The number of social media platforms has mushroomed since and I really can’t be bothered to maintain them all — I’d rather be out shooting!

Staying closer to home

Tony: You did a few early trips to overseas events, but then stopped those and focused on doing shoots based around UK studios and locations plus a few UK events. What brought about the change in your modus operandi?

Andy: I rapidly got tired of event shoots that used flash at short range because they all ended up looking like something from a photo booth, and the same as everyone else’s. I wanted to do something different.

If you look at my shots from the 2004 Rubber Ball, for example, they were shot from the front of the circle with a long lens using only stage lighting. Everyone else was sat at the front of the stage using flash.

In the end I decided I preferred a more organised and controlled approach and that was just easier to organise in the UK. I won’t deny that work pressures were a factor too.

The only way I could get a studio level of quality and control for events was to bring the studio to the events. I grabbed models walking around or as soon as they came off the runway and shot them in my portable studio. That approach worked very successfully for assorted Xpos, Passion, and now, of course, Le Boutique Bazaar.

Early use of high-end kit

Tony: In 2007 you covered The Fetishistas-sponsored fashion shows for the first Barbican Xpo, with live show photography and a studio where you produced some amazing-quality images that set the bar very high. Even then, you were shooting with a top-of-the-range Canon — kit beyond the budgets of most fetish ’togs — which offered a technical advantage but also came with a weight penalty.

Andy: I shot the Xpo with a Canon EOS 1Ds MkII — I’ve just checked the EXIFs [camera data]! My ‘proper job’ is a two-edged sword, providing a useful income but taking up far too much of my time and brainpower in return.

I distinctly remember buying that 1Ds body at Jessops in Leicester. My company had a discount arrangement with Jessops which resulted in a substantial reduction in price.  They weren’t very happy but agreed in the end. I’ve never really worried about the weight and it’s easier to hand-hold something with a bit of inertia behind it.

Tony: How did your equipment set-up evolve? You were one of the first people I worked with who shot with the camera connected to a laptop. Later, you added medium format to your capabilities. And you carted your portable studio around in a Mini rather than a 4×4.

Andy: The Mini did have a trailer for larger jobs such as the Xpo, though!

In my teens I’d shot film with an Olympus OM-1/OM-2 but also strayed into medium format with a Pentacon 6TL. Once DSLRs reached a sensible price I looked around to see what was available. Olympus seemed stuck in a point-and-shoot mindset and the only firm offering full frame DSLRs was Canon, so that’s where I went and have stayed ever since.

I’ve been through a couple of versions of the 1Ds and 5D and I’m currently using a 5DsR as my main camera.

I came into an inheritance several years back and decided to try medium format again, so bought a reconditioned Phase One P30 digital back which I twinned with a Hasselblad 553ELX body and lenses from eBay.  In those days you could buy the body and three or four lenses for less than £1,000 total, as nobody wanted them.

As for tethering (the camera, not the model!), it’s the only way to go if you really want to see what you’ve shot. Sometimes it can be a bit of a faff to carry around and set up, but if it gets rid of the ‘if only I’d noticed that at the time’ moment just once, it’s worth it.

A Gothic mystery: the missing year

Tony: Your Gothic Image relaunch site has a gallery for every year between 2003 and 2020, except for 2013. What happened that year?

Andy: As I said earlier, my ‘proper job’ can be a bit of a two-edged sword. Between 2012 and 2014 things got very silly and I just didn’t have time to plan and execute shoots the way I wanted to, so I slowed down and eventually stopped. Nowadays I’m semi-retired and only working three days a week, so things have picked up again with a vengeance.