food photography

[lopp]

hi people. i've had to do a bit of food photography for a project at work. i've never taken any images of food before - this has all been very new to me.

i used sensia 400 slide film with a 70-300mm lens, mostly at a focal length of about 200mm from about 6 foot away. i lit the area with available light by putting the plates of food next to a window, and used two large white cardboard sheets to create a makesift lightbox (in the loosest sense of the word).

anyway, here is a little selection of the pictures, i'm keen to get some feedback:

http://www.juxprose.com/photo_box/food/

thanks.

[jkn]

I'm not sure what kind of project this is for... if it's more of a magazine article type image - they're fairly cool. On the other hand if it's more for a menu or selling the food in some way, I think you'd want much more of the food in focus and brighter/richer in color (the tomato's look especially washed out - which they may be out of season and looking that way on their own...). I don't have the technical chops to be able to recommend how to light this better to bring the richness out.

The top and bottom shots are especially narrow in focus. These photos don't make me excited to eat the food - if that makes sense. The middle two are the most appealing.

[lopp]

cool. thanks. yeah they are for a magazine article. this still needs to sell the food, and make it look appealing. i actually thought the colours were pretty good, maybe i need to get a little dirty in photoshop :)

yeah, they were supposed to a bit narrow in focus: one or two food stuffs in focus and the rest blurry and colourful.

thanks for the comments, the idea was to make people want to eat the food, i'm glad you've said it doesn't make you want to eat the food, and for the remark about more food being in focus. good stuff, helpful.

[jkn]

I love photographing food, but more in the simple object macro sense. Did a test run on some grapefruit the other day - fun stuff. We have a tendency to have a lot of photos interrupting dinner sorts of moments... :-)

We just recently bought a few ceramic knives... wow - do they cut clean.

[lopp]

Did a test run on some grapefruit the other day - fun stuff. We have a tendency to have a lot of photos interrupting dinner sorts of moments... :-)

haha. great.

i like the idea of photographing food, but it needs to be in a controlled environment, like at home, with time to spare. the shots i took had to be done in 20 minutes before the resturant opened. too much pressure.

[jkn]

Ouch - that's a bit of pressure. I don't think 20 minutes was really enough time.

I thankfully don't take photos for my work - although the short on time and overall pressure has been ratcheting up non-stop this week. Working on pixelpost and such has been a nice pressure release valve this week (along with Stargate SG-1 season 2 dvd's and putting a puzzle together with my wife... :-)

[lopp]

haha, yes. i don't take photo's for work in a proper way, i am a last minute stand in when real photographers have other things to do.

pressure release is essential, as is incorrect grammar and spelling on forums, which i enjoy. the feeling of freedom when not capitalizing is grand. a wife sounds good too, i shall continue looking for one, although 8.30pm sitting on a forum is not the place to find one, must leave house.

[jkn]

Just don't devolve into hax0r speak, please.

I've been married 13 years - yes - it's a good thing. She's at least as creative (probably more) than I am. It's 6 hours earlier here - but by 8:30 pm I'm sure I'll be deciding whether to stare at the computer screen some more today or just watch tv. If the weather improves, we were planning to drive an hour south of here tomorrow and take photos - although it's freezing rain and not supposed to improve tomorrow - so I'll hopefully be tinkering with my synths.

[lopp]

Just don't devolve into hax0r speak, please.

I've been married 13 years - yes - it's a good thing. She's at least as creative (probably more) than I am. It's 6 hours earlier here - but by 8:30 pm I'm sure I'll be deciding whether to stare at the computer screen some more today or just watch tv. If the weather improves, we were planning to drive an hour south of here tomorrow and take photos - although it's freezing rain and not supposed to improve tomorrow - so I'll hopefully be tinkering with my synths.

i don't know what hax0r speak is, but if it's mentioned somewhere i'll now know it's a bad thing.

i've been listening to a few of your tracks. kind of cool. my ambiant knowledge expands only to brian eno. i will listen to more of the downloads, i like what i'm hearing.

[emaquiling]

I worked for a food photographer for a while back in NYC. I am a personal chef as well now besides my other job. Also, I teach cooking. Very difficult to cook, teach, and shoot at the same time. Your pictures are a good start but focus on one thing on the plate. With food, you'll need to sometimes prop things up underneath so it is visually more appealing. If people are making food, you'll need to set up in advance with the plates they will be using and set up an area where you can put a similar sized plate and set up your tripod and lens and whatever so they can just slip the cooked food plate right in that spot. I tend to use a lot of reflectors (just foam core and white cards).
I tend to, when I am teaching, set up a chair and a tripod and shoot down. That way I can see the whole plate. Your shots seem to be at a similar plane as the lens so the back of the plate seems very far. Also, I can't really tell what the food is. Like the first shot, are those chicken wings? Sometimes you'll have to move food around and paint the plate. For me, I plate the plate like I was taking a shot. I'm lucky to have some food photography experience and cooking experience so my food plating is geard for taking a picture.

My food shots (not much but working on it) is on my signature below

[postedpixels]

Lopp,

I checked out your food photos and to be honest, they are over-saturated and have the appearance of fresh vomit.

Maybe that's what the magazine was looking for?

:-)

Now that's constructive!

-Aaron

[unseen]

i'm really sorry but i just have to...
h4x0r is t3h 1337!

*ahem* anyway, about the food... i like the first two because it's obvious what you are shooting. but i don't really think food + macro is very complementary, like jkn said, macro is better for simpler subjects. the bottom two are too busy and don't have much focus. the first could be better if you focused more on the tomato, i think... it also looks like you used a flash. try it with the flash off, i think the food could look more appealing if it was less shiney. over all, they're pretty decent; i always find food hard to shoot because it's difficult to be creative and make it look delicious at the same time. good job though!

[lopp]

thanks for all the comments people. very useful.

[jkn]

i've been listening to a few of your tracks. kind of cool. my ambiant knowledge expands only to brian eno. i will listen to more of the downloads, i like what i'm hearing.

Off topic...

Thanks for pulling a track or two down. I've been in a bit of hibernation from music - only finally setting things backup. I've had a bit of fun with piano and bass now and then, but nothing has been recorded in a couple of years. Yes - most of my stuff is ambient/minimal techno, though I've played a ton of things, including loud guitar/bass/drums stuff... :-)

Hopefully I'll get a few projects completed this year and get back to releasing again.

[Joe[y]]

Lopp,

I checked out your food photos and to be honest, they are over-saturated and have the appearance of fresh vomit.

Maybe that's what the magazine was looking for?

:-)

Now that's constructive!

-Aaron

personally i like the saturated colours. colourful food appeals to me.

however, i agree that macro doesn't suit this food well.

also be careful- you have a slight purpley colour cast over these photos - which ain't pretty. you could correct this easily with custom white balance.