Not the Average Petrolhead

©Jonathan Taylor

Jonathan Taylor is a travelling photographer. His commercial work for big corporate clients like McDonalds, Jimmy Choo, Christian Dior and Primark leads him all over the globe. Often at night, or in the early hours of the morning, Jonathan will be there to capture the perfect retail spaces, before they are opened to the public. Being in these diverse and often exotic locations he will often take the opportunity to do some non-commissioned work on his lifelong passion of cars, for which he has built up a substantial portfolio.

©Jonathan Taylor

Cloud 9 Photography is the Leeds based company that Jonathan runs with his wife Zarina. They’ve been in the Architectural Photography Industry for over 30 years now and have developed a particular specialism in retail, working for some of the world’s top fashion brands, who want to rest assured that their boutiques are captured to the same exacting standards as employed in their products and store construction. Jonathan is a keen advocate of the technical camera. We’re proud that he’s been using one of ours for over a decade.

“There are many reasons I work with a technical camera and Phase One back, but I guess the first reason is image quality. This is sometimes hard to get across to people, but I like to describe what you get on screen as looking like the actual texture of a subject rather than a photograph of the subject. So much detail is lost by 35mm that even when viewed at screen size Phase files have much more life to them.” For a photographer like Jonathan, there’s also a place for 35mm gear. He does own an extensive range of Canon equipment, but whenever he’s got the time, he’ll prefer to shoot with the Cambo. Being an experienced photographer, very often he will find that time to use the tech cam.

“The technical camera allows me to stitch perfectly, play with the plane of focus and most importantly adjust the perspective and shape of architectural spaces. Whilst 35mm shift lenses may also give you this control, it is so much more precise on my Cambo.”

©Jonathan Taylor

March 2014 we had Jonathan at our Photography Show booth, where he launched his book Cars of Cuba. Indeed, a topic hard to combine with commercial assignments. That’s a bit different about the book he has just published, titled Cars of the Emirates. Some of the photographs in there were made right before and after doing a presentation at the Phase One Stand Out event in Dubai, 2016. After that, his work must have led him to The Emirates at least twenty times. And it was never the same as it was during a previous visit.

Due to the Covid lockdowns and lots of commercial work, the Cars of the Emirates project has only just been finalised. December 2023 sees the images exhibited in Dubai at two prestigious car showrooms, Tomini Classics and Pupil of Fate. With prints up to 2 meters wide, the quality of the Phase One 150mp files shot with Rodenstock lenses on the Cambo, will really come into their own.

Jonathan has always kept his automotive photography as a personal diversion from his day-to-day work on the high street. Thus he’s entirely free to explore his own artistic and aesthetic ideas. Whereas a lot of car photography nowadays is done with CGI and a big team with art directors and marketing executives, Jonathan prefers to keep his automotive photography as pure as possible. Usually, he works with just one assistant and a single Profoto head, maybe adding a reflector or two.

The secret to his images is scouting the right cars and locations. He will always be on the look out for the locations, often driving for hours around a city, recording the light direction and the possibilities of parking a supercar. The cars are sourced through his extensive network on social media and then paired with appropriate locations. This is very much a labour of love, but one that he uses to enhance his profile among his clients in the world of retail.