Duffy, who was suffering from a degenerative lung disease died on Monday evening, BJP understands.

Born in 1933 in London, Duffy first took up photography in 1955 when he worked for Vogue magazine. Duffy, Bailey and Donovan were also know as “the terrible trio”, and are credited as the three most important photographers of the Swinging London movement of the 1960s, defining, through their images, the explosion of pop and fashion that made London the "coolest place on the planet".

The three photographers were all East Enders, sharply different in attitude and outlook to the previous generation of fashion photographers, many of whom were very much upper middle class. "We were great mates yes, but we were also great competitors," said Duffy at one point. "People of my generation were not prepared to wear it. We were fairly chippy and if you wanted it you could have it. We would not be told what to do."

Duffy is also famous for shooting the album cover of David Bowie's Aladdin Sane.

Bailey, who spoke with BJP's Diane Smyth this morning, said: “I’m fucked, I’ve got no one to argue with now. If you said ‘It’s a nice day’ to Duffy he’d pick an argument with you, he was a cantankerous old fucker.”

Remembering his time with Duffy, Bailey added: “The Holy Trinity, it was rubbish. It was just journalists not wanting to write about three nice boys. There was nothing shared, no style [in common]. We shared a class more than anything, though he wasn’t from the East End he was from Kilburn or something [he was born in North London but moved to East Ham when he was five]. It was nothing to do with our pictures," he said. “It was an exciting time, but it’s an exciting time now. It’s what you do. You have to make it exciting. If it’s dull it’s because you’re dull.”

After 1979, Duffy slowly disappeared from the headlines, having given up on photography after burning some of his negatives. One small incident triggered his actions, as he famously explained in an interview with the Financial Times: he arrived one day at his studios to discover there wasn't any toilet paper left. “I realised I was chairman, CEO and senior stockholder in my business and I was now responsible for toilet paper.” That's when, the Financial Times writes, Duffy "gathered his boxes of negatives, took them to the garden and set them alight."

However, the smoke alerted neighbours, who called the council. Their intervention preserved most of Duffy's work from disappearance.

But Bailey dismisses the incident, blaming journalists for the myth it created. "[The myth] comes from journalists. It’s something to hang it on ‘he burnt all his pics’. That creates a myth. Duffy knew that, we talked about it [years later]. At the time I said ‘I’ll file them for you,’ because I had more room. He said ‘No I’m burning them’ and I said ‘Fine, it’s up to you.”

He added: "Everybody threw then away in those days, the transparencies, you chose three or four and the rest went in the dustbin. It wasn’t just Duffy. I haven’t got much colour work from the 60s. The black-and-white was filed for printing so I’ve got that.”

Matt Butson, vice president of the Hulton Archive at Getty Images, told BJP: "His work across a broad spectrum of photographic genres; be it advertising, fashion, portraiture, album covers, photo-documentary and abstract, proves that Duffy was arguably a great deal more versatile - and creative - than many of his peers, many of whom have gone onto achieve legendary status in British Photography."

Butson added: "In my humble opinion Duffy, as one of the corner stones of what was known as the Black Trinity (with Bailey and Donovan - as Norman Parkinson dubbed them) should be regarded as a true innovator and pioneer of his art and the fact he became disillusioned by an industry he had served for over a quarter of a century does not diminish his achievements."

"I had the distinct pleasure of knowing Duffy and can honestly say in the brief time I knew him, he left a lasting impression – his wit, his cantankerous nature, his great intelligence and the ability to hold one spellbound, was a joy to behold – a one hour meeting would easily turn into six," said Butson. "As one of the Black Trinity or Terrible Three as others called them, Duffy is the sole member who has yet to be honoured by the photographic establishment, which is curious to say the least."

Read and see more of Brian Duffy's work and life:

Linda Brusasco produced a documentary on Duffy's work. Entitled The Man Who Shot the Sixties, it can be viewed in its entirety online at duffyphotographer.com.

The Financial Times published a portrait of the photographer in October 2009. It can be found at www.ft.com.

See a selection of Duffy's most iconic images at Getty Images.