Shoot the Food
A pro shares his tips and techniques for successful food photography.
Lou Manna reports.
Digital cameras are classified by the megapixel count in the image sensor. For basic food photography, you should have at least a 6 megapixel camera. If you're going to need gallery-quality 8"-by-10" prints or if your pictures will be used in a publication, you should purchase a digital camera with at least 8 to 12 megapixels. Some of the top camera manufacturers are Olympus, Canon, and Nikon.
I recommend a Digital Single Lens Reflex (DSLR) so you can see the image through the lens and because the lenses are of better quality and some of them interchangeable. You can purchase a good DSLR in the price range of $400 to $1,000.
You can get good deals purchasing a camera by mail order or over the Internet, but there's no substitute for the experience of holding a camera in your hands and getting a good feel for its controls and settings. You should feel it's one you'd like to use every day.
Digital cameras are mini computers, and you need to read the manual carefully to operate them successfully. Beyond that, I'll help you to find the key ingredients for taking a much better food photo than you ever have.
What the settings mean Get to know the settings on your camera and start using them instead of leaving everything set to auto. You wouldn't drive a car using cruise control in New York City, would you? So learn how to shoot photos with the camera set to manual and experience the difference.
Macro Use this setting on your camera when photographing objects at close distances. For serious food photography, you'll need a macro lens or a lens with the ability to focus at very close distances. As fixed and zoom lenses vary in these capabilities, you might want to invest in a special macro lens attachment for your camera.
Manual focus is used when you need to focus on a specific area of the photo. All professional digital cameras have this feature. Check your camera's instruction manual for the specifics on setting your camera to manual focus. On most digital cameras, you control manual focus by turning the focusing ring on the lens of your camera to the left or to the right.
Custom white balance Adjusts the white point for digital cameras. Aim the camera at a white card and capture the white balance setting so that anything white will appear white in your photo.
I always set the white balance to manual mode. Often, I create a custom white balance to get better color rendition.
Here are some examples of different white balance settings on your camera and what they do.
Tungsten Use this setting when photographing indoors with tungsten light, such as a light bulb. Otherwise your photo will look too yellow and orange. This setting adds blue to the image to compensate for the color of this light source.
Daylight Use this setting when photographing outdoors on a sunny day or indoors with a flash. This is the cleanest and whitest light source.
Cloudy Use this setting when photographing outdoors in cloudy conditions. Otherwise your photo will look just a touch blue. This setting adds a little yellow and orange to compensate for the color of this light source.
Shade Use this setting when photographing outdoors in the shade. Otherwise your photo will look too blue. This setting adds more yellow and orange to compensate for the color of this light source.
Fluorescent Use this setting when photographing indoors with fluorescent light sources, as found in most commercial kitchens. Otherwise your photo will look just a touch green. This setting adds magenta to compensate for the color of this light source.
Composing good photographs Composition refers to the arrangement of various forms, shapes, textures, colors, and elements in a photograph. Think of it as trying to put a puzzle together, with pieces that are not precut to fit a certain way.
Here's a visual explanation of some simple rules of good composition to hook your eye and make you hungry.
Spiral Our eyes naturally tend to scan pictures in a clockwise fashion and then spiral in to the area that has the whitest and brightest colors at its center.
Lowercase "a" Thinking about the shape of a lowercase "a" is helpful in understanding the principles of good composition. It's a simple shape that acts as a guide for the eye. The "a" leads the eye in a clockwise fashion, similar to a spiral, pointing it to the main subject, which is slightly off-center.
Bull's eye This is an old-fashioned technique of placing the key element smack in the middle of the photograph. The use of concentric shapes pulls your eye into the middle of the photo.
Rule of thirds Think of a photograph as divided into thirds, either vertically or horizontally, like a tic-tac-toe board. The idea behind this type of composition is to place the key element in the shot at one of the four intersecting points, away from the center. Composing pictures this way helps make them more dynamic.
Camera tilt A simple tilt of the camera can help composition because it places the subject slightly off-center and creates movement and visual flow.
Framing Use the outer area of your photos to frame the image and to draw the viewer's eye into the picture. Try to use darker elements near the perimeter and lighter ones in the key areas.
Lighting Of all the challenges facing food photographers, lighting is probably the most crucial. Constantly dealing with different shapes, textures, and reflective objects can make photographing food very complicated. Lighting is the one variable that has the greatest potential for turning a good photograph into a great one.
Here are some lighting basics to keep in mind:
• Avoid using direct flash (it flattens the subject).
• Bounce the flash or keep the light off to the side of the food to give it more dimension and some shadow.
• Use mirrors and reflectors to add dimension and shadow detail and create specular highlights.
• For accurate color rendition, take a custom white balance reading off a white card.
• Use gold reflectors to add warmth to the shadows.
• If you need to shoot at slow shutter speeds in low light, make sure to use a tripod, in order to keep the camera steady.
• Try shooting near a window or with table lamps, and reflect the light back into the subject with aluminum foil or white paper.
You can use flash when you shoot outdoors in sunlight to show some detail in the harsh shadows. It's called flash fill.
• Keep the contrast range between highlights and shadows to about one or two f/stops for proper reproduction and to maintain the best image detail.
Proper resolution Here's the pixel payoff. Be sure to use some type of photo editing software (Adobe Photoshop) and cook the photos to enhance their visual flavor. Don't forget to set the digital oven to 300dpi with an image size of at least 5"-by-7" to 8"-by-10" in a TIFF format for the best look.
Don't forget to write captions and a descriptive file name.
