I was born in 1961 and for as long as I can remember, I have followed David Bailey’s work. He has been a huge influence on me – the way that I shoot, the way I expose my shots and some might argue – the way that I am! The photograph in this post is a self portrait that David Bailey did and I have never published a photograph on my web site belonging to someone else. So, if I am told to remove it, I will do so immediately out of respect to (in my humble opinion) the greatest photographer of all time. He has a potty mouth and that suits me just fine.

He is a source of many fantastic photography and life quotes. Many photographers “play” with light but I always thought that Bailey “plays” with “dark”. Throughout his career he has made fantastic use of shadows and I in turn have always been influenced by that. I get that it isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but it works for me. I have never met Bailey and in many ways, I hope that I don’t, but it would be an honour to meet this icon of my industry.

“It takes a lot of imagination to be a good photographer. You need less imagination to be a painter because you can invent things. But in photography everything is so ordinary; it takes a lot of looking before you learn to see the extraordinary.” ~ David Bailey

“Anybody can be a great photographer if they zoom in enough on what they love” ~ David Bailey

“Being Trendy is dangerous. I’ve never been trendy, which is why I’ve never really fallen out of favour.” ~ David Bailey

“I was surrounded by strong women, so it had never occurred to me that women were anything other than equal to men.” ~ David Bailey

“I always go for simplicity” ~ David Bailey