures aren't the only thing you come home with. You've got to have a lot of things that were magnificent failures, but you want some magnificent successes.
-- Jay Maisel

#Home #Want #Coming Home

There are rules about perception, but not about photography.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Perception

A photographer's art is more in his perceptions than his execution. In a painter, I think the perception is only the first step, and then you have a kind of hard road of execution.
-- Jay Maisel

#Art #Thinking #Perception

Be aware of every square millimeter of your frame.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Squares

If you can capture the element of surprise, you're way ahead of the game.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Games #Elements

The best camera is the one you have with you.
-- Jay Maisel

#Inspiring #Cameras

It's always around. You just don't see it.
-- Jay Maisel

Money and fame that photography can bring you are wonderful, but nothing can compare to the joy of seeing something new.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Joy #Photographer

Forget what it was. Look at what it is.
-- Jay Maisel

#Looks #Photographer #Forget

You have to learn not only from your failures. You must also learn from your successes.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photographer

You have to let the past successes go, or you'll never be able to see anew.
-- Jay Maisel

#Past #Able #Photographer

Don't overthink things in front of you. I fit moves you, shoot it. If it's fun, shoot it. If you've never seen it before, shoot it.
-- Jay Maisel

#Fun #Moving #Photographer

Had I not been told to look, I would have quite, ignorant of what was really there, because I had 'made plans' and was wearing visual and emotional blinders that limited my perceptions and my vision.
-- Jay Maisel

#Emotional #Perception #Ignorant

All these factors are only valuable if you're curious. But in any case, the more knowledge you have, the more things are open and available to you.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photographer #Curious #Cases

You sort of have to be always aware, even when you're not thinking of shooting. That's when the best stuff happens.
-- Jay Maisel

#Thinking #Shooting #Stuff

When you shoot, that is opportunity number one to make a statement. When you edit, you have opportunity number two to make your statement. It could be an affirmation of your first choice or could go off in another direction.
-- Jay Maisel

#Opportunity #Two #Numbers

Keep your mind open. You may very well learn something new about yourself and your pictures.
-- Jay Maisel

#Mind #May #Photographer

You always end up with too many pictures to edit and too few that you feel 'got it'.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photographer #Ends #Feels

It's important to realize that the images are everywhere, not just where you want or expect them to be.
-- Jay Maisel

#Important #Want #Photographer

There is no one solution to all problems. It's the problem itself that can lead to the solution.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Problem #Solutions

Always wait for the trigger. The trigger is the final part of the puzzle, the reason you want to shoot.
-- Jay Maisel

#Waiting #Finals #Want

When finding the right angle for a shot...'Move your ass.'
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography #Moving #Ass

Never say you're going back - SHOOT IT NOW!
-- Jay Maisel

#Photography

You must be open to what otherwise may seem to be a detriment to your 'plans'.
-- Jay Maisel

#May #Photographer #Plans

You see shape, and how the light hits things, how the color changes from one end of the photo to the other, and how movement affects the mood of the photo.
-- Jay Maisel

#Light #Color #Movement

It's not just when you shoot, or what you shot, or where you shoot, it's the combination of the three.
-- Jay Maisel

#Three #Photographer #Shots

You can't just turn on when something happens, you have to be turned on all the time. Then things happen.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photographer #Turns #Things Happen

You are responsible for every part of your image, even the parts you’re not interested in.
-- Jay Maisel

#Responsible #Not Interested

You find that you have to do many things, more than just lift up the camera and shoot, and so you get involved in it in a very physical way. You may find that the picture you want to do can only be made from a certain place, and you're not there, so you have to physically go there. And that participation may spur you on to work harder on the thing, . . . because in the physical change of position you start seeing a whole different relationship.
-- Jay Maisel

#Hard Work #May #Want

Every picture should have a place you can go, a home, a climax.
-- Jay Maisel

#Home #Should #Climax

Each picture you take has power as long as it brings experience to the person who’s looking at it.
-- Jay Maisel

#Long #Persons

Pain is not a conduit to art or joy
-- Jay Maisel

#Art #Pain #Joy

The pictures are everywhere. If you're open, they will find you.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photographer

I love when pictures ask questions or make others ask questions.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photographer

The more light you have in an image, the less drama you get. The details start taking over; the mystery is all gone.
-- Jay Maisel

#Drama #Light #Details

You have to pick the right tool for the point you're trying to make and there is no one solution.
-- Jay Maisel

#Trying #Tools #Photographer

Sometimes without shooting a picture germinates in your head. Other times, you keep taking pictures of the same thing and watch the images mature and grow.
-- Jay Maisel

#Watches #Shooting #Photographer

As you see something that yo want to shot and it's bearing down on you, it's important to start framing long before the subject gets close to you. The light will reveal itself possibly long before you want to take the image, but you have to wait until the picture comes to you, and if you've been anticipating carefully when the subject will be in position, the background will have been figured out in advance.
-- Jay Maisel

#Light #Long #Waiting

When we are given gifts, we must be quick and able to accept them.
-- Jay Maisel

#Able #Photographer #Accepting

I try not to tell students where to shoot, when to shoot, or what to shoot. I feel finding the picture is the most important part of being a photographer. The actual shooting is of lesser importance.
-- Jay Maisel

#Important #Trying #Shooting

You need minimum color for maximum effect.
-- Jay Maisel

#Color #Needs #Photographer

Sometimes as you work, you find that you are learning things about your own perceptions and motivations that are way below you consciousness. If you get lucky, you recognize what you are doing, but all too often we don't find the connection between our work and our own motivations.
-- Jay Maisel

#Motivation #Perception #Connections

Color really doesn't have interaction if it's full of colors. It's the interaction or relationship among or between colors that makes a color image. This usually happens with a few colors, not a glut of them.
-- Jay Maisel

#Color #Photographer #Interaction

The problem suggests the solution.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photographer #Problem #Solutions

It's my obligation to take out all the 'wrong' pictures.
-- Jay Maisel

#Photographer #Obligation

Gesture is not always action.
-- Jay Maisel

#Gestures #Action #Photographer

Remember that most people (those who are not photographers) don't even see the things that you missed. Many don't even look. Ergo, you are way ahead of the game.
-- Jay Maisel

#Games #People #Looks

Since the background is as important as the subject, you mustn't let it default by chance. You must control not only vertical and horizontal, you must be aware of the depth of field (or lack of it) that you want in the background.
-- Jay Maisel

#Important #Depth #Want

The awareness of the quality of space in out photos is akin to our awareness of the very air in our photos, the atmosphere that pervades every square inch of our image and yet is often invisible to the photographer.
-- Jay Maisel

#Squares #Air #Space