Ansel Adams

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

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

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

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

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

“The negative is the equivalent of the composer's score, and the print the performance.”

“Not everybody trusts paintings but people believe photographs.”

“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.”

“It is horrifying that we have to fight our own government to save the environment.”

“There are worlds of experience beyond the world of the aggressive man, beyond history, and beyond science. The moods and qualities of nature and the revelations of great art are equally difficult to define; we can grasp them only in the depths of our perceptive spirit.”

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

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

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