Arthur Hammond Quotes (1880-1962)

“Practically speaking, the securing of true tones in a photograph depends entirely upon the exposure.”

“A view or a landscape will impress different people in different ways, just as a human individual will.”

“This is composition; knowing what to select, how to arrange, what to emphasize or eliminate and how to do it...”

“There is as much difference in the meaning of the words tone and tones as there is in the words nerve and nerves.”

“Too many lines and too many objects of equal importance in a picture will cause confusion, discomfort and eye-strain.”

“There should be no very violent contrasts and no spottiness of light and shade, and, above all, the tones must be right.”

“The laws of principality and unity, harmony and balance, must always be observed. The picture should tell one story, and only one.”

“Plates and films possess great latitude, it is true, but too short an exposure always has a tendency to cause a loss of atmosphere.”

“So photography, having a place among artistic processes, has its own distinguishing quality which cannot be duplicated by any other medium.”

“...picture-making is almost entirely a matter of good taste, and that is largely instinctive when the taste has been trained and cultivated.”

“...the accuracy of the lens is often regarded as infallible, whereas, from the artistic standpoint, a lens is less accurate than the trained eye.”

“...but the fundamental element of picture-making is the cutting of the picture-space by lines or edges of tones, and this is what is known as "spacing".”

“The main object of interest should not be in the exact centre of picture-space, because that is where we imagine the fulcrum of the steelyard balance to be.”

“The lack of hard edges and the entire absence of that biting hardness of definition that is unavoidable with some lenses is just what the picture maker wants.”

“A curved line, as a rule, will convey an impression of beauty more strongly than a straight line; a curve can be vastly more satisfying and pleasing than a tangent.”

“...shading is of great importance, and good shadows can best be secured when the sun is low, and when one side of all objects is more strongly lighted than the other.”

“The areas of tones are called masses and, whatever the subject of picture may be, its success as a picture depends very largely on the effectiveness of the spacing and massing.”

“...the composition in portraiture and figure studies may be constructive rather than selective, though it will be found that selective composition also plays an important part in portraiture.”

“A painter, by the skilful use of color, can make idyllic pictures in which a figure or a group of figures is not the dominant thing in the picture, but for a photographer this is more difficult.”

“I do want to make it clear that the success of the picture does not depend entirely upon the beauty of the subject, but mainly upon the manner in which the picture-maker uses his pictorial material.”