Every dining department has one — an album of snapshots taken of plate presentations, catering displays, special event offerings and other past culinary creations. Often, these photos were taken because the subject matter represented some of best the department has offered. But in most cases, the quality of the photography is poor-to-middling at best.

Capturing attractive images of food is one of the more difficult specialties in the photography world. The truth is that the techniques most amateurs use to take ordinary snapshots are counter-productive when it comes to capturing an image of food that has real impact and appeal.

While most FSDs and managers will never become food photography pros, many can learn — or have someone on their staff learn — to take pictures that are immensely better than what they have in those scrapbooks now. The investment is mostly in know-how, not in equipment, and in understanding basic techniques of lighting and composition.

To help you get started, Food Management interviewed several readers who have developed their own techniques for this purpose. None are professional food photographers per se, and each one works differently. Some use only the simplest of equipment, while others, like Sodexo's David Martin, shown above, use more involved lighting setups. All have produced high quality results.

This is the first installment of a series of short articles in which we'll talk to each of them to explore some of the differences in their techniques and shooting philosophies.

First, let's consider some general advice that will apply from the simplest to the most complex efforts.

Light, not a camera, is your primary tool. You don't need top-end equipment to shoot a quality picture. While a digital single-lens reflex (DSLR) is preferred, even some of the better point-and-shoot cameras can do a credible job if you take them off automatic and turn off their on-camera flashes. Lighting and composition are the most important factors.

Don't mix light sources. This is a special problem indoors, where different kinds of artificial lighting can cause unpredictable shifts in the color of photographed food. Turn off overhead and other lights and stick to either natural daylight or one kind of artificial light (if possible, balanced for daylight) that you can control.

Shoot many variations of an image once you've got it set up. Vary lighting, exposure, horizontal and vertical compositions, the camera angle. Compose the image close in and farther away, move different elements, add and delete props. This gives more choices later on.

Keep notes about your setup and exposures, especially as you're learning and experimenting. If one setup works very well for you, you'll want to be able to duplicate it again.

Always use a tripod and shutter release to minimize camera movement (if you don't have a remote release, use the camera's self timer). If neither the food nor the camera moves, you can use long time exposures even if the light source isn't very bright.

 

For this image, Rick Kelly arranged the composition so a large window provided backlighting and another window behind the photographer lit the front of the food.

Rick Kelly
Business Manager
Residential Dining Services
University of California-Santa Barbara

Our first interview was with Rick Kelly, business manager of residential dining services at the University of California-Santa Barbara. Kelly first became interested in photography when his children were born a decade ago, “and I've developed quite a passion for it since then,” he says. He often shoots food images for his department, like the one used in the sushi promotion shown here.

“I like natural light and use it almost exclusively. There's an office near one of our kitchens that has large windows on three of its walls. I do many of my food shot setups on a table there.

“Avoid stainless steel walls and counters in your pictures like the plague. Stainless just reeks of ‘institutional food.’ Always cover a stainless steel table if that's all you have to work with.