Sam Abell Quotes & Sayings

I wanted life to be episodic. I wanted to be a magazine photographer and I was willing to do what it took to become that. — Sam Abell

Editorial photography has to be energetic and visually competitive. — Sam Abell

'Woman on the Plaza,' with its distinct horizon, snow-like surfaces, wintry wall, stunning sunlight, sharp shadows, and hurrying figure, would become the most biographical of my photographs - an abstract image of the landscape and life of northern Ohio where I grew up and first practiced photography. — Sam Abell

I had luck, but I worked hard and I suffered. It's not just photography I'm talking about. It's about whatever dream you want it to be. — Sam Abell

We know that photographs inform people. We also know that photographs move people. The photograph that does both is the one we want to see and make. — Sam Abell

Photography, alone of the arts, seems perfected to serve the desire humans have for a moment - this very moment - to stay. — Sam Abell

It matters little how much equipment we use; it matters much that we be masters of all we do use. — Sam Abell

I was known as a 35-mm photographer with a view-camera mentality. — Sam Abell

There isn't an aspect of book creation I don't enjoy, and there has always been a book in my life to dream about or work on. — Sam Abell

My dad had been an ardent amateur photographer, and he taught me to compose a photograph from the back to the front, and then populate the picture. — Sam Abell

And that desire-the strong desire to take pictures-is important. It borders on a need, based on a habit: the habit of seeing. Whether working or not, photographers are looking, seeing, and thinking about what they see, a habit that is both a pleasure and a problem, for we seldom capture in a single photograph the full expression of what we see and feel. It is the hope that we might express ourselves fully-and the evidence that other photographers have done so-that keep us taking pictures. — Sam Abell

The neatest part of this book I'm working on - to me - are the pictures that show the process ... Because photographers ... think things through and ... it isn't luck, and it isn't random and it isn't accidental. It isn't. — Sam Abell

My best work is often almost unconscious and occurs ahead of my ability to understand it. — Sam Abell

Actually, ambition won't get you that far. You'll shift gears. You'll see something that's shinier. But if you believe ... then you're the long-distance runner. — Sam Abell

"You know you are seeing such a photograph if you say to yourself, "I could have taken that picture. I've seen such a scene before, but never like that." It is the kind of photography that relies for its strengths not on special equipment or effects but on the intensity of the photographer's seeing. It is the kind of photography in which the raw materials-light, space, and shape-are arranged in a meaningful and even universal way that gives grace to ordinary objects." — Sam Abell

For spiritual companions I have had the many artists who have relied on nature to help shape their imagination. And their most elaborate equipment was a deep reverence for the world through which they passed. Photographers share something with these artists. We seek only to see and to describe with our own voices, and, though we are seldom heard as soloists, we cannot photograph the world in any other way. — Sam Abell

Just like some people's instinct to photograph is triggered by vacation ... assignments might be that to me and that's why I've built my life around assignments. That was the way to live the photographic life. — Sam Abell

How the visual world appears is important to me. I'm always aware of the light. I'm always aware of what I would call the 'deep composition.' Photography in the field is a process of creation, of thought and technique. But ultimately, it's an act of imaginatively seeing from within yourself. — Sam Abell

In almost every photograph I have ever made, there is something I would do to complete it. I take that to be the spirit hole or the deliberate mistake that's in a Navajo rug to not be godlike, but to be human. — Sam Abell

My first priority when taking pictures is to achieve clarity. A good documentary photograph transmits the information of the situation with the utmost fidelity; achieving it means understanding the nuances of lighting and composition, and also remembering to keep the lenses clean and the cameras steady. — Sam Abell

For sheer majestic geography and sublime scale, nothing beats Alaska and the Yukon. For culture, Japan. And for all-around affection, Australia. — Sam Abell

Essentially what photography is is life lit up. — Sam Abell

My father taught me photography. It was his hobby, and we had a small darkroom in the fruit cellar of our basement. It was the kind of makeshift darkroom that was only dark at night. — Sam Abell

The unusual wins out over the usual. — Sam Abell

There are a lot of ways to be expressive in life, but I wasn't good at some of them. Music, for instance. I was a distinct failure with the cello. Eventually, my parents sold the cello and bought a vacuum cleaner. The sound in our home improved. — Sam Abell

I think of myself as a writer who photographs. Images, for me, can be considered poems, short stories or essays. And I've always thought the best place for my photographs was inside books of my own creation. — Sam Abell

Photographs that transcend but do not deny their literal situation appeal to me. — Sam Abell

One of the things that I most believe in is the compose and wait philosophy of photography. It's a very satisfying, almost spiritual way to photograph. Life isn't' knocking you around, life isn't controlling you. You have picked your place, you've picked your scene, you've picked your light, you've done all the decision making and you are waiting for the moment to come to you. — Sam Abell

Life rarely presents fully finished photographs. An image evolves, often from a single strand of visual interest - a distant horizon, a moment of light, a held expression. — Sam Abell

When I first went to 'National Geographic,' I thought I was the least qualified person to step through the doors. But because of my parents and the culture of continual learning they imposed on us, I later came to believe I was the most qualified person who ever worked there. — Sam Abell

My parents, grandmother and brother were teachers. My mother taught Latin and French and was the school librarian. My father taught geography and a popular class called Family Living, the precursor to Sociology, which he eventually taught. My grandmother was a beloved one-room school teacher at Knob School, near Sonora in Larue County, Ky. — Sam Abell

Above all, it's hard learning to live with vivid mental images of scenes I cared for and failed to photograph. It is the edgy existence within me of these unmade images that is the only assurance that the best photographs are yet to be made. — Sam Abell

The best lesson I was given is that all of life teaches, especially if we have that expectation. — Sam Abell

But there is more to a fine photograph than information. We are also seeking to present an image that arouses the curiosity of the viewer or that, best of all, provokes the viewer to think-to ask a question or simply to gaze in thoughtful wonder. We know that photographs inform people. We also know that photographs move people. The photograph that does both is the one we want to see and make. It is the kind of picture that makes you want to pick up your own camera again and go to work. — Sam Abell

As I have practiced it, photography produces pleasure by simplicity. I see something special and show it to the camera. A picture is produced. The moment is held until someone sees it. Then it is theirs. — Sam Abell

A mad, keen photographer needs to get out into the world and work and make mistakes. — Sam Abell

There are grander and more sublime landscapes - to me. There are more compelling cultures. But what appeals to me about central Montana is that the combination of landscape and lifestyle is the most compelling I've seen on this earth. Small mountain ranges and open prairie, and different weather, different light, all within a 360-degree view. — Sam Abell