Food photography tips

[jdesai]

I'm asked to take pictures of hot/steamy prepared dishes. Does any one have any tips on taking these kind of pictures?

I'd appreciate any tips. Thanks.

[Nicole]

I highly recommend the Still Life With blog that's all about food styling and photography. You'll find lots of helpful hints there. There were also 2 posts recently on 2 other blogs with links to food photography resources: Photodoto & Photojojo

[netbymatt]

Chris Marquardt covered this when he interviewed a Chef on his photography podcast "Tips From The Top Floor." Link to episode.
I don't remember anything specific as I've never taken photos of food, but I do remember a lot of tips that seemed to make a good deal of sense.

[Orange Capsule]

It depends on the color of the dish,
but most of the time i like simple background and plate
(like white)
because i feel that colorful backgrounds often take attention away from the dish.
and have a lens with good boken.
of course to me most importantly, dont let the steam get anywhere close to my lens =]
(perhaps use a filter just in case)

[MarcelLuettmann]

Once I stubmled over http://www.photocritic.org/2008/food-photo-tricks/ and found it to be quite interesting.

Marcel

[jsanders]

What I think that works good for food is to use a good dosis of saturation to get nice colours!

[CallMeKat]

i second the orange capsules tip about having a simple background. food that looks good enough to photograph shouldn't have to compete with a cluttered background. also since these are usually close up shots, it would be good if you had a tripod, even a small one, to reduce hand shake. another thing, use depth of field wisely. shallow dof is usually good for food, especially if the background isn't so attractive, but if your taking a photo of a buffet, deeper dof could be better. if the image doesn't pop, post editing in photoshop can make it more vibrant so consider that too

[SarahN]

Don't ever take a food shot from straight above, and don't use the flash--nothing looks worse than food taken from that angle, unless it has something interesting structurally from above.

[Pshorten]

I suggest you keep the setup really simple - you're going to have to move fast once the food is served up so set everything up using the dish the food will be in then take all the practice shoots you need to - then get the hot food out and go for it!

[nofocus]

To get back to the issue of hot, steamy dishes, some or all of the following have proven to work for me:
- Dark coloured dish, dark background;
- Longish exposure, taken maybe from an elevation of about 30-45 degrees above horizontal (implies a good tripod and remote shutter release or self-timer);
- Slight under-exposure to give a richer colour saturation;
- TWO light sources - shooting into some light reflecting off the food proper, and some light from 45 degrees behind your shoulder for a bit of fill.
- Shoot RAW, and then increase the range of the tonal width in the "shadow" areas;

If the above has been done, you should get nicely illuminated steam and a contrasty, moist-ish appeal to the food in the dish as well! Good Luck!