Food Photography - Part 2

Thanks for joining me again, as I continue my discussion on how to take great food photos. In the previous blog, I discussed lighting, one of the most important aspects of good photography. Now we will move on to other techniques.

2. Camera and Software. My camera is a Canon PowerShot SD850 IS Digital ELPH 8 MP Digital Camera.

It's a good little camera, but nothing fancy. I use the manual digital macro setting to take my close-up pictures of food. I never use the flash to take my food photos. My computer has a neat little program that lets me adjust the contrast on the photos when I import them on to the computer. A lot of times, my photos are so flooded with light, it tends to wash out the colors. So I bump up the contrast just a little to help the colors stand out more. But you want to be careful to not bump up the contrast too much or it starts to look artificial.

3. Aperture. The best way to describe aperture is with a photo:

Aperture refers to the depth of field. See how the almond in the middle is in focus and the almonds in front and in back are out of focus? This refers to aperture. It's one of my favorite things to experiment with because it gives the photo depth, more than one dimension. Some cameras will let you adjust the "f-stop." Mine doesn't (Santa, are you taking notes?), so I just have to play around with food and camera placement to achieve the desired depth of field.

You can use objects, such as a lemon slice or a tea cup, to place in front or back of the food to give the photo more depth. I love to take the same food item, more cookies or another bowl of salad, and place it behind, making it out of focus and thus giving the photo more depth. Like this photo:

4. Angle. This is something you just have to experiment with. Take lots of photos from many different angles. More often than not, I find myself taking the photo at the same level as the food. My camera is right down there at the same level as the plate. I also like to get up close to show as much detail as I can.

5. Styling. A lot of the time, I just have my kitchen counter as the back-drop. Recently, I've been using different colored fabrics from a quilt project that I've never started. Sometimes I'll use different colored napkins or placemats. Adding a utensil, like a spoon, adds some interest. The color of the "prop" usually depends on the colors in the food. Sometimes the food I'm photographing is very light, so I'll use a dark background to make it stand out, like in this photo of a glass of milk and coconut cookies.

You can also pick out an accent color in the food, and use that as your backgroud or prop color, to help the food stand out more. In this photo, the wild rice soup is rather monochromatic, except for the carrots, so I chose an orange napkin to help the carrots "pop."

I also love to use "natural" props, such as parsley and citrus slices. They can add a nice burst of color to your photos.

It's hard to put in words what it is that I do, so I hope I've made it clear to you. If you have any questions, just ask! Photography is an art form and I find it really fun and a great way to express myself. Most artists' goal is to evoke feeling in the viewer. My goal is to evoke hunger! I hope this blog has made you hungry for photography. Now go out there and take some great pictures!

Food Photography - Part 1

A little over a year ago, I started taking food photos and posting them to allrecipes.com. Now, I'm no expert at photography, but I have taken classes and been encouraged by my dad, who also loves photography. At one time in high school, I thought I might like to be a photographer. I also thought I might like to be a chef, an interior designer, or a nutritionist, but somehow I ended up an engineer (scratch head....). Anyways, I hadn't done much photography in quite a while (since high school, basically). Enter in allrecipes.com. I've been using the sight for years, but never did much reviewing or taking pictures, mostly just printing off recipes. Since quitting being an engineer, I've had a lot more time on my hands, so I started my new hobby.

The first photos I took of recipes weren't that (ahem) great. Like this one......

(Yeah, I read the comics while I eat dinner, who doesn't?) I was just excited to get a photo uploaded, never mind the quality! I knew I could do better though, so I started experimenting and in no time I was taking better photos. Here are some tips that I've put together that I hope you find useful.

1. Lighting, lighting, lighting. It's the most important aspect of photography, and also the biggest pain in the butt sometimes! I've found that natural light works the best for me. I have a kitchen counter that gets great natural light from all around in the daytime (at night it's another story, but I will talk about that later). Find a room that gets great natural light, but resist the urge to put it right next to the window. It's best not to put the food right in the sun beams, but in a spot where the light is more diffused. My counter works great because I get light coming in from the living room in one direction, and even more light pouring in from the patio door in the other direction, yet the counter is far enough from either to get diffused light. This lets me play with backlighting or have the light bounce off the side of the food, like these photos.....

This photo of a brownie has good lighting from all around, but a majority of the lighting is coming from the back.

This photo of french toast has a lot of light from the side, making the strawberry shine. The brownie and french toast photos were taken from the same counter, just different directions.

Unfortunately, natural lighting isn't always possible, especially if it's Minnesota in the dead of winter, and it gets dark at 5pm, long before dinner is served. Sigh.....I was having the hardest time getting good photos. I tried different lamps, overhead lights, anything. If you look through my past photos, you can see me kind of experimenting with different lighting techniques. I was never satisfied because I always had shadows and I couldn't get the light to "bounce around," like I do with natural light. My hubby understood my angst and got me a wonderful birthday present. This.....A light box! It's a tent with two lamps. It diffuses the light so I don't get shadows. He bought it from http://www.cowboystudio.com/ It is one of the tabletop kits. It still isn't as nice and natural looking as sunlight, but at least I don't get shadows! Here's one of first photos I took with my new box. True color and not a shadow anywhere!

If you would like to take photos using artificial light, I would suggest using fluorescent daylight bulbs, which is what my setup uses.

Well, the topic of lighting is a long one, so I think I will continue my discussion in the bext blog. See you there!