Food Photography: No Styling vs. Styling February 10, 2010
Posted by Nicole : Food, Photography, Tips & Tricks , 6 comments
Styling is something that can really make a big difference in your food images. Heck, it’s so important in the industry that some people make it their full-time job! And since I mostly do my own food photography then I have no one but me to rely on to make my images look good.
In the images above it’s pretty obvious which image was styled and which was not. The image on the left was photographed at an an outdoor taco stand, so the food is fresh, and not too bad-looking, but it’s not quite as appealing as the image on the right. The image on the right is fully edible … it got cold during the shooting process so it didn’t get eaten but other than that, and a few different ingredients than the taco-stand image, it’s basically the same. I spent several minutes placing the ingredients exactly where I wanted them to be … everything is in its place because I wanted it to be there.
In my photos I will usually do as much styling as needed to make the image look great. Sometimes it makes the image inedible (like adding soap-suds to bacon to give it a “foamy” look), but most of the time everything in the dish is natural … so don’t think that you have to do anything weird to your food to make it “photographable”. The key to making food images look good is using fresh, clean, ingredients and having immaculate attention-to-detail. I like to look at lots of food images in magazines and cookbooks to help inspire me for my own creations, and when I look at an image I will usually ask myself “why does it look so tasty?”. When I answer that question I log it away and apply that newfound knowledge in my own photography.
Taco Stands February 9, 2010
Posted by Nicole : Food, Photography , add a comment
Canon 7D, Canon 24-105 ƒ/4L IS, 1/320th second at ƒ/4, ISO 100
Last week I went to downtown Salt Lake City to meet up with some friends and visit some of the street-side taco stands. We started at one, but they ran out of tortillas and so we had to find another one … then it became a “let’s visit all the taco stands on this block” game and we all ended up eating way more than we should have (they were sooooo tasty!). I’m trying to bring my 7D around with me pretty much everywhere I go and so I got some neat looking (and some very scary-looking) photos.
My friend Ann has a full account of the taco-visits on her blog here.
Food Photography: Take a Bite! February 3, 2010
Posted by Nicole : Food, Photography, Tips & Tricks , 6 comments
Canon 7D, Canon 24-105 ƒ/4L IS lens, 1/30th sec @ƒ/4, ISO 100
When it comes to food photography crisp, clean images are always nice, but sometimes it’s good to mess it up a bit. Get some crumbs on the plate, use that fork/spoon/knife and make the image look like it’s being enjoyed. There are ways to do this and still make the image look tasty.
I am very particular about the styling in my images, so the placement of every crumb, garnish, or droplet was placed there either on purpose or was left in place because I noticed it and liked the way it looked. My ultimate goal is to make the image look like it wasn’t on purpose, but still look tasty enough to eat.
Food Photography: Finding Triangles January 28, 2010
Posted by Nicole : Food, Photography, Tips & Tricks , 10 comments
Canon 7D, Canon 24-105ƒ/4L IS lens, 1/15th second at ƒ/5.6, ISO 100
In food photography, and photography in general, a good fundamental tip on composition is to create or find triangles in your images. Triangles keep the viewer’s eyes on the photo, since when you follow a triangle with your eyes you are basically circling around the image, looking at all the elements. In this image the basil leaves are the boldest color, so your eyes probably were drawn to that part of the image first. If you followed your eyes to the other leaves then you were fooled into looking at the entire photo. ;)
Your triangles don’t have to all be the same colors or shapes – they could be as simple as three different elements in an image that your eyes will be easily drawn to. If you are photographing people then the direction of a person’s eyes are going to draw the viewer’s eyes in the same direction, and you could use that element in your “triangle”.
In food photography you will also find that adding this technique to your styling is very pleasing to the eye. I always add the “final touches” to the dish while it’s sitting on its mark, since I have a better view of the image through the viewfinder and can create or find the best placement for things like garnishes and silverware from that perspective.
Using a Reflector January 25, 2010
Posted by Nicole : Before & After, Food, Photography, Tips & Tricks , 14 comments
When I photograph food I do my best to use as much natural light as possible. The images above both have natural, diffused sunlight coming in from the right with a reflector to the left, but there is a slight difference between them.
Can you see it?
In the image on the left there isn’t enough fill-light hitting the subject. The reason for this is that the reflector wasn’t pointing to the part of the image that needed light. It was angled the wrong direction – completely parallel to the window (you can see that the background is a bit lighter in that shot). I needed the light to hit the glass at an angle, so I turned the reflector so it was facing the front-left part of the glass that was in my view. (See the diagram to the right for the final setup – click on it for a larger view.)
It’s important that you not only have your reflector filling in the subject opposite the main light, but also that you make sure it’s angled in a way that it’s pleasing to your photograph. You don’t need anything fancy to use as a reflector – a large piece of foam-core will do the trick. But if you do have a traditional reflector (this is the one I use) then you are also able to bend and warp it to wrap more light around your image.
