Welcome to Lens Quotes, where the power of words meets the clarity of vision. From renowned photographers to insightful philosophers, the lens has often been a metaphor for understanding the world around us. Whether capturing a fleeting moment or offering a new perspective, quotes about lenses transcend mere optics to explore themes of perception, insight, and reflection.
In this curated collection, we delve into the profound insights and musings that revolve around the lens. These quotes illuminate the ways in which we perceive the world, both literally and metaphorically, through the lens of our experiences, beliefs, and emotions. As you journey through these words, you’ll discover how the lens serves as a symbol for understanding, interpretation, and introspection, inviting us to contemplate the nuances of our existence.
Below, you’ll find a selection of quotes that encapsulate the essence of the lens in all its metaphorical richness. Feel free to explore, reflect, and perhaps even be inspired to view the world through a different lens.
Medicine may be the lens through which I see the world, but since I think of medicine as ‘life +’, a place where life is exaggerated and seen at its most vital and poignant, I’ll be writing about life more than I will be writing about medicine. Abraham Verghese
You have to kind of be invisible when you photograph children, so you use a longer lens. David Bailey
Memory is often – perhaps usually – a distorting lens: what we think we remember isn’t the way it was at all. It’s what we’d like to remember. Graydon Carter
The lens is the actor’s best critic… showing his mind more clearly than on the stage. You can get wonderful cooperation out of the lens if you are true, but God help you if you are not. Sydney Greenstreet
Be sure to take the lens cap off before photographing. Elliott Erwitt
My first experience with film was through a still camera. I would sit, very much against my will, with my father in the game reserve, watching some elephant or rhino or whatever, through a 400 millimeter lens and wait, and waiting and waiting. Gavin Hood
I was born in Jamaica but was educated by, and now serve, prestigious First World institutions, so I believe that I have a unique, dual perspective. To sidestep any biases I might have, I use the objective lens of the stock market to discover which policies actually delivered prosperity to emerging markets. Peter Blair Henry
In the winter of 2012, as my fiftieth birthday approached, I began to write what turned into my autobiography, a look at my own life through the lens of food. Kate Christensen
Food is a lens for culture. Dana Goodyear
I think I am a religious person just by nature. I think I sort of view everything through the lens of some inner undying thing in people that drives them to act as they do or to feel ashamed of not acting in some other way. John Darnielle
Every generation looks at literature through the lens of their own experience, but with the Bible, everyone gets apprehensive and thinks it’ll be too stuffy. Walter Kirn
I actually think acting is a form of self-hypnosis. You have to be hyper, hyper aware of what’s going on around you. You have to know where the lens is, what the shot is, and where you’re moving. And then you have to trick yourself into an emotional state where you believe this stuff is actually happening. Julianne Moore
When I can see things through the lens of the director, it’s like being able to see the whole puzzle – it’s not just about my role, but the whole script. Justin Baldoni
There was something about Marilyn. She couldn’t act her way out of a bag, but she became an icon because something happened between her and the lens, and no one knows what it is. Richard Widmark
Normally, when someone we love is turning away from a struggle, we self-protect by also turning away. That’s definitely my first response. I think change is more likely to happen if both partners have common language and a shared lens to see problems. Brene Brown
Having a strong race lens means you understand racism is threaded through and institutionalized in all of our systems and our very perceptions, threaded through how someone looks at you, treats you, thinks about you and your potential. Pramila Jayapal
Look and think before opening the shutter. The heart and mind are the true lens of the camera. Yousuf Karsh
It’s important to choose initial investors who are not twitchy and rushing for an exit. Wall Street’s quarter-by-quarter lens may make the CEO make sub-optimal long-term decisions. Roelof Botha
I know there’s an impression that I’m someone who seeks to have violent confrontations with people. I don’t. Do I regret screaming at some guy who practically clipped my kid in the head with the lens of a camera? Yeah, I probably do, because it’s only caused me problems. Alec Baldwin
I use femaleness as another lens, so I don’t even think all my creatures are women; I just think that I bring out the femaleness in them. Wangechi Mutu
The music industry is an interesting lens through which to look at change, because it has had such a difficult time adjusting to the digital age. Jennifer Egan
I see the world from the perspective of a 5’8 person, not someone who is 6’4. so naturally, I’m going to choose certain lens heights over and again… Sometimes nature makes choices for you. Michael Mann
There isn’t really anybody who occupies the lens to the extent that Lindsay Lohan does. Something happens when she steps in front of the camera. There is this magnetic energy. Richard Phillips
The concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR) has long been used as an effective lens through which to examine the actions business can take toward ensuring mutual long-term well-being and sustainability. Klaus Schwab
Whenever I arrive on a real location, I have to move around and work out what the best angles are going to be. When I was moving around with the lens, I discovered things that the naked eye would not have. Pedro Almodovar
When we look at history, we see history is made up of the heroes of their times. Yet, somehow we miss this when we put on the lens of the Scriptures. Erwin McManus
Paradigms are like glasses. When you have incomplete paradigms about yourself or life in general, it’s like wearing glasses with the wrong prescription. That lens affects how you see everything else. Sean Covey
If you see everything through the lens, you are constantly composing pictures. I think in pictures; I don’t think in text. Alison Jackson
Warhol was the ultimate voyeur, constantly observing people through the lens. He watched and listened, but did not participate. Behind the camera, Warhol was in control. Alison Jackson
Judaism is my life. Everything I do is through the lens of Torah. Matisyahu
Make no mistake: Tackling climate change is vital. But to see everything through the lens of short-term CO2 reductions, letting our obsession with carbon blind us to the bigger picture, is to court catastrophe. Alex Steffen
In everything I do, the aesthetics are driven by the emotion. However I can do that with a camera, whether it’s a long lens or a wide lens, I’ll do. Reed Morano
My lens of choice was always the 35 mm. It was more environmental. You can’t come in closer with the 35 mm. Annie Leibovitz
If a photographer cares about the people before the lens and is compassionate, much is given. Eve Arnold
Drama is drama, and it’s really… if it’s something small, you put a magnifying glass up to it; if it’s something big, you use a wide lens. Gore Verbinski
My lab and academic work fill my day from about 9 am to 7 p.m. Then I zoom out the lens to work on my other writing. David Eagleman
All the things worth writing about are outside me. I’m a lens, not a source. And even if it’s not always a comfortable journey, it’s always a stimulating one. Karen Traviss
It’s like that with what sort of ideas people outside of the band have of HIM. They all see it through a different lens as well which is beautiful. Hopefully, it makes it an endless topic of conversation. Ville Valo
Cinematography is so much about instinct and intuition – you want the same range of experience going into behind the camera as what you see in front of it. Your life experience will come through the lens. Rachel Morrison
I don’t remember the first picture I took, but I actually found a picture of myself on a trip back to my old family home in Malaysia. I’m five years old, sitting on the floor with the family camera in my hand. It was a film camera – not a DSLR – with a fixed lens and a nice manual zoom. Ren Ng
Just as theater has to be where people live, actors have to go out in the marketplace – not be cut off by a lens. Either an artist grows or he stagnates. Ralph Waite
I think that any woman who had a conversation with me and had an opportunity to truly understand my life story wouldn’t view it through a critical lens. There are people, of course, in the world of politics, who look for things to be critical about. But those people are already against you. Wendy Davis
I have a simple rule: when I’m on TV, I’m not talking to just my anchor or my colleague on my right. I’m talking to America. I look into the lens, and in my head, I’m talking to somebody in Nebraska. Why Nebraska? Why the Cornhusker State? I have no idea. But it feels like it’s a good place to talk to people. Donna Brazile
Being behind the lens gives me a completely different perspective, and because of my blog, I get to do projects and attend shows lending me another angle. Hanneli Mustaparta
Just one step. Just one mile. Just one dollar. Just one kiss. Just one person. When we look at life through the lens of ‘one,’ everything becomes that much more attainable. Mick Ebeling
Commanded by God dozens of times in the Hebrew Bible to remember their past, Jews historically obeyed not by recording events but by ritually re-enacting them: by understanding the present through the lens of the past. Dara Horn
They say a lot of women would like to see me naked, but there’s not a lens long enough for that. Andy Garcia
Having a range of perspectives allows you to tell stories through a different lens and approach things from fresh angles. If you’re straining everything through the same filter, you’re always going to wind up with the same product. Nahnatchka Khan
Music is a lens through which to see who we are. Every phrase of every piece of music is trying to tell a story. Charles Hazlewood
I’ve been lucky to travel and work all over the world through the lens of the back of the house, and I love that monocle. I love that lens, because it’s real people. Marcus Samuelsson
In Ethiopia, food is often looked at through a strong spiritual lens, stronger than anywhere else I know. It’s the focal point of weddings, births and funerals and is a daily ceremony from the preparation of the meal and the washing of hands to the sharing of meals. Marcus Samuelsson
I always knew I belonged on the other side of the lens. Kathy Ireland
In every generation and in every intellectual sphere and in every political moment, there have been African American women who have articulated the need to think and talk about race through a lens that looks at gender or think and talk about feminism through a lens that looks at race. Kimberle Williams Crenshaw
I was bullied in high school, and it’s interesting coming from the other side of the camera lens, finding out that all of these people that I thought were my antagonists in my life were probably just as insecure as I was at that age. Dacre Montgomery
Public education must be viewed from the lens of providing each child with the learning environment that best meets his or her needs. If we can send a low-income child to a parochial school, knowing that his odds of attending college will increase as a result, then that should be our mission. Jeb Bush
I’m very lucky that I’m not a photographer for hire – people hire me for me. I go into every commercial work with an art focus, with that lens; every brand I’ve worked for just lets me do whatever I want to do. I have full creative freedom. Petra Collins
Examine our every action through the lens of how we would feel if it were to become front page news. John Mackey
I feel every shot, every camera move, every frame, and the way you frame something and the choice of lens, I see all those things are really important on every shot. Roger Deakins
Everything at Apple can be best understood through the lens of designing. Whether it’s designing the look and feel of the user experience, or the industrial design, or the system design, and even things like how the boards were laid out. John Sculley
I was in Boots buying contact lens solution, and my mobile went off. It was Jay-Z’s partner at Roc Nation asking me what I was up to. He asked if I’d been to America, and I said, ‘No.’ Then he said, ‘I’m putting you on a flight to New York tomorrow.’ Rita Ora
It was an idea we had when Al was in the Senate – to organize and moderate an annual conference that would look at government policy through the lens of the family to help identify ways that the family can be supported and strengthened. Tipper Gore
We have been indoctrinated to see the world through a politically correct lens. Charlie Kirk
I think it’s gonna take a sincere empathy and compassion for people of all races, to really reflect and process on the true history of the black community in this country. The history has been filled with incredible oppression and we really have to acknowledge that, to start to change the lens of how we see true equality. Erik Spoelstra
Design accelerates the adoption of new ideas. And many of these ideas are important for designers to show that there is a way. When you see things through that lens, you realize it applies to any industry and any form of design. Yves Behar
I am not a scientist. I have never analyzed the far reaches of the solar system through the lens of a telescope nor scrutinized cancer cells under a microscope. Gordon Gee
‘Paris Is Burning’ was only just a glimpse into what was happening within the ballroom scene. The difference is that ‘Pose’ is opening the lens a little bit more, and it’s diving into the personal lives of these women who fought for their kids – who raised their kids to be strong individuals so that they can move on and have a legacy, too. Mj Rodriguez
I don’t know how to have a normal relationship because I try to act normal and love from a normal place and live a normal life, but there is sort of an abnormal magnifying glass, like telescope lens, on everything that happens. Taylor Swift
So often when we historicize material, we use this big wide-angle lens. Jonathan Evison
I don’t know one lens from another. That’s not my job. It’s the cinematographer’s job. But I can talk to people. Penny Marshall
That music and the lyrical aspects of Razorblade Romance is so personal to me that, now with me being grown up a bit and meeting new people and doing new things, it makes me look at the same things I was writing about back in the day through a different colored lens. Ville Valo
We see the world through the lens of all our experiences; that is a fundamental part of the human condition. Madeleine M. Kunin
I think one of the greatest joys I have now in my career and in my profession is to be playing at an age where I can appreciate it more than I used to… It’s a whole different lens you look through the older you get. Andre Agassi
From the first moment I handled my lens with a tender ardour. Julia Margaret Cameron
People believe that art and science are two distinct realms. It is far from the truth because, if you look at science from a microscope or from a different lens, you can see the beauty in science. It is very artistic. Kiran Mazumdar-Shaw
When you’re used to looking through a stills lens and you have to capture an emotional moment, and that picture is not moving and yet it has to have impact, I think that’s the first influence on my style. Gavin Hood
We all have mental models: the lens through which we see the world that drive our responses to everything we experience. Being aware of your mental models is key to being objective. Elizabeth Thornton
I see everything through a spiritual lens. Katy Perry
When I hung out with my Uncle Chris, things got real. He was fun, talkative, and loud. He was the life of the party and a magnet for mischief. Since he saw the world through a gangsta’s lens, he wanted me to become tough and aggressive. Lecrae
People say I have a distorted lens. I think I see things as they really are. Nikki Sixx
There can be no better grounding for a lifetime as an author than to see humanity in all its various guises through the lens of the reporter for the town. Terry Pratchett
I’m an ER doctor, period. I look at a problem with a certain lens: very action-oriented, very results-oriented. Raul Ruiz
A screenplay is really an instruction manual, and it can be interpreted in any number of ways. The casting, the choice of location, the costumes and make-up, the actors’ reading of a line or emphasis of a word, the choice of lens and the pace of the cutting – these are all part of the translation. David Nicholls
If you don’t have a lens that’s been trained to look at how various forms of discrimination come together, you’re unlikely to develop a set of policies that will be as inclusive as they need to be. Kimberle Williams Crenshaw
It is good to be in front of the lens to appreciate more being behind the lens. Carine Roitfeld
I believe the poet shouldn’t be in the poem at all except as a lens or as ears. Alice Oswald
A whopping 89 percent of buyers start their home search online. How your house looks online is the modern equivalent of ‘curb appeal.’ Rent a wide-angle lens and good lighting, get rid of your clutter and post at least eight great photos to win the beauty contest. Barbara Corcoran
I always wanted to know what lens they were on, how close they were. I didn’t do it with a plan in mind, but I would instinctively gear what I was doing toward what lenses they were using. Donna Mills
For a long time in my adolescence, comedy was the only tool I had for communication and dealing with the world and dealing with people – I didn’t know any other lens in which to do it. Raphael Bob-Waksberg
I was apprehensive. I feared every time I talked about poetry, it would be filtered through the lens of race, sex, and age. Rita Dove
I think that lens flares can work really well under certain circumstances. Personally, I am trying to get rid of them most of the time. I don’t like artifacts that draw attention to the surface of the image. Roger Deakins
Often as a poet I find that I am somewhat outside an experience I want to hold onto, consciously taking mental notes or writing them down in my journal – for fear that I will forget. It’s not unlike being on a trip and taking pictures, your face behind a camera the whole time – the entire experience mediated by a lens. Natasha Trethewey
Contemporary paganism gives me a subjective lens through which the world in which I live can be interpreted on an aesthetic and an ethical basis. I’m interested in narrative, myth, and story, in folklore and the way we connect to the turning of the seasons and the natural world. Liz Williams
I had a really good time working with Jim Cameron. A lot of people didn’t, but I did as I got on with him really quite well. For a director who spends most of his time looking down a lens or in the digitisation studio or working out some graphics, he is actually very good with actors. Bernard Hill
I’ve always had the utmost respect and awe of what the lens can do and what a director can do with just a camera move. Matthew Gray Gubler
When I’m meditating on an idea, I try to let the idea completely saturate me to the point where I feel like I’m covering myself in it or totally immersing myself in it, so that everywhere I’m looking, everywhere I’m going, it’s through the lens of that idea. And that’s sort of what I do with the music – I try to lose myself in it. Matisyahu
There is a mystique about psychiatry that people think that you have some kind of a magical lens, you know, Superman’s X-ray vision into the soul. One of the reasons I left psychiatry is that I didn’t believe that. Charles Krauthammer
It wasn’t until my girlfriend, photographer Jennifer Rovero, took hundreds of pictures of me as I recovered from my amputations that things started to change. The process was a sort of therapy for me, which Jennifer coined as ‘photo therapy.’ I grew to see the beauty and strength in myself and my journey through the lens of her camera. Lauren Wasser
In general, I get nervous when I do print interviews because I know that whatever I say is going to be shown through the lens of whomever I’m talking to. Emma Stone
Independent documentary isn’t beholden to some of the interests that the mainstream media are influenced by. It’s a pathway to renegade, independent reporting in an in-depth, investigative fashion, and it can do so with a compassionate lens; it allows people to speak in a way that is more human than the mainstream media approach. Josh Fox
For me, having played the game of football, I look at it through a much different lens. I don’t look at it from a fan’s perspective. I’m always trying to analyze and critique things when I’m watching sporting events. That’s why I never have the sound on. Shannon Sharpe
