Nowadays, a news blurb starting with a sentence like, “A photographer in England shot a Vogue cover of an actress in the U.S. using a remote photo app” is not as farfetched as one might have imagined pre-Covid-19. Especially now that the remote photo app CLOS is being used more and more by pro photographers on everything from fashion shoots to ad campaigns and more.

After all, smartphone photography has really progressed from pixelated images to magazine covers to taking photos when the photographer isn’t even in the same room—or the same country. Photographer Greg Williams recently shared a behind-the-scenes video detailing how he photographed actress Zendaya while he was in England and she was in Atlanta, Georgia. The image made made the cover of British Vogue earlier this year.

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The COVID-19 pandemic has forced photographers to apply their creativity to the very essence of how they shoot. From face swaps of parent-shot iPhone photos to FaceTime portraits, many photographers improvised to create images without being in the room. For Williams, he turned to an app called CLOS.

CLOS is an iOS, Android and web-based virtual photoshoot app. The app allows the photographer to control the second device—the one actually taking photos—remotely. Unlike FaceTime, the app also allows for capturing RAW photos. The app can save the images to the model’s camera roll or can upload them to a cloud. The app even boasts an AI camera, which the developer describes as an “artificial intelligent photographer that knows exactly when to press the shutter button.”

Williams said that Zendaya’s personal assistant first walked the phone around, showing him different rooms. The assistant then held the phone during the shot. While the app allowed the photographer to control the phone, it also allowed the two to communicate during the remote session.

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“This picture worked really, really well and its mad to think that it’s a picture taken through the internet on her own mobile phone—and it became a full-page spread in Vogue magazine,” Williams said in a recent video he posted on YouTube about the shoot (see video above).

Williams, once a photojournalist, is known known for his images of celebrities that mix candid moments with glamour. While he used Zendaya’s phone for the Vogue shoot, he recently helped design a Special Edition Leica, a Daniel Craig x Greg Williams Leica Q2. Williams is also a documentary filmmaker and shares his knowledge with Skills Faster, his own online education platform.