1.1 Food Photography

Food Photography is a combination of Still Life and commercial photography. Its aim is to make whatever the food is, appear appealing and appetising that are used in advertising the food to hopefully influence the audience in buying or choosing that meal, that are often featured on a range of platforms such as menus, packaging, cookbooks and magazines. Food photography can be quite time consuming in that it involves a lot of patience to achieve the shot that is most suitable, and moving the objects around and taking pictures at different angle may be required. After having a first lecture with Richard about what is required for Food photography and what environment and equipment is most suitable, it came to my attention that to make the subject more appealing, light is an important factor. Depending on where the light is can make or break an image of food because it could make it look dirty and point out any negative aspects of the subject. In a studio with manual lighting or daylight is more suitable to capture the food and conveniently in a conservatory if available, which luckily I have that will hopefully create some appropriate light. Sometimes it requires a range of people such as an art director, food stylist and assistants for capturing food photography because of the effort it takes to set the whole thing up, especially if it was for a big company or successful chef for example. After doing some research in books, magazines and online about food photography, it appeared to all feature to have some sort of rustic background and props to go with the food and placed on a wooden plank or table. I think that this gives off a more homely feel to it and is more relatable to its audience. For the next few following weeks, my intention is to capture a range of different food in both the studio and daylight.