File:WithTheBeatles.jpg

With The Beatles
Photograph: Robert Freeman

The cover for With the Beatles was shot by Freeman on 22 August 1963 in the Palace Court Hotel, Bournemouth, England.

Freeman recalls: "They had to fit in the square format of the cover, so rather than have them all in a line, I put Ringo in the bottom right corner, since he was the last to join the group. He was also the shortest.”

Paul McCartney's recollection of the session: “He arranged us in a hotel corridor: it was very un-studio-like. The corridor was very dark, and there was a window at the end, and by using this heavy source of natural light coming from the right, he got that very moody picture which most people think he must have worked at forever and ever. But it was only an hour. He sat down, took a couple of rolls, and that was it.”

The original idea was to paint the picture from edge to edge, with no bleeding or title, but the studio vetoed it, on the grounds that the Beatles were not yet famous enough to carry a nameless cover. (The first album to carry an edge-to-edge cover was the Rolling Stones' self-titled debut, released a few months later.) The studio also tried to pull the cover because the Beatles were not smiling, and it was only after George Martin intervened that they won the day. Freeman was paid £75 for his work (three times the normal fee).