Mario Testino Quotes

I've been taking photographs since I was a teenager, and fashion has taught me a lot more about photography. It's definitely inspired me.

A lot of people didn't believe in me.

It takes a lot of courage, when everyone is asking you what you want to do, if you say that you want to be a musician or an actor; people can be very condescending and say, 'Oh, that's so sweet, good luck with that!' It can be very frustrating.

I have a great little camera, and I had a theory that if the story is interesting, it doesn't matter what medium you shoot it on. You just have to make a good film.

You either are a good director or you're not.

I fight to take a good photograph every single time.

I'd love to do a Michel Gondry film. That would be ideal! I'd love to do an Almodovar film; you know, I think he's very, very talented. I don't care that people say he's pretentious. So what? He's a good director; he can be pretentious.

With photography, I always think that it's not good enough.

All creative people have to have vulnerability because those nuances are what move people. So I'm deeply insecure - but I'm good at hiding it.

Botticelli would have made a very good fashion photographer. He did eight heads instead of seven heads in a body, which is fashion illustration.

I knew I had to write a good screenplay to be taken seriously, and I knew I needed to present Mississippi on visuals instead of just saying, 'Hey I wanted to film it in Mississippi.' It would seem like it was a hometown boy just wanting to be home.

There is one thing the photograph must contain, the humanity of the moment. This kind of photography is realism. But realism is not enough - there has to be vision, and the two together can make a good photograph.

I've stopped worrying about whether people think what I do is any good. I've taken stick in the past, and I've genuinely worried and got incredibly upset.

I'm always trying to find something unique or a project that I can do something unique in. When the director has a vision for a piece that I've never heard before, and they can back that up with visuals and they talk a good game, I get really interested in the world that they're trying to create.

I'm not an art director; I'm just not. I've always been somebody who has a sensibility that I hope is the same sensibility of others.

My first impression when I made it through was 'Good, because I'm going to prove to you that I deserve to be here', because they told me that sometimes I lack confidence in my performance and sometimes I'm not as consistent as they'd like me to be.

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

I think that short films often contain an originality, a creative freedom, an energy and an invention that is inspiring and entertaining. I think they are, as Shakespeare put it, a good deed in a naughty world.

I'm sure a lot of people don't take me seriously.

Growing up in the entertainment industry, I've had a lot of people tell me I'm not good enough.

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.

I want to direct but I think I'd be bloody awful and I don't want to produce but I think I'd be a very good producer because if I believed in something I'd be able to protect it.

Sometimes I have given my husband a manuscript to read that has turned out to have fantastic rave reviews and he'll tell me it is no good. Well, if I didn't know him as well as I know him I would be terribly depressed.

I can use movie as a language. Not only could it send a good message, I could let people know about my thinking and how I see the world, how I see the colour, how I see the music, how I see everything.

I started writing songs, I guess, when I was about 13 or 14, but I didn't know if they were good enough yet or anything.