food photography
As I mentioned in my last post I like food and I like photography. So it´s easy to understand why I´m writing about food photography.
You can call food photography an own section in professional photography. I just read somewhere that the specialization is going up to the point where someone is an expert in shooting beer. Not liquids in general but beer. Seems that the breweries are offering a huge budget if you can live from that – insane isn´t it?
Nevertheless, shooting food is like photography in general all about light. I very much recommend the page of Michael Ray, where I stole most of the content. (His side has maybe not the best navigation – at least from my point of view (sorry Michael), but he knows what he´s writing about.)
Beyond the fact that in a professional studio environment you usually have a food stylist, the studio equipment etc., the question is how you achieve acceptable results as an amateur.
- As mentioned before photography is all about lighting. This is in particular valid for food photography. A big soft light from the back and some spot lights to work out the texture on the surface can make the difference between a boring amateurs picture and a good looking one. Michael recommends to use mirrors. I did not try it yet but this would be one of my next steps.
- Think about how to arrange the object. Where do you want to have sharpness? How to focus the view on the food? As long as no one is paying the food stylist for you, you need to try some arrangements.
- Professional food photographers are working with tricks. One of the best known is to treat the surface often with a mixture of glycerin and water, to give this fresh look.
One of the best possibilities to learn about (food) photography: have a look at other photographers work. What did they do to achieve their result? How did they arrange the lighting? All this pro equipment is off cause nice to have, but not mandatory. Remember the good old home made light box…
Here I give you some links, where you can find some nice examples of food photography.