David Burnett Quotes
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When you've lived through the golden age of photojournalism, there's no point in being nostalgic.
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War isn't a TV show with plot twists to keep the viewers interested. The proliferation of images and blanket media coverage have suffocated the life out of old-style photojournalism.
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I love New York, but am happy to be away from it. I really like small towns, with welcoming barbecue restaurants.
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The fact that I have a little ten-megapixel camera with me all the time, is way better than having the greatest camera in the world sitting at home on a desk instead of on my shoulder.
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As an emerging photojournalist in the early 70s, my focus was on trying to create stories for magazines to the exclusion of almost everything else. I wish someone had told me then that the most personally important pictures you’ll ever make are those about you and your life. I’m glad I had the chance to work for some great magazines, but I really miss those little everyday images, the ones that take place in and around your own life, which will never make the news. Don’t sell yourself short: photograph your own life, not just everyone else’s.
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I see myself as a recorder of history, sort of a visual historian.
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Do not settle for easy. Do not settle for that first image. Craft it, work it, and make something more out of it. And finally, don't forget that the biggest joy in photography is making pictures of those things in your own life.
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The satisfaction comes from working next to 500 photographers and coming away with something different.