Neil was greatly influenced by other great sport magazines like Times and Sports Illustrated. He also looked up to other great photographers. "I looked at Life Magazine every week, I looked at Look Magazine every two weeks, and I began looking at Sports Illustrated when I got keen on sports photography. All my heroes were the photographers that I hoped to someday be as good as. Hy Peskin, Marvin Newman, John Zimmerman, George Silk, Mark Kaufman. They were really my five heroes. Each one of them had something that was a bit different." He always wanted to be a photographer, when he was in school he took a photo workshop class his teacher was a big impact on his life. "They had a photo workshop that was run by a wonderful woman named Nelly Peissachowitz, who really had that ability that good teachers have to excite young people. Her influence sure worked with me and was a major factor in my choice of making a career out of photography."

When Neil was just at the the start of his early career he was only taking pictures for he worked for time magazine to be a staff photographer at Sports Illustrated.

In his later career Neil became one of the best sports photographer in history, he is also an book author, and is also a little film maker too.

Neil Leifer is famous for being one of the greatest sports photographers ever, and for his famous photos including his pictures of the great muhammad ali. He also won the Outstanding Sports Documentary in 2002.