Lambertz Goddess Calendar fashion photography campaign photographed by James Nader across Europe

THE PROJECT

Commissioned by Lambertz (Germany) to photograph its prestigious annual fine-art calendar — a major European publication widely regarded in the same territory as the Pirelli Calendar.

The Goddess Tour became a series of twenty individual photographic artworks inspired by the goddesses of Europe, bringing together fashion photography, celebrity portraiture, creative direction and photographic compositing.

Produced across twelve European countries with a twenty-seven-person international team, the assignment combined mythology, location photography, dramatic lighting and extensive Photoshop post-production within one coherent visual world.

CLIENT Lambertz (Germany)

PROJECT The Goddess Fine-Art Calendar

LOCATION 12+ European Countries

DURATION 29 Days

DELIVERABLES 20 Finished Artworks

PRODUCTION 27-Person International Team

MY ROLE Photographer / Creative Director

Lambertz Goddess Calendar — European Fine-Art Photography

The Goddess Tour — Twenty Pieces of Fine-Art Photography Across Europe

The Lambertz Calendar had already established itself as one of Europe’s major prestige calendars, widely regarded as a serious alternative to Pirelli. When I was commissioned to photograph it, the assignment was not to produce a conventional promotional calendar. It was to create twenty individual pieces of photographic art.

The word calendar can be misleading. This was far removed from the old idea of a promotional calendar designed simply for a garage or workshop wall. Lambertz had developed the calendar as a collectable fine-art publication, intended to be displayed on walls across Europe.

That meant each photograph had to function in two ways. It had to work independently as an artwork, but it also had to belong to a complete visual series.

The production eventually involved twenty-seven people travelling through twelve European countries. The women photographed included Miss Germany, a winner of Germany’s Next Topmodel, Dita Von Teese and internationally recognised supermodel Petra Němcová.

For me, however, the attraction was not simply the scale of the international fashion photography production or the calibre of the people involved. What interested me was the opportunity to create something that pushed beyond conventional fashion photography and into a more cinematic, conceptual and constructed visual world.

The calendar was the format. The photograph still had to stand alone as a piece of art. James Nader

The Concept

The Goddesses of Europe

Each woman represented a goddess or mythological figure drawn from European culture. That provided the creative thread running through the entire Lambertz Goddess Calendar.

The individual photographs could be dramatically different in location, styling, subject and atmosphere, but the finished calendar still had to feel as though every image belonged to the same visual world.

There was no conventional photographic brief containing twenty finished layouts for me to reproduce. The process demanded interpretation.

I worked alongside the co-producer responsible for the Photoshop compositing and final image construction, which meant I had to approach every location with the finished artwork already forming in my mind.

I wanted the photographs to feel dark, theatrical, cinematic and elemental. The mythology supplied the narrative, but the photography itself still needed enough reality to make those constructed worlds believable.

Each photograph had to begin as a believable photograph before it could become a believable piece of photographic art.

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Creative Direction & Photographic Compositing

Photographing Towards an Image That Did Not Yet Exist

Working towards a finished composite changes the way you make the original photograph. I could not simply judge each frame by what appeared through the camera. I had to think about what that photograph was eventually going to become.

Where should the woman sit within the finished composition? Which direction did the light need to travel? How much negative space would be required? Which elements had to be captured on location, and which could be developed later through Photoshop compositing and post-production?

Perspective, scale, light direction and atmosphere all had to be considered at the point of capture. A convincing composite depends on those relationships already making sense before the image construction begins.

This was one of the most demanding parts of the Lambertz Goddess Calendar and also one of the reasons the project interested me so much. Photography and post-production were not separate disciplines. They were different stages of the same creative process.

Photoshop could extend the visual world, but it could not manufacture the emotional quality of a photograph that had never been there in the first place.

The Visual Language

Somewhere Between Photography and Mythology

The balance between photography and image construction was critical. Push the image too little and it risked becoming conventional fashion photography. Push it too far and it could lose its photographic credibility and begin to feel more like illustration.

I wanted the real woman, the real environment and believable light to remain at the centre of each picture. The compositing could then extend that foundation into a more mythological world.

That meant the atmosphere had to exist in the original photograph. The relationship between subject and location had to be believable. The lighting had to already suggest the world that would eventually be constructed around it.

The intention was never to demonstrate Photoshop technique. The finished image had to feel complete enough that the viewer stopped thinking about how it had been assembled.

In high-end conceptual fashion photography, the technique should disappear into the idea.

I wasn’t simply photographing what was in front of me. I was photographing towards an image that did not fully exist yet. James Nader

International Photography Production

Twenty-Seven People. Twelve Countries.

The creative challenge was only one part of the assignment. Moving a twenty-seven-person production through twelve European countries turned the Goddess Tour into a substantial piece of international fashion photography production.

Much of the journey was made by road. We travelled from the UK across Europe and eventually down to Pula in Croatia, then drove back across the continent and through the Channel Tunnel before flying to Ibiza for another stage of the production.

Cameras, lighting, wardrobe, models, production equipment and crew all moved with us. Every country brought another set of roads, locations, weather conditions, access considerations and practical limitations.

Every move effectively reset the production.

New country. New location. New conditions.

Yet the finished Lambertz Goddess Calendar could not look like a collection of unrelated location shoots.

The photographs needed variety, but they also needed continuity. What had to remain consistent was the atmosphere and the visual language connecting the entire series.

Everything around the photograph could change. The visual language could not.

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Creative Direction & Photographic Compositing

Photographing Towards an Image That Did Not Yet Exist

Photoshop could extend the visual world, but it could not manufacture the emotional quality of a photograph that had never been there in the first place.

The Visual Language

Somewhere Between Photography and Mythology

I wanted the real woman, the real environment and believable light to remain at the centre of each picture. The compositing could then extend that foundation into a more mythological world.

The intention was never to demonstrate Photoshop technique. The finished image had to feel complete enough that the viewer stopped thinking about how it had been assembled.

In high-end conceptual fashion photography, the technique should disappear into the idea.

I wasn’t simply photographing what was in front of me. I was photographing towards an image that did not fully exist yet. James Nader

International Photography Production

Twenty-Seven People. Twelve Countries.

Every move effectively reset the production.

New country. New location. New conditions.

Yet the finished Lambertz Goddess Calendar could not look like a collection of unrelated location shoots.

The photographs needed variety, but they also needed continuity. What had to remain consistent was the atmosphere and the visual language connecting the entire series.

Everything around the photograph could change. The visual language could not.

fashion-photographer-james-nader-creative-fashion-advertising-photography-james-nader-011

Behind the Production

When Production Reality Starts to Change the Plan

As the Goddess Tour progressed, it became clear that some of the locations the German producer expected us to use had not been properly cleared or permitted.

The assumption was increasingly that we could arrive and make the shoot happen more or less ad hoc. That might occasionally be possible with a photographer, one assistant and one subject. With a twenty-seven-person international production, vehicles, wardrobe, lighting and equipment, it becomes something entirely different.

This is where large-scale location fashion photography stops being only about the camera. Access, permissions, logistics, schedules, weather, safety and the movement of the crew all begin to affect what can actually be created.

The production had to remain adaptable, but I did not want adaptability to turn into randomness. The pictures still had to feel intentional.

Whatever changed behind the scenes, the finished Lambertz Goddess Calendar still had to maintain the same creative standard.

The plan can change. The standard of the photograph cannot. James Nader

Morana — Hintertux, Austria

Establishing the Visual Language in the Mountains

One of the early Goddess photographs was made high at Hintertux in Austria. The altitude, cold and rapidly changing conditions immediately established the kind of production this was going to become.

We were working in the mountains with a substantial crew and only a limited amount of time in which the model could realistically remain exposed to the conditions. The landscape, however, was already providing much of the visual drama.

There was little value in overwhelming the scene with unnecessary lighting or equipment. I kept the photographic approach relatively simple and allowed the cloud, snow, mountain and scale of the location to become part of the picture.

The problem was not simply how to photograph a model in an extraordinary place. It was how to make the woman feel connected to that place.

The goddess could not appear as though she had simply been placed in front of an impressive Alpine landscape. The fashion, the light, the subject and the environment needed to feel as though they belonged together.

That photograph became important because it began to establish the visual language for the series: dark, cinematic, elemental and large in scale, while keeping the woman at the centre of the image.

An extraordinary location is not enough. The subject still has to belong to the photograph.

Skadi — Inside the Hintertux Glacier

When the Location Dictates How You Photograph

The Skadi image took us inside the glacier at Hintertux and introduced an entirely different set of limitations.

Equipment had to be transported through several cable-car stages and then taken down into the ice cave. Inside, the conditions were wet, slippery and close to freezing, with restricted access and difficult movement.

Under those conditions, the idea of an ideal equipment list becomes largely irrelevant.

The more useful question is: what can I safely use here that will still allow me to make the photograph?

The camera and lighting set-up therefore had to become simpler and more practical. The environment was determining the photography rather than the other way around.

Once the model photography was complete, additional areas of the glacier were photographed separately. Those elements could then be incorporated into the final photographic composite during post-production.

The complete artwork did not physically exist while I was photographing the model. But the structure of the finished picture had to be understood before those individual elements were created.

The equipment has to serve the photograph. The photograph should never exist to justify the equipment. James Nader

Extreme Location Photography

Different Conditions. The Same Responsibility.

Morana and Skadi were visually very different photographs, but both depended on the same principle. The environment could dictate the practical decisions, but it could not be allowed to dictate the quality of the finished work.

One location required simplicity because the mountain already contained the drama. The other required simplicity because the glacier physically restricted what could be carried and used.

In both cases, the technical solution came after the more important question: what does this photograph actually need?

Medusa — Dita Von Teese, Ibiza

When the Original Photograph Has to Change

Ibiza brought a different kind of pressure. Dita Von Teese was being photographed as Medusa, combining celebrity portrait photography, conceptual fashion photography and the mythological language of the Lambertz Goddess Calendar.

The conditions were very different from the mountains and glacier. We were working with heat, wind, dust, a horse and a restricted amount of time. There was also an existing visual idea for one of the photographs.

But an idea that looks convincing on paper can change very quickly when a real person, a real animal and a real location are involved.

One proposed set-up involved positioning Dita forward on the horse. She was uncomfortable with the idea and we were working close to a substantial drop.

At that point, the question was no longer how to force the original idea to work. The more important question was whether that particular photograph still made sense at all.

So the idea changed.

That decision may sound obvious afterwards, but commercial productions carry momentum. Money has been committed, people have travelled, schedules are tight and a client can understandably become attached to a particular concept.

Part of the photographer’s responsibility is knowing when the original idea is no longer serving either the subject or the finished image.

A commercial photographer is not there simply to execute instructions. The responsibility is to protect the final photograph.

Sometimes the professional decision is not how to make the planned photograph work. It is recognising when it should change. James Nader

Diana — Petra Němcová, Stonehenge

Seeing the Photograph Before Every Element Exists

The shoot with supermodel Petra Němcová at Stonehenge brought the project back to one of its central creative challenges: making a photograph around something that was not physically there.

Petra was photographed as Diana, holding an imagined moon that would only exist in the finished composite. The final image therefore had to be understood before all of its visual elements were present.

The gesture had to work. Her position within the composition had to work. The direction of the light had to anticipate an object that did not yet exist.

The negative space had to be deliberate, and the relationship between Petra and Stonehenge needed to feel resolved before the final Photoshop compositing began.

Working at Stonehenge also brought its own production requirements, including the permissions and protections associated with English Heritage and the historic site.

Again, the camera was only one part of a much larger process.

Recognition Before Capture

The Picture Has to Exist in the Mind First

Photography is often described as responding to whatever appears in front of the lens. On a project like the Lambertz Goddess Calendar, that was only part of the process.

Some of the most important elements of the finished photographs were not physically present during the original shoot.

I had to recognise the structure of the final image first, then create the individual components that would allow that photograph to exist.

The more that would eventually happen in post-production, the more important the original photographic decisions became.

Light, gesture, scale, perspective, composition and atmosphere all had to be resolved before the composite could succeed.

I believe that photography is less about taking photographs, and more about recognising the photograph that exists before the shutter is pressed. James Nader

From Capture to Finished Artwork

The Original Photograph Was the Foundation

Dita Von Teese and Petra Němcová represented very different photographic problems, but both reinforced the same principle.

With Dita, the original plan had to change because the reality of the subject and location demanded it. With Petra, the image had to be constructed around an element that did not yet exist.

In both cases, the final result depended on making the right decisions before the photograph was complete.

That is where creative direction, celebrity portrait photography, location fashion photography and photographic compositing all became part of the same process.

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From Photography to Finished Artwork

Twenty Images. Twelve Countries. One Visual World.

By the end of the Goddess Tour, we had created twenty individual pieces of photographic art across twelve European countries.

Different women. Different mythological characters. Different landscapes, climates and production problems. Some images depended heavily on location, others on controlled lighting, celebrity portraiture or extensive photographic compositing and Photoshop post-production.

Yet the finished Lambertz Goddess Calendar still had to read as one coherent body of work.

That, for me, was the real measure of whether the project had succeeded.

The viewer did not need to know about the vehicles, cable cars, travel days, weather changes, permissions, difficult locations or production problems. Those things belonged behind the photograph.

What finally appeared on the wall simply had to work as art.

The photograph made on location was not always the finished artwork. It was the foundation from which the artwork was constructed.

Looking Back

What Remains After a Production of This Scale

The numbers naturally form part of the story: twenty-seven people, twelve countries, twenty finished artworks and internationally recognised women including Dita Von Teese and Petra Němcová.

But when I look back at the Lambertz Goddess Calendar now, what interests me most is how little of the difficult part was actually about operating the camera.

The work depended upon interpretation and decision-making.

Knowing when to simplify the lighting. Recognising when a location was giving us something better than the original plan. Understanding when an idea should be changed. Seeing how the final composite could work before all of its elements existed.

The larger the production became, the more important those decisions became.

The camera records decisions already made. James Nader

Behind the scenes of the Lambertz Goddess Calendar European fashion photography production by James Nader

THE DECISION

Across twelve countries, every location presented a different problem. The solution was never to impose the same photographic formula on every image.

The decision was to maintain a consistent visual atmosphere while allowing the location, subject and mythology to determine how each photograph was made.

Build a believable photograph first. Let direction, lighting and post-production complete the mythology.

See the
Final Image

Read the
Location

Build the
Composition

Adapt to
Reality

James Nader | European Fashion Photographer & Creative Director

THE PROJECT

The Goddess Tour — Twenty Pieces of Fine-Art Photography Across Europe

The Goddesses of Europe

Photographing Towards an Image That Did Not Yet Exist

Somewhere Between Photography and Mythology

Twenty-Seven People. Twelve Countries.

Photographing Towards an Image That Did Not Yet Exist

Somewhere Between Photography and Mythology

Twenty-Seven People. Twelve Countries.

When Production Reality Starts to Change the Plan

Establishing the Visual Language in the Mountains

When the Location Dictates How You Photograph

Different Conditions. The Same Responsibility.

When the Original Photograph Has to Change

Seeing the Photograph Before Every Element Exists

The Picture Has to Exist in the Mind First

The Original Photograph Was the Foundation

Twenty Images. Twelve Countries. One Visual World.

What Remains After a Production of This Scale

THE DECISION

LET'S CREATE SOMETHING EXTRAORDINARY