Food photography: overview
- elle walker
- Apr 4, 2019
- 2 min read
Location vs studio
One obvious advantage of a studio shoot versus a location shoot is the aspect of having total control over the lighting.
In this image the comparison between a side lit and back lit image is quite clear. Lighting the image from the side throws beautiful specular highlights on the food which makes it appear more tantalising than food lit from the back. In the latter case, the light cannot reach the front of the image - the part of the image directly in front of the viewer – so whilst the composition is identical, it looks less dynamic.
My images of cookies were lit from the side, though using natural light.
Had these images been backlit, the texture of the cookies would have been lost, particularly in the dark photography image. The side lighting adds an appealing dimension to the images where front or back lighting would have been flat and uninteresting.
The lighting for my premixed gin and tonic cocktail was lit using natural light, supported by a variety of modifiers. The natural light was from the rear of the image, which contradicts what was said above about the cookies, but in this instance it works. The glass bottle and metal knife help to reflect light around the image and using a reflector and torchlight to add a pop of light across the label helps to amplify the light.
This approach is different to lighting a bottle of whiskey in studio. This image is likely to be a composite, with an abundance of post-processing to achieve the desired effect. The gin drink is more naturalistic and is closer to the actual product a prospective customer might see in the supermarket.
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