It always feels freeing to set aside the laptop and apps for a few minutes, grab a pencil, and sketch out an idea or a layout in a notebook. Which is usually where I start when I'm looking for a new concept. There's something about the speed and low-fi nature of the process that stops you thinking in terms of pleasing aesthetics, and allows you simply to concentrate on the idea and quickly generate different versions. Nor are you worried about boring concerns like practicality. Which can make life interesting later on when you realise you have to actually figure out how to make it happen. A great picture editor and prop team are priceless.
Cover and feature portraits of Paul Merton and Ian Hislop for Have I Got News For You, which played on their onscreen rivalry and friendship, and subverted their perceived class divide. The image was shot without the signage graphics and newspaper copy, which were added afterwards. Which is probably how we got away with those headlines. Photographer: Sven Arnstein
Concept generation / shoot planning / art direction / prop design / reprographics
The cast of high school comedy Sex Education didn't need much encouragement to throw themselves into an unruly makeshift classroom. I picked the furniture out of a catalogue, sketched a few set-ups, and trusted we could make it work on the day. The biggest challenge was creating the interactions when shooting everyone individually – with one person shot on a different day in a different studio. Photography: Richard Grassie. Prop Styling: Propped Up
visual concept / photoshoot / art direction / typography / layout
On the green benches with female journalists who cover politics in Westminster. The concept needed to be particularly flexible to accommodate the fact that, even as we began to shoot, we didn't know how many people we were going to turn up as people's availability was subject to the all-too-fast-moving news cycle. Photography: Mark Harrison
visual concept / art direction / typography / layout
State surveillance drama The Capture, starring Holliday Grainger, depicted a world of near-total observation. This unsettling image aimed to convey the invasiveness and sense of claustrophobia of constant scrutiny, both within the show and in the nature of celebrity. Photography: Mark Harrison; Prop Styling: Propped Up
Concept generation / shoot planning / art direction / reprographics
Striking, certainly. But I'm still not quite sure whether or not this surreal image of Cusho Jumbo – shot for her Britbox drama The Beast Must Die – worked. The idea, in keeping with the show, was that the faces we present to the world are but masks of our true selves. Some readers could be forgiven for thinking we'd decapitated her, though. Photographer: Vincent Dolman
Concept generation / shoot planning / art direction
Feature for Bob Mortimer and Paul Whitehouse's Gone Fishing Christmas special. With strict social distancing in place at the time which meant that Paul and Bob weren't allowed anywhere near each other, the fishing rod proved a fortuitous prop for sharing festive presents. Photography: Adam Lawrence. Set Styling: Propped Up
photoshoot / art direction / typography / layout
Whether it's planning a new cover shot in under ten minutes on the set of Peaky Blinders or turning up at Michael Caine's place and asking to requisition the underground car park because the area you've been allocated isn't working, shooting on location always requires thinking on your feet and more than a little improvisation. With little opportunity to pre-plan, getting the right shot can involve quick recce's and developing ideas as you go. And if you're in the middle of a pandemic it can mean the art director doubling up as photographer's assistant, which is never good for anyone.
A series of portraits of Tom Burke and Holliday Grainger shot on the set of Strike for the premiere of the adaptation of JK Rowling's detective series. Photographer: Richard Grassie
location recce / on-site shot planning / art direction
Inspired by my love of the atmospheric tableaus of American photographer Gregory Crewdson, these scenes – shot for a feature on ITV drama Cheat – hold an ominous tension between stars Tom Goodman-Hill and Katherine Kelly. With the window being soundproofed art direction had to relayed via a series of people down halls and around corners. Photographer: Jonathan Ford
Concept generation / location recce / art direction / reprographics
Shot on a freezing November's night, with passing tourists applauding what they believed was a wedding party. Strictly's Ed Balls and Katya Jones were hardy pro's, dancing time and again to stave off the cold and give us the opportunity to shoot multiple different exposures in order to comp together a glowing vista. Photographer: Ian Derry
A dream job, to photograph Michael Caine at home. We turned up, though, to find that the space we'd been allocated to shoot – the lobby to the building – looked like something out of a White Company catalogue and didn't quite have the ambiance we were looking for. It took a bit of negotiating with security for them to allow us to take over the underground car park. Photographer: Richard Grassie
Each year, to mark the Oliver Awards we have worked with the organisers to shoot a series of portraits which captures some of those up for awards in intimate settings on stage and behind the scenes. Photographers: Richard Grassie, Mark Harrison
Over time I've figured out that half the job of art directing a portrait shoot is working out how much actual directing will get the best out of a subject. Some people like strong, specific direction, others need someone to act as a distraction if they're uncomfortable in front of the camera. And sometimes it's best to take a backseat behind the laptop and let someone's rapport with a photographer unfold in unexpected ways.
A collaboration with BAFTA ahead of their 2022 awards season. With television enjoying a golden age and now legitimately competing with the big screen for stars and stories, I wanted this celebration of contemporary talent to appear as if they'd walked right out of the classical Hollywood era. Photography: Rachell Smith; Prop Styling: Propped Up
My first celebrity photoshoot. I had no real idea what I was doing and pretty-much winged it from start to finish with help of a great photographer. But I did manage to get this piercing one-eyed shot. Photographer: Ian Derry
art direction
Shooting a portrait of James May for his show Toy Stories provided a challenge, considering the toys in question –model trains – were a lot smaller and more intricate than he is. This forced-perspective shot, using a translucent table lit from below, proved a good solution. Photographer: Mark Harrison
shoot planning / art direction
Larger than life funny man David Walliams caught in a rare moment of sombre reflection. Photographer: Ian Derry
The lighting design for these three portraits – of Sofie Gråbøl, Lars Mikkelsen and Birgitte Hjort Sørensen – captured the tense atmospheres of their extremely popular scandi-noir shows. It was also a simple idea that could be easily replicated as each person was shot separately at different times and locations. Photographer: Mark Harrison
Shooting multiple people requires coming up with answers to a lot of questions. How to place people so that they appear evenly distributed while at the same time naturally arranged (and not in the gutter)? How to make it feel like they're all involved in a single moment when everyone's arriving, and thus being shot, separately? How to manage the demands of multiple agents and PR's? The approach I favour is to give yourself as many options as possible on the day, and let the real work begin in fitting together the jigsaw in post.
An ensemble shot of fourteen of the brightest new talents on television and radio. Shooting such a large group, individually or in pairs across a long day, required a meticulous plan in order to construct the finished image. Photographer: Sven Arnstein
location recce / shoot planning / art direction
The Strictly Come Dancing class of 2016, shot for a 'half-term report' for feature mid-series. It's amazing how little encourage it takes to bring out someone's inner child when you hand them a blazer and a few props. Photographer: Nicky Johnston
Having to work with a light set-up, this group shot, of BBC Young Musician of the Year winner, Sheku Kennah-Mason, and is his siblings, was captured in-camera at the Royal Academy of Music with mostly natural light. Photographer: Richard Ansett
