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Food Photography

post #1 of 11
4/22/09 at 6:29pm
Thread Starter 
How do I go about this? How do I get in with someone who takes photos and styles the food? I dont even know where to begin with the research for this.

Thanks for your help guys.
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post #2 of 11
4/23/09 at 4:46am
i have many friends who are photographers... so i have asked them to photograph plates for my site. however, the problem is how to go about it? just have them come by every day for a month and photograph every dish? or just make each dish for the photo shoot?

if you like i can refer a photographer to you, they are all located in the nyc area.
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post #3 of 11
4/23/09 at 9:07am
The last time I did it, I bribed a friend with free food and wine. I had him set up in a corner of the kitchen, out of the way. Before service, we layed out a small piece of black marble, put a dish of food on it, and worked on the lighting and focus for a while until we were happy. Then, during service, as I expedited, I would "style" each particular plate of food we wanted to shoot, as is was ordered, and quickly pass it off to the photographer. Because we already had the set-up the way we wanted, each plate only took about 5-10 seconds to shoot -then out to the table. No waste, no cold food, it worked out really well. The next day I had him come in for a few staged action shots: floury hands rolling out pasta, brandy flaming in a saute pan, blah blah blah. I let him bring his girlfriend in for a couple of dinners, done deal.
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post #4 of 11
4/23/09 at 2:04pm
similar here, however conflicting schedules... i purchased muslin backdrops for clean photos, but have yet to have anything shot bc our schedules never match... also since i am not paying im not harassing them, but im sure if they were doing this as a job it would already be done.
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post #5 of 11
4/23/09 at 5:27pm
Thread Starter 
Sorry Let me rephrase this:

As a job, or a career how to get in with someone who does this professionaly. I guess it would have helped if I didnt leave that part out. :crazy:
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post #6 of 11
4/23/09 at 9:24pm
Mmmm.... sign up for a photography course / degree?
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post #7 of 11
4/25/09 at 4:04pm
Maybe you could post a notice at your local college asking for photography students who might be interested in food photography to 'play around' with food with you for a bit?
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post #8 of 11
4/26/09 at 9:35pm
I saw a show on this some years ago, covered stuff like varnishing items to make them glossy, painting the perfectly browned chicken, hiding cigarettes to create "steam" etc. There's certainly an art to it.
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post #9 of 11
5/4/09 at 6:48pm

food stylist

What do you want the photos for?There are a broad range of possibilities. It depends what you want to do and what your budget is. A photography student could be a good choice for the lower end of your budget. Any good student should be assisting a pro somewhere. A pro will have much more experience, giving you a better final product and faster results, and will cost much more.

A food stylist will give you much more help then you think they will, they think about food differently than you do.

Food stylist charge between $500 and $1500 a day(editorial vs commercial vs advertising, photo vs video), plus expenses, depending on what the project/client is. Commercial photographers start double that. You want a photographer who has significant food in there portfolio, as food is different than other still life.
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post #10 of 11
5/4/09 at 8:52pm
If you are close to NYC I'm sure there are a number of photographers who work with food photography. Start with an NYC phonebook, get the names of photographers and check out their websites. You might also want to check out the photo credits of food magazines. This will give you a lot of info. Food photography isn't really that much different that close range still life photography or product photography (not sure the technical term for this type of photography). The skill in food photography is the "styling." This is where the "art" of food photography really comes in. Using numerous techniques from airbrushing to blow torches, to creating non-melting sundaes to individually placing each leaf of lettuce in a salad, these are the people that make food photographs so tempting.
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post #11 of 11
5/17/09 at 8:58am
The CIA offers a class in Food Styling. If you want to do it for a career that is where to start. Then apprentice with someone.

The suggestions given by the prior posts is OK if you are doing pics for a personal web site or something, but for professional applications, IE., menu boards, magazines, web sites, etc.. there are special technical requirements. They don't shoot just .jpg pictures.

Also, my experience is that it can take several hours to properly shoot just one picture. Lighting, layout, styling.... can take a while to get just right. Sometimes we can shoot a whole menu in one day, the next day we would only get 3 shots in the can.

You can start out doing it part time. If you do the class and get a little experience behind you as a stylist, then go to a photographer that doesn't currently do food. Sell them the idea to do food and work with them. This is easier than trying to get your foot in the door with an established food photographer.
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