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Photographer behind Rihanna’s Ambani lunch says ‘honest images’ matter more in the AI era
Celebrity wedding photographer Himanshu Patel opens up about photographing Rihanna at Antilia, capturing emotional moments over chasing ‘iconic’ shots
- PUBLISHED: Wed 6 May 2026, 3:33 PM UPDATED: Wed 6 May 2026, 3:42 PM
When Rihanna stepped into Antilia for an intimate lunch with the Ambani family, the Internet saw a global superstar wrapped in marigolds and sunlight. In one frame, she is mid-laugh, showered in flower petals, bathed in a soft yellow glow that feels almost too ‘Bollywood’ to be real. For the man behind the lens, however, the moment was less about its “viral” potential and more about what it truly captured: a global icon slipping, effortlessly, into the heart of an Indian celebration.
Himanshu Patel, founder of Epic Stories, had already documented one of the Ambani family’s most significant milestones during the wedding celebrations of Anant Ambani and Radhika Merchant. So, being invited back into their Mumbai home felt, to him, like a vote of confidence. “Honestly, the first reaction was gratitude. When a family invites you back into their space, especially after you’ve already documented one of the most significant moments of their lives, that’s not something you take lightly.”
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In a conversation with Khaleej Times, the small-town engineer-turned sought-after wedding photographer to the stars looks back at capturing Rihanna inside one of Mumbai’s most exclusive homes, revisits the wedding that changed his life and weighs in on why photographers, as “documentarians of memory”, will matter even more in the age of AI.
Excerpts from an interview:
When you got the brief that you’d be photographing Rihanna at the Ambani residence in Mumbai, how did you begin visualising the shoot?
The visualising came in a little later, and even then, not really in detail. My instinct on a shoot like this is never to over-plan. You can't script a day like this. What you can do is prepare yourself emotionally and technically, walk in with an open mind and let the day unfold. The best frames almost always come from moments you didn't see coming.
I've learned that the more I try to control a shoot, the more I end up missing the moment. So my real preparation is about being present. The rest takes care of itself.
Those soft, yellow-toned photos from the lunch really stood out. Can you walk us through how you approached and framed those shots...
There's one frame from that afternoon that I think about a lot. It was during 'Phoolon Ki Holi'. What struck me was that [Rihanna] wasn't experiencing it as an outsider observing a tradition. She was celebrating it the way we do. The way friends and family throw petals at each other, laughing, chasing, completely lost in the joy of it.
That's the spirit of how we play Holi, with people we love, with no inhibitions and she was right there.
Then came a moment that honestly felt straight out of a Bollywood film. She turned, looked directly at my camera and playfully threw a handful of petals at the lens. I clicked. That was it.
That frame became one of the most talked-about images from her India visit and I think the reason it travelled so far is because of what it shows. It's not a celebrity posing for a photographer. It's a moment of someone embracing our culture, joining in the way we hoped she would. That's the kind of image we always chase.
As for the yellow tone, that wasn't post-production. That was the light itself. Indian afternoon sun coming through traditional windows has this golden, gentle quality you simply cannot replicate. Our job in those conditions is to stay out of its way and let it do the work.
Antilia is synonymous with scale and luxury, while Rihanna is this global powerhouse of a personality. How did you balance showcasing the grandeur of the Ambani home with keeping the images intimate and authentic?
This is something I think about a lot because it applies to almost every wedding we shoot now.
Scale and intimacy aren't opposites. They're partners, if you frame them right. The trick is to never let the grandeur dominate the human. A beautifully lit room means nothing if the person in it feels small inside the frame. So, our discipline is always to lead with the human and let the scale support them rather than swallow them.
That's also a personal philosophy behind this. I grew up in a small town in Madhya Pradesh and I'm very aware that the most powerful images aren't about how grand the setting is, they're about how present the person is within it. The Ambani home is extraordinary, of course. But what we wanted to capture wasn't the house. It was the warmth inside it. That's a very different frame.
From the puja to the holi celebrations and the traditional welcome, there were many deeply Indian cultural elements at this lunch. As a visual storyteller, what were you most keen to highlight for a global audience that may be seeing these rituals for the first time?
When I'm photographing a ritual that an international audience may be seeing for the first time, I remind myself that explanation isn't my job. Feeling is.
I don't need someone in Dubai or London or New York to know exactly what an aarti (a traditional ritual) means. I want them to feel the warmth of the flame, the focus on a face, the weight of the silence before the prayer begins.
The joy of being showered in flowers translates without context. Indian rituals are deeply emotional at their core and emotion is the most universal language we have. My job is to honour the rituals visually, hold the cultural specificity and let the emotional truth do the heavy lifting.
If a global audience walks away feeling something, even if they can't name it, we've done our job.
High-profile shoots like this move very fast, with little room for retakes. What is your personal checklist for making sure you come away with at least one ‘iconic’ image?
The honest answer is that you don't aim for the iconic image. You aim for the honest image. Iconic is what the world makes of it afterwards.
We've had frames we thought would land but didn't and others we almost overlooked become the ones that travel everywhere. So, the discipline isn't about chasing the iconic. It's about not missing the small, true moments, because those are the ones that become iconic in retrospect.
After 150+ weddings and many high-pressure shoots, I've also learned that panic is the enemy of a good frame. The photographer who breathes is the photographer who sees.
You've photographed several high-profile clients in India and now Rihanna. How does your approach change when shooting a global celebrity versus a private client?
Genuinely, very little changes. And that's something experience has taught me. When you photograph celebrities often enough, you realise that fame is just on the surface. Underneath, every person in front of your camera is just a human being going through a moment that matters to them. A bride who's never been photographed before is feeling exactly what a global icon feels... the same vulnerability, the same joy, the same awareness that this day matters.
That's the most beautiful part of doing this for a long time. You stop differentiating between people. Everyone becomes someone you're trying to honour.
Before Epic Stories became a go-to name for luxury events, what first pulled you towards photography?
I come from a small town in India where the ideal career path is to become an engineer or a doctor. And that's exactly what I did. I started engineering in 2013 and by 2017 I had been placed in an MNC. The future had been mapped out in the way it usually is for boys from towns like mine.
During college, I worked, earned some money and bought myself a camera. Photography started as a hobby. My friends were the ones who said, you have something here, take it seriously. But where I come from, photography wasn't considered a serious career, especially wedding photography.
While I was waiting for my offer letter, a friend called from Mumbai and asked if I'd do a freelance wedding. I said yes, mostly out of curiosity. This was on December 17, 2017.
That wedding changed my life. It wasn't anything like the weddings I had grown up around. There was warmth, laughter, emotion and a family genuinely living the best day of their life. And I had never seen a wedding like that before.
That day, standing there with my camera, I made the decision. If I get to witness this on an ordinary working day, this is what I want to do for the rest of my life.
From that one wedding in Bombay to where Epic Stories is today, none of it was planned. It all started with a 'yes' I almost didn't say.
Dubai is a major wedding and luxury event hub. What differences do you notice between shooting in India and the wider Gulf region?
Dubai and the Gulf have become incredibly important in the global wedding conversation and it's been fascinating to see the region develop its own visual identity.
Aesthetically, the contrast is striking. India offers a layered, textured, almost cinematic quality with old architecture, traditional rituals, multigenerational warmth. Dubai offers modern architecture, dramatic landscapes and a sleek international sophistication. Neither is better. They're just different palettes.
In terms of expectations, families in the Gulf often want work that feels global, something that resonates whether it's seen in Mumbai, London, or New York. That pushes us as storytellers.
With AI becoming more advanced, how do you view its impact on photography?
I think about this a lot and I've realised that I'm not afraid of AI. What it's doing is forcing the industry to rediscover why a real photograph matters.
Photographers will become more important [in the age of AI]. We will become witnesses, not just creators. The documentarians of memory in an age where memory itself is becoming uncertain.
Himanshu Patel
Anyone can generate a beautiful image. What no one can generate is a true one. A photograph isn't valuable because it looks good. It's valuable because something actually happened and someone was there to witness it. That experience is something AI cannot replicate.
So, I believe photographers will become more important, not less. We will become witnesses, not just creators. The documentarians of memory in an age where memory itself is becoming uncertain.
Personally, I'm intentional about how we use AI in our workflow. For organisation, sometimes for technical refinement, but never in a way that interferes with the truth. Because the moment a photograph stops being honest, it stops being a photograph. It becomes something else. And families don't hire us for something else. They hire us to remember what really happened.
That's a responsibility I take seriously and one I think every photographer needs to define clearly now.
