The story behind the image.
The Lover.
In response to a comment made by Jamie on the Youtube page, I thought I would share the story behind the image “The Lover”. This image was created in May 2015 in Durham in the UK with model Zara Watson in Zara’s own house. I had arranged to pay Zara a visit as her house was a converted old chapel and a beautiful location to shoot in. I had been sent several images before my trip North by Zara so I had an idea of what to expect.
As with most locations they offer up unexpected angles when you start to look around when you’re there and can see with your own eyes. This angle was the stairwell to the master bedroom and was right in the centre of the room giving access to look down for all four sides. It also offered great symmetry so was very appealing, as you can imagine, to me.
We had been working on various storylines throughout the shoot and this one popped into my head as to being caught by your lover as many people often are in life. I instantly dismissed the obvious thought of it being a man and added the extra intrigue of putting another woman in the shot. This would add the mystery of who actually was the lover.
Setting up the camera was tricky as it meant it was hanging over the edge of the bannister rail and this is always a worry as if it should fall it could not only land on Zara but it wouldn’t bounce very well. I use an old Brenbo tripod that used to belong to my father but is still very sturdy and has an arm allowing it to be set up in these kinds of situations. Attached to that is a Manfrotto ball and socket head which is also more than capable of supporting the camera I was using, which was a Canon 1DX at the time. 
Lighting had to be added as the stairwell was dark by photographic measures, and as with all my lighting, I wanted it to look believable and as is so to speak. I set up a strobe light in the hallway outside the door and bounced it off the wall and this light just had a reflector dish fitted as I didn’t need a light modifier with the wall being white, this gave me a nice natural look. It was triggered remotely from a unit fitted to the camera hot shoe and also allowed me to change the power and not have to keep running up and down the stairs.
Next came posing Zara, this was fun as asking someone to look like they had just fallen downstairs made for some great remarks being exchanged. Zara was a star and pulled it off perfectly as always. When you work with a model who is on the same hymn sheet it’s always easier and Zara and I have worked together several times and the shoots and ideas always flow and produce results for us both.
Next came the feet in the image and you might be surprised how many people do not notice them until they are pointed out. Again this is something I strive for in my work as it’s not always the obvious focal point that tells the story. The feet also belonged to Zara and it was my intention to join the two images together in post and this is why it was important to get the camera position fixed as it makes it so much easier afterwards.
The camera settings were 1/400, F3.2 and the iso was 640. The lens fitted was the 17-35mm F2.8L from Canon.
The image was then imported into Adobe Lightroom normalised exported to Photoshop for the images to be joined together and then back to Lightroom for the black and white conversion.