Best Photo advice or tips you have ever received?

[patrick_f]

<p>Thats it, what is the best piece of advice or tip that you have learned in your career. Yes, this may be a tough one!<br>

Patrick</p>

[phyrpowr]

<p>If it won't run away, use a tripod</p>

[bueh]

<p>The background makes or breaks a great image.</p>

[bobcossar]

<p><em><strong>"Always, always ask the next question."</strong> </em> One never knows enough, and you won't if you don't ask the next question....regards, Bob</p>

[bruce_margolis]

<p>Always follow the light</p>

 

[bobcossar]

<p>Ah, Bruce.....not meaning to seem obtuse here but, what does that <em><strong>mean, </strong> </em> exactly....?</p>

[ellis_vener_photography]

<p>-you are responsible for every square millimeter of the frame.</p>

<p>-If the light in front of you looks great or is doing something interesting turn around and see what it is doing behind you.</p>

<p>Both from Jay Maisel.</p>

<p> </p>

[Matt Laur]

<p>"Set the alarm clock for 3:00AM."</p>

[tibz]

<p>The most important feature of the camera is what's 11 inches behind it. -Ansel</p>

<p>or something to that effect.</p>

[seismiccwave]

<p>I will have to say the advice about tripod is the most important. Unfortunately I am so lazy that I still don't use it as much as I should.</p>

[RobertChura]

<p><strong>Read the </strong> <strong>Manual </strong></p>

[guendanadxi]

<p>Always think what are you trying to say in a photograph before pressing the shutter.<br>

(Still working on this one....)</p>

[lex_jenkins]

<p><em>Don't hesitate. Film is cheap, life is fleeting.</em> -- (An approximation of the consensus of tips from various mentors.)</p>

<p><em>Put down the camera. You're a better writer than photographer.</em> -- (My first journalism instructor. I should have listened to her.)</p>

<p><em>Get out of the bathroom! Give someone else a chance!</em> -- (My little brother, after my mom gave me a home darkroom kit when I was a kid. Everything fit on the tiny bathroom sink.)</p>

[Leonard-just-Leonard]

<p>Photography is all about capturing light...<br /><br />No idea who said it but I think I read it here on photo.net... I keep this in mind with almost every shot I take, looking at the background, shadows, sunlight and so on.<br>

and...<br>

<br />A guy at the local print shop showed me how to crop photos to standard sizes in photoshop... really basic stuff I did not know but helped me a lot</p>

[graham_thompson1]

<p>Give it up!</p>

[nhut-nguyen]

<p>Stop spending so much time on Photo.net forum and start spending more time shooting.</p>

[colin carron]

<p>An artist decides what to include in a painting while the photographer decides what to exclude from an image. </p>

[john clark]

<p>Oh, loads... but the best advice I was given was to keep my eyes open, so that I see what's going on around me. Too many times it is easy to be pre-occupied and miss things. </p>

[Hector Javkin]

<p>"Take off the lens cap ..."<br>

When I was a teenager, ages ago, using a Yashica rangefinder.</p>

[will_daniel1]

<p>Take hundreds and hundreds of photos and throw away all the bad ones. The only difference between a good photographer and a bad one is the good one never shows his bad work.<br>

Will</p>

[bernie moore]

<p>"You give everything to your art but your time, whatdya expect?"</p>

[luis_g]

<p> "The obvious is the last thing we see"<br>

Said by either Wendell Berry or Jonathan Williams.</p>

<p>[Yes, I'm well aware of Eggleston's "I'm at war with the obvious" quote, but I think WE was coming at this from the other side of the mirror]</p>

<p> </p>

[rick_helmke1]

'Film is cheap, don't worry about it'-my first editor a long time ago.

 

 

 

'You need to make at least $12,000 a year.'-My dad even longer ago.

 

 

 

Rick H.

[vincent_peri]

<p>Learn the Zone System. </p>

[stp]

<p>Get there before the sun comes up, and don't leave just because the sun has set.</p>