The priest who became a legend: the story of the famous photos of the "tennis Player"

In the 80s poster with the image of the girl hung in the room of every teenager, and publishing, which published most of these posters earn millions. And it all started with an Amateur photo shoot of two young men.

What is the story behind the creation of iconic scenes and what happened to his character, read our material.

In September of 1976, 30-year-old Martin Elliott, the photographer who studied at the University of Birmingham, convinced his 18-year-old love, Fiona Butler to participate in the survey. The guy wanted to do a photo shoot style pin-up.

Fiona Butler

For shooting Fiona asked girlfriend racket and a tennis dress which she sewed by hand. The father gave the girl tennis shoes, and a family dog courtesy of tennis balls, serving her as a toy. And formed the image of a sexy female tennis player, though she Fiona, as she admitted later, did not play tennis due to poor coordination.

The photo shoot was quite short. Elliott managed to shoot only one film, but I was hoping that ready-made frames will be the "one". And so it was.

The man immediately realized that the photo of the girl lifts the dress and shows ass, be a success, so took the photo Agency to Athena. So, in 1977, "Tennis" appeared on the pages of the calendar of the company and since then has never left the shelves of bookstores and newsstands.

Especially popular were the posters of the tennis player. They hung in almost every room and cabin truckers, and sold them for 2 pounds apiece. A pretty good sum at the time! Not surprisingly, Martin Elliott earned "the Player" is 250 thousand pounds sterling. The model itself has not received a penny, as initially decided not to advertise his name and refused to share the profits.

However, to regret the lost money Fiona was not necessary. The girl married a multimillionaire of Ian Walker (Ian Walker), married with whom she had a son and two daughters. Now Fiona works as a freelance magazine Illustrator in Droitwich Spa, Worcestershire, and leads a fairly private life.

Only in 2011, after 35 years, after taking a photo, the woman appeared at the event, timed tennis, held at the Institute of fine arts Birmingham. Of course, one of the exhibits was the same poster, because it, according to experts, most often associated the image of the modern tennis players.

The Creator of the iconic photographs of Martin Elliott soon became a respected photographer. Most often he worked in a style that critics called "Breasts and butt". The most recognizable of its photo shoot in this direction was called "Girls at work". Color images were shown of Secretary, workers theater, drivers of trailers and so on.

In 2011, after a ten-year battle with cancer, Martin Elliott died, forever securing the fame of the author of the legendary pictures.

But this shot would be impossible without another party — Bater friend Carol Knotts, who so successfully lent her my dress and racket. In 2014, the woman put them on auction and immediately found buyers. The famous dress was sold for 15 thousand pounds and the racket over 2 thousand pounds.

Thus, the poster got the money all but of the model itself. Here's an interesting story behind one seemingly random photo.