Photographers don’t often look to supermarkets for their big break. Bargains, yes. Lunch, sometimes. But career salvation? Unlikely.

Now, though, M&S Food has just partnered with the World Food Photography Awards – aka the Oscars of pointing a lens at something edible – to launch the M&S Food Rising Star category. And for once, the phrase “life-changing opportunity” isn’t hyperbole.

This new award offers something food photographers rarely get: a straight line from talent to paid commercial commission. The winner will be invited to shoot an actual M&S Food advertising campaign. Yes, the UK high street store famous for sensual voice-overs and close-ups of pouring sauces wants you (or at least, potentially you) to craft its next piece of national food lust.

It’s essentially a catapult into the commercial mainstream, garnished with a maximum £500 travel budget and a great deal of bragging rights. So it might well be worth a punt.

Why this matters

Of course, the photography sector is not exactly short of awards to enter. But this one grabbed my attention because the commercial food world is notoriously hard to crack. You can have impeccable still-life instincts, a studio stacked with clamps and scrims and a personal collection of backdrops organised by “emotional warmth”, yet still struggle to step into major brand work.

It's one of those slightly opaque sectors that runs on reputation, trust and the ability to produce a perfect quenelle under pressure. Breaking into the inner circle can feel like waiting for a dinner reservation that never opens.

M&S Food partnering with the World Food Photography Awards changes that dynamic. It formalises a pathway. It says: show us what you’ve got, and backs that invitation with a real, billable commission.

Rich Robinson, head of creative at M&S Food, stresses the brand already works with some of the best names in the business. But this new contest, he says, is about giving emerging talent a genuine stepping stone. And let’s be honest: anyone who’s watched an M&S Christmas advert knows the standard expected. This is not an “I’ll just fix it in post” scenario. This is achieving immaculate lighting on a single raspberry seed.

The challenge

Unlike some awards that hide opportunities behind multiple fee tiers or confusing categories, this one is refreshingly simple: submit as many five-shot portfolios as you like. Just remember: the winner of this category can’t win the overall World Food Photography Awards title. But honestly, if you walk away with an M&S advertising commission, I reckon that's a price worth paying.

For finalists, there’s also the satisfaction of seeing their work exhibited at Mall Galleries and, if selected, Fortnum & Mason. Not a bad pair of venues for your future “clients” section on LinkedIn.

So, should you enter? If you’re a food photographer looking for your break, I reckon this is one of the most straightforward, high-impact opportunities you’ll see for a while. If you’re a hobbyist thinking of going pro, it’s a chance to test your mettle. And if you simply enjoy photographing pastries at weekends… well, maybe this is your moment to shine too.

Just don’t forget to polish your props, tame your highlights, and show the broccolini who’s boss. Entries close February 8 2026.

Check out our guide to the best cameras for food photography

Kate is one half of the Kate and Brent Kirkman creative partnership, which specializes in storytelling solutions for a variety of clients. The duo are both Sony European Imaging Ambassadors and Rotolight Masters of Light. We caught up with her to ask about how she got into food photography.

What first attracted you to photography, and how did
you get into shooting food?

I needed a hobby to save me from the Groundhog Day of small children and I was attracted to photography because I love painting and it seemed a much faster way to be creative. Plus, I had two small children on hand to practise with.

I didn’t set out to become a food photographer – it happened quite naturally as part of my work capturing weddings and events. I was asked more and more to photograph the food, and from there, I realised it’s a speciality in its own right and I enjoyed the styling side of it, too. Compared to working with people, it’s calmer and more controlled – but the human element still finds its way in, particularly when the project involves chefs or restaurant teams, which I also love.

As your career developed, what was your most important breakthrough?

The biggest breakthrough for me, especially in terms of confidence, was understanding how to use additional lighting. Initially, it was all about using flash in as natural a way as possible, but recently I’ve moved towards continuous light. Food shoots can take hours so you need to create a lighting set-up or environment that can remain consistent over a long period. Once I understood how to shape and control light, everything changed. I also recognised the importance of developing a consistent style – clients are essentially buying a product, and they need to trust that what they see is what they’ll get.

What has been the best thing about your career to date?

Working with Sony as an Ambassador has been a highlight. It’s a fantastic brand – supportive, collaborative and open to ideas. We’re currently exploring ways to work with photography students and help prepare them for the reality of the commercial world beyond academia, which is a valuable area to support.

What advice would you give
someone who wants to get into
food photography as a career?

Start by photographing the food around you – at home, in cafés, at events – and use it as a chance to practise. Don’t be afraid to experiment with lighting and composition, and take the time to understand what makes food look appealing on camera. The learning curve is steep, but it’s worth it.

There are so many small businesses who desperately need food content for marketing and social media so finding people to provide the key ingredients shouldn’t be hard. One skill that can be overlooked is composition – it is critical to the success of food photography so 
if you don’t feel confident then brush up on colour theory, balance and contrast.

How difficult is it to master the technical elements, such as working with the kind of lighting required?

It’s not easy! We all need to put in the hours and get through the first 10,000 photographs. But the good news is that knowledge directly feeds confidence.
I can’t stress enough how important
it is to lean into the things you find intimidating or don’t understand. Once you get over that, everything is easier.

Start simple – single-light setups and experiment with diffusion and using reflectors to fill shadows. See if you prefer hard or soft light. Pay particular attention to the direction of the light source and then, slowly, add more lights if you think your set-up needs them.

Do you have a recognisable style
and how important is it to have one?

Yes, I do – and I’ve come to realize how important that is. When someone books you, they’re investing in your creative vision, so consistency is key. It’s about finding that sweet spot where your artistic instincts align with what clients are looking for. Having said that, don’t be a one-trick pony – at the end of the day, you are shooting for brands and businesses who will have a look and feel, and you need to be able to create the aesthetic they need.

Is all your food photography shot to a brief, or do you explore your creative approaches with personal work too?

Most of my food work is commissioned and brief-led, but I always try to carve out time for personal projects. It gives me a chance to test new ideas and shoot without constraints, which makes my client work better. My husband and I are creating an outdoor kitchen space for shoots, so we’re having fun with that.

Which Sony camera and lens combinations do you favour, and what could you not do without?

I use the Sony Alpha system and switch between a few favourites depending 
on the job. My main body is an A9 II but we also use an A7 IV and an A7S II for filming. The FE 24-70 F2.8 GM is versatile, especially when shooting wider setups. The FE 90mm F2.8 Macro G OSS is a staple for food – it allows you to capture all the little details. If you’re starting out, you can create wonderful food photography with a simple 50mm lens.

What sort of post-production
do you do to your images?

My editing style is clean and natural –
I want the food to look like something you could reach out and eat. I’ll adjust colour, contrast and sharpness to bring the image to life, but I try to avoid anything that feels over-processed. I sometimes add a subtle colour grade 
or filter if it enhances the final image.

Is social media important for getting your work seen and continuing to develop an audience?

Yes, it’s important. I’ve finally accepted that it’s here to stay. I’ll admit it doesn’t come naturally, but I’m committed to getting better. I’ve realised that with
a bit of effort and planning, it doesn’t have to be overwhelming – or take up
so much time. Part of the problem is that we have three photography brands so I can easily feel overwhelmed.

You might think a food photographer spends all of their time capturing close-up images of delectable plates, but food photography is much broader than that.

I was fortunate enough to talk to photographer, Josep Reverendo, about a project he photographed at Barcelona’s historic La Boqueria market. It’s a great example of how the worlds of food photographers, street photographers, and documentary photographers can collide. Here's the story of Josep's stunning photo project, in his own words…

This article was first published in the August 2024 edition of N-Photo: The Nikon Magazine.

Light and bright

After a few years shooting on analog cameras, I finally switched to the Nikon D90 and digital photography in 2010. This inspired me to start my urban photography project in Barcelona.

Over a decade later, I replaced my faithful DSLR and made the move to mirrorless, with the Nikon Z5. But my D90 served me well and is the sole camera I used to create this project.

I paired the camera with the Nikon AF-S DX 35mm f/1.8G. The 1.5x crop factor offers an angle of view similar to that of a ‘nifty fifty’ on a full-frame camera, which creates a natural-looking frame because it delivers a similar perspective to that of the human eye.

But what really makes this little prime stand out is its fast f/1.8 aperture, enabling it to render bright images with attractive, bokeh-filled backgrounds. It won’t break the bank, either, and can be picked up for around $100/£100 on the used market.

A fresh take

The Mercat de Sant Josep de la Boqueria – or La Boqueria – is a world-famous market in Barcelona [1]. Its origins date back to the end of the 19th century and, to this day, it’s crammed with a vibrant assortment of fresh produce, and the hustle and bustle of vendors and customers.

Unsurprisingly, this hive of activity makes it a must-visit destination for photographers. The historic market covers a huge area that spans over 2,500 square metres and accommodates around 300 stalls, all brimming with colour and flavor [2].

Its spectacular iron structure means a large portion of the market is undercover and, while it isn’t dark inside, the reduced daylight made it the perfect place to test out my fast prime.

And of course, wide apertures mean plenty of background blur and beautiful discs of bokeh. For this project, I wanted to go a step further with my use of bokeh. Here the blur isn’t just the backdrop, it’s a secondary protagonist – almost as vital as the main subject.

By focusing on the foreground, I’ve intentionally framed scenes of interest within the background blur to build a narrative. This creates imagery in which subjects aren’t totally clear [3]. Instead, they are insinuated, suggested. This creates a powerful atmosphere.

I like color and black-and-white imagery equally. However, in this series, color made sense so I could capture the cosmopolitan atmosphere and exuberance of the food. Undoubtedly, food is the main protagonist of these images: colorful fruits, fresh fish and vibrant chilled juices [4].

Market method

In scenes with artificial light, it’s important to achieve an accurate white balance to preserve natural-looking colors. The color balance of RAW images can be tweaked easily in post-production. But if you choose to shoot JPEG, then selecting the right white balance preset or even manually tweaking your camera's kelvin meter is essential.

Despite my lens’ fast f/1.8 aperture, I chose to narrow it down slightly – by a stop – to f/2.5. By increasing the depth of field slightly, I had a little more play in point of focus and ultimately ended up with more reliably sharp subjects [5].

This was crucial in capturing the ‘decisive moment’ – that moment when all the compositional elements of a scene come into harmony. A second before or a second later and the scene is no longer the same.

It can prove a little tricky to compose so close to the edge of the frame. You can either use single-point AF to physically move the focus point over your desired subject, or use AF-S or back-button focus to employ the focus and recompose method (lock focus first, then recompose from exactly the same position).

The latter is particularly useful if you need to react to a moment quickly.

In my images, the human anecdote is very important, I always attempt to capture the personality of people. I’m interested in the market as a part of life and as a living and changing spectacle. Details help the image to speak and I love to tell stories about life through my photography.

I particularly enjoy the beauty of special moments that only exist for a moment. I try to immortalize them with the camera so they can be examined and show that seemingly mundane moments are not always as simple as they might look when they fly by in reality.

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Want to see more of Josep's great work? I just love this cinematic night shoot! Plus, here's the best camera for food photography and the best camera for street photography.

Whether Santa’s brought you a new mirrorless camera for Christmas or you’re simply looking for a photography project you can do at home in the warm, the holiday season is the perfect excuse to indulge in a little food photography. After all, you shouldn’t have to look far to find an assortment of festive props and treats that you can use to compile a photogenic feast.

You don’t need much camera equipment, either. A kit lens and a tripod will stand you in good stead, and if you don’t have a photography lighting kit, then you can rely on diffused window light to get the job done. So, while the family settles down to watch Home Alone for the 50th time, grab your camera, tripod, and a few treats to photograph a festive feast.

1. Set the table

Diffused or indirect window light is a great way to illuminate food photography. If the light is lacking, consider illuminating your setup with an LED panel or even a household lamp. You could also use a reflector to bounce the natural light back onto the arrangement to fill shadows.

Begin by setting up empty plates and adding a few Christmas decorations to ‘sketch’ your composition without spoiling the food. I laid a tablecloth partially across the wooden table to provide multiple textures to add interest to the image.

2. Use a tripod and get the right lens

Food shots hinge on the arrangement. I put my camera on a tripod to roughly gauge the framing and keep it consistent, while I tweaked the arrangement of the food. If you’re shooting a static food display, use Exposure Delay Mode to avoid camera shake and mirror slap.

If you’re capturing movement, like pouring cream or a dusting of flour, a remote shutter release and burst mode is preferred. I used the Nikon Z 35mm f/1.8 S, but a ‘nifty fifty’ is a great alternative, like my DSLR-friendly Nkon AF-S 50mm f/1.4G ED. A kit lens would work well, too.

3. Add the figgy pudding

Once you’ve put together a rough layout and framed a rudimentary composition, you can begin to add in cold food items. If you’re photographing food that’s still cooking, try using similar-sized props in its stead so it doesn't cool or it spoils before you have time to photograph it.

I elected to keep my figgy pudding in its tub – before heating – so there was no danger of it collapsing while I moved items around and refined my composition. Try not to make your arrangement look too uniform; it should resemble a real Christmas spread that invites the viewer to sit at the table. Framing a chair or two will reinforce this.

4. Big up your bokeh

The festive season gives you an excellent excuse to add lots of bokeh to the background of your food shots. I put a Christmas tree behind my spread and opted for a simple string of white lights, so as not to distract too much from the food.

There are myriad of ways to increase the size of the bokeh: a wider aperture, longer focal length, physically moving the tree further back, or placing the camera closer to the point of focus. But bigger doesn’t always mean better. If the bokeh is too intrusive, it may detract from the subject.

5. Dial in your camera settings

I used single-point AF to focus on the figgy pudding. If you’re shooting a completely static food display, you can select your base ISO and dial in any shutter speed to compensate. I captured a hand pouring cream over my pudding and settled on 1/100 sec to freeze the movement, requiring me to up my ISO to 200.

I found that my Nikon's Flash white balance preset provided a neutral color temperature, which I could then tweak in post-production. Being able to freely alter white balance is one of many reasons why shooting RAW is always preferred.

6. Christmas color grading

Color grading allowed me to tweak individual colors within my image. After inputting general tonal edits in Adobe Lightroom Classic, I added magenta (+4) via the Tint slider and then headed into the Color Mixer’s Hue panel. I increased the intensity of Greens (+35), added red to Yellows (-20) and Oranges (-12), while using the Saturation panel to boost Reds, Oranges and Greens. I then used the Color Grading panel to add red to Midtones, orange to Highlights and blue to Shadows. Reds and greens really add to the festive vibe.

Quick tip: Photograph a flaming figgy pudding

After you’ve shot your festive spread, try capturing some frame-filling close-ups. My flaming figgy pud was shot with the Nikon Z 70-200mm f/2.8 VR S. Place the pud against a dark background to make the flames really pop and set your camera on a tripod. Use single-point AF to focus on the pudding and switch to manual focus to prevent hunting.

The flames burn brightest as soon as the pudding is lit, so enlist a friend to light it while you fire off a high-speed burst. I used 1/125 sec to freeze the flickering flames and a wide-open aperture to separate the pudding from the background. Always take great care when lighting a Christmas pudding – adult supervision is essential.

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Got a new camera for Christmas? Here are my 10 expert tips for getting to grips with it fast! If you're looking for another festive photography project, I made these fun custom bokeh shapes for my Christmas photography on a shoestring budget. And if you're looking for something interactive, check out my photography general-knowledge quiz.

World Food Day is on October 16, so what better time to celebrate the connection between food and photography? Leading camera equipment insurer photoGuard shares five effective tips for better food photography. As food photography can be a messy business, it makes sense to ensure your pricey equipment has the right level of cover…

1. The right light

The most important factor when setting up a food photo shoot is the light intensity and how it impacts the dishes you are photographing. It's generally best to take photos using natural ambient light – such as from a large window not struck by direct sunlight (a north-facing window in the Northern Hemisphere, a south-facing one in the Southern Hemisphere). Avoid flash or overhead lighting, but use a reflector to bounce the natural light back onto the face of the food.

2. Choose your angles

Try taking images from a variety of angles, but more often than not, the go-to shots for food photography are from a 45-degree angle or directly overhead. The 45-degree angle offers a similar perspective to one that a diner would have sitting down at the table ready to tuck in, while the overhead shot, commonly known as a 'flat lay' is a great way to show off the dish alongside its ingredients.

3. Think minimalist

Keep in mind that the food should always be center-stage of the shot, and minimize any background clutter that is likely to distract the viewer's attention. But that's not to say that there shouldn't be anything else in the scene, just make sure it's relevant. Cooking implements and ingredients used in the dish itself can work well, but use a shallow depth of field to blow these out of focus.

4. Avoid the shakes

Working only with window light indoors may mean that you need to work with a slow shutter speed, which can lead to blurry images caused by 'camera shake'. You could increase the ISO setting to compensate, but this will have an adverse impact on the quality of the image. The best way to avoid camera shake is to opt for a tripod and use a remote shutter release, to ensure the camera remains completely still during shooting. A tripod has another important benefit, as it enables you to compose the shot with pin-point precision, carefully setting up your scene to avoid unwanted distractions.

5. Pick the right lens

There are several factors to consider when selecting the best lens for food photography. While a fast standard zoom undeniably offers a huge amount of flexibility when it comes to accurately framing your shots, prime lenses have 'faster' maximum apertures, which enables you to use a shallow depth of field so that the focus is firmly on the food itself and everything else is creatively blurred.

Check out the best books on food photography

To celebrate World Food Day, I've collected a selection of tips and tricks from professional food photographers whose job it is to capture truly scrumptious captures.

Food photography is a subject that everyone can attempt in the comfort of their own kitchens. And while the best camera for food photography and the best lenses for food photography certainly help, a kit lens or 'nifty fifty' and a sturdy tripod are really the only essentials needed to capture stunning 'foodie' images.

The best part is, once you've wrapped the shoot, you can tuck in! It would be a shame for all those tasty treats to go to waste, after all…

This article was originally featured in N-Photo: The Nikon Magazine (issue 111), where a reader was invited to learn alongside the pro in question. Who coached them to take the excellent Super Shots (below)!

Professional food and garden photographer Jason Ingram took N-Photo reader Mick Thurman under his wing. They were joined by Silvana de Soissons, their stylist for the day, who cooked and sourced all the ingredients for the food to be photographed.

Tip #1 – Tell a story

Mick told N-Photo: "Jason and Silvana explained that a good food picture tells a story – you need to set the scene for the dish. Here [above, left] the hearty celeriac, leek and shallot soup is presented as the ideal winter warming meal. The tray, cloth and accessories were all selected to work together, and the fried sweetcorn and fresh herbs were added to provide a touch of color. Even the drink was picked with its image-enhancing qualities in mind, as sherry apparently gives a better hue in such shots than wine."

Tip #2 – Frame within a frame

Trays are useful props. They can be used to create a frame-within-a-frame in which to construct your composition. There’s no need to show the whole tray, however; the suggestion that it is there is enough.

Tip #3 – Keep your hood on

Jason recommends that you always use lens hoods when photographing food, as flare can be a particular problem when shooting with fast prime lenses at or near their maximum apertures. The use of a lens hood on Mick’s 85mm could have a small, but significant, effect on the resolution and saturation of his photographs.

Tip #4 – Pick your focus point with care

When using a shallow depth of field you need to pick where to focus with care. Jason and Mick chose the biscuit to focus on in Super Shot #2, then checked the focus on the laptop.

Tip #5 – Introduce some used props

One of the keys to successful food photography is to have a wide range of props with which to style your shots, and Silvana’s home has become an incredible museum of beautiful bowls, sieves, tablecloths, plates, spoons, and much more over her years of collecting cookware. She says that you always need to haggle: “One way of getting cheaper pieces is to buy those that are chipped or cracked – the imperfections won’t usually show in the shots.”

Tip #6 – Use a clamp like the Wimberley Plamp

The Plamp is an ingenious device that Jason uses in garden photography for holding plant stems in position; it stops them moving around in the wind. There are clamps on either end of a multi-jointed arm – one end attaches to the plant and the other to a tripod. Inside, Jason uses the Plamp for holding small reflectors in place. To fill small areas he uses sheets of A3 5mm foamboard. One end of the Plamp attaches to the table, and the other to the foam.

Pro food photographer, Olly Hearsey, joined N-Photo reader Caroline Wadey at Brighton restaurant Silo, which had the advantage of a professional kitchen – and chefs – to prepare food to be photographed…

Tip #7 – Slow down and consider each image

Caroline told N-Photo: "Olly suggested we start by creating a scene. We kept it simple with two marrows next to a massive window, then we used reflectors to fill in the shadows. I normally push my ISO up to ISO4000 and ‘spray and pray’ in the hope that I’ll get a shot that’s usable, but Olly made me realize that I was sacrificing quality for quantity. By taking a moment to think, he assured me, I’d end up with better photos."

Tip #8 – Move into the light

Light from a large window is great, especially when it’s overcast outside. A cloudy day diffuses the light, which is perfect as it produces soft shadows, whereas bright, direct sunlight will introduce hard, harsh shadows. It’s hard to balance the exposure in direct sunlight, too, with deep shadows and bright highlights pushing the extremes of the dynamic range. Olly used mountboard as a reflector; it’s great for bouncing light back into your subject. You can use one piece, two or even more, depending on your requirements.

Tip #9 – Light it up

If the weather isn’t with you, you don’t have large windows that let in ample light, or you want to shoot at night, use a studio light. Move the light off-camera – to do this you should have a light that’s capable of being triggered by a hotshoe-mounted wireless transmitter. Cheap wireless triggers can be bought for £15/$35. Use a softbox or umbrella to soften the light. Studio lights will also have a modeling lamp, which enables you to focus easily, and also shows how the light will fall on your subject, so you can preview the effect of any changes.

Tip #10 – Give your composition room to breathe

Composition depends on what’s in your scene and what you want to focus on. For Super Shot #4, Caroline focused on the bread's cracking crusty top. Don’t bring the subject too close to the edge of the frame. If you leave some area around the food to let it breathe, this will increase your cropping options in post-production. If you’re too close, move back and recompose. Angling the bread gives you a more artistic three-dimensional look, and helps make shadows more pronounced. You can also show more of the produce than if you shoot straight on.

Tip #11 – Use a sieve

A small sieve is so useful in food photography. If you try spreading flour over your food by hand you run the risk of it falling in clumps and spoiling the image, but if you sieve flour it’ll be nicely diffused. It adds another layer of texture and detail to what you already have.

Full-time blogger and food photographer, Donna Crous, works with publishers photographing recipe books and brands for recipe development. N-Photo reader and food blogger, Benji Millar, arrived having already baked biscuits, bread and other tasty treats especially for the shoot…

Tip #12 – Balance the scene

Benji told N-Photo: "When I’m getting my food ready I’m already visualizing the end result and that influences the way I style the board. I wanted to make an image that looked as if this freshly baked bread was about to be served up. I cut the end of the loaf and used that as a prop beside the knife. I used my 18-55mm at 30mm to include the whole of the bread box, and Donna suggested I include a little bit of ivy in the right-hand corner of the frame to balance the towel wrapped around the bread on the left."

Tip #13 – Giraffe pose...

Stand with your legs either side of your food on the ground. It’s important to make sure the image sensor is parallel with the surface you’re shooting. Making it perfectly symmetrical in this way means the depth of field is maximized from top to bottom. Also, if the camera is tilted slightly, one side of the food is closer to the sensor than the other and so will appear larger in the final shot.

Tip #14 – Use a reflector

When shooting using a window as a light source, the subject will be backlit, so you’ll need to use a reflector [above] to bounce light back at it to fill in dark shadows, but what effect do different-colored reflectors have?

1. Black is designed to absorb the light and reduce reflected light from other surfaces.

2. Gold fill is rarely used in Donna’s style of food photography, but it can warm up shadows.

3. Silver fill is more intense and is better to use when you’re faced with strong, direct sunlight.

4. White fill is the most natural way to bounce light as it doesn’t discolor the light.

Tip #15 – Use a shutter release

Benji found that the light was fading during certain setups because the sun went behind clouds. His ISO was already quite high so Donna suggested he use a tripod and remote shutter release to allow a longer shutter speed without the danger of camera shake.

Tip #16 – Photoboards

Donna uses waterproof, heat-resistant photoboards, meaning you can put hot food on them without fear of damage. She also uses a wide selection of convincing flexible background prints from Capture by Lucy, as it’s easy to wipe down the boards afterward.

Freelance photographer and stylist Victoria Campbell and N-Photo reader, Hannah Daniel, spent the day on-location in the kitchen at Apteekki, a plant-based health and nutrition cafe in Melton Mowbray, shooting next to the large, bright windows, where the chefs served up a variety of scrumptious dishes to shoot…

Tip #17 – Crop in to focus on the food

Hannah told N-Photo: "This shot [above, left] combines everything I learned throughout the day. A top-down view allows us to see the whole plate, but I’ve cropped in close to keep the focus on the food. It looks like someone’s about to take a bite, because the toast has been spread with pâté and chutney."

Tip #18 – Diffuse harsh light

In the afternoon the sun had crept around to the front of the building, with some direct sunlight spilling into the shot. So Hannah used the diffusion panel built into a 5-in-1 reflector. After unzipping the reflector and removing the diffuser, she placed it up against the window to soften the light.

Tip #19 – Take the time to style your dishes

The chefs did a great job of making the food look good, so Hannah first took some photos as it was presented. Then, after she got those shots in the bag, she experimented with the look of it. Here [above], Victoria suggested she split the pâté with a knife but then spread it over the toast with the back of a spoon to give it a smoother, more pleasing texture.

Tip #20 – Don't mix light sources

Victoria turned off the overhead strip lighting because it was contaminating the white balance of the light over the food. With the lights turned off, the Nikon could precisely render color tones – especially important with food photography.

Tip #21 – Add layers to the scene

To draw the eye through a scene it’s important to layer up the shot – you need something in the foreground, mid-ground and background to keep it looking interesting throughout the frame, especially when shooting across the food, rather than from above. Victoria placed some avocados behind the dish and asked Hannah to shoot with a wide aperture so that there would be some out-of-focus – but still clearly recognizable – texture in the background of the shot.

Tip #22 – Continuous drive mode
Alongside the food the pair also tried some pouring shots with drinks. As Victoria was pouring the drink off the teaspoon, Hannah used Continuous drive [above] to take multiple images during the pour. This meant she could cherry-pick her favourite photo afterwards, instead of trying to nail one shot during the action.

If you're a food photography lover, then check out the best reflectors and the best tripods.

I thought I'd celebrate World Food Day by photographing a flavorsome flat lay. Social media was once teeming with dodgy food snaps, but grainy pictures of pancakes are now few and far between.

Instagram is awash with perfectly lit images of fresh produce, neatly arranged atop quaint kitchen counters. But if you’re intimidated by a lack of studio lighting, culinary skills, attractive kitchen space or access to the best camera for food photography, don't be! Food photography is one of the most accessible genres out there.

In fact, many of the best lenses for food photography are 'nifty fifties', so you don't even need super-expensive optics. I photographed this tantalizing flat lay in natural light. The trick is to shoot the food-themed still life on a lightweight base that can be moved into an area with great ambient lighting. You can then manipulate the light with a reflector.

My base was formed using self-adhesive vinyl planks, which I set up in a bay window. This enabled the sunlight to strike the subjects from multiple directions and soften the shadows for a more even coverage.

The central column of my Manfrotto 190 Go!! tripod can be fixed at a 90º angle. This meant I could adjust the arrangement of my subjects, while keeping the frame fixed, all the while using my Nikon D800's rear LCD to keep tabs on the composition.

That's all there is to it – here's how to rustle up a 'foodie' flat lay…

1. Gather ingredients and 'foodie' props

I'm not known for my culinary expertize, so I purchased food from the supermarket. The props are household items but, if you need to buy anything, thrift stores are affordable and full of inspiring trinkets. Your subjects should complement your base. I paired rustic foods with a rustic base and added a few vibrant food items to offset the delightfully earthy tones.

2. Find an attractive surface

I stuck self-adhesive vinyl planks on construction paper to form my base, but you could use anything from tiles to lengths of wood or fabric. Just make sure your base isn't too heavy – you'll be moving it around to find the best possible source of light.

3. Set up by a window

Set up in a well-lit area, like my bay window or outside (if it's calm enough). On a cloudy day, clouds will act as a diffuser and produce softer shadows. If you're shooting on a bright clear day, like me, be careful not to position the base in direct sunlight as the shadows will be too harsh.

4. Tilt your tripod

A tripod enables you to adjust the position of your subjects without moving the frame, and ensures you can shoot at low ISOs for maximum quality. If you've no alternative then you can still shoot handheld, but a tripod is recommended.

5. Create your composition

There's no hard and fast rule for arranging your food-themed still life, so experiment. Use the rear LCD to keep tabs on your composition and the grid overlay to ensure the frame is lined up. I used a tea towel to lead the eye toward the main focal points, the espresso and porridge. A standard focal length like my Nikon AF-S 50mm f/1.8G will help minimize distortions at the edges of the frame.

6. Bounce light with a reflector

You can soften shadows by using a reflector to bounce light back onto the subjects. If you're shooting on your own, set your camera's timer to ten seconds. This not only provides you with enough time to position your reflector, but it ensures you don't jog the tripod as you press the shutter button.

Quick tip

If you're only shooting short subjects that sit on a similar focal plane to your base, you can get away with shooting flat lays at wider apertures. I shot at f/8 to increase the depth of field enough that it compensated for the tall bottle of orange juice.

Consider yourself a bit of a 'foodie'? You might be interested in the best tripods or the best books on food photography.

Now in its third year, the Yeast Photo Festival aims to examine how the production and consumption of food by humans affects society, and negatively impacts the climate. 

The festival will be held in Matino and Salento, Italy, between 19 September and 03 November.

The photographs on show hope to investigate and promote a renewed relationship between humans and the environment through food, and this rendition of the festival is about asking questions. 

What did you eat today? Where did you get the ingredients – the supermarket, the market, your garden, a cafe? 

Are you aware that your love of Quinoa has made it impossible for poor communities in countries where it’s grown to afford their staple food? 

Or that Mexican forests are being illegally destroyed to make way for your avocados? 

All these questions prompted the name of this year's festival, From Planet to Plate. 

"Questions," explains the festival’s Artistic Director Edda Fahrenhorst, "that invite us to reflect on our daily food and its origins. These facts not only increase our awareness about food but also raise important social and environmental issues."

Take a look at a selection of the photographs and artists involved. 

Take a look at the best cameras for beginners, the best professional cameras, and the best lenses for portraits.

Early into our chat, Emma Dunham and I find out that we share something in common – we both used to live in Sydney. I reminisce about the ferry from the seaside suburb of Manly, cutting its way across the harbor to Circular Quay, and declare that it must surely be one of the world’s best office commutes. “I know,” she replies, “and they always had this kiosk with these spinach and ricotta pasties. Each day I’d say, ‘I’m not going to eat one, I’m not going to eat one’, and every day I still ate one!” 

That a professional food photographer relates a favorite snack to a time when she lived on the other side of the world may not sound surprising. But Emma switched to food photography less than five years ago, having worked as a portrait and commercial photographer for over a decade. Clearly, her love of food had always been there but, as she freely admits, it was when she fell out of love with commercial portraits that she began to look at spinach and ricotta under a new light. As a portrait photographer, she was shooting corporate headshots, rows of schoolchildren and families with their children, but while her subjects were smiling for the camera, Emma was anything but smiles behind it…

This interview first appeared in N-Photo magazine. 

You might be interested in the best Nikon cameras along with the best Nikon lenses – and particularly the best Nikon Z lenses designed for its mirrorless cameras. 

Marketing yourself as a photographer can be a pain point for many of us. All the usual questions pop up – how do you do marketing? How do you book your next client? How do you make yourself stand out from the crowd? 

Although understanding these questions and finding the answers can seem both difficult and daunting, finding the right information that hasn't been buried in the depths of a treasure trove of experience can be equally hard.

I always say that having a photography business is more about business than it is about photography. Having the talent and skill is crucial for success, of course, but you need to think with a business head to get your work in front of the right clients – and must think outside the box to grow your career to where you want it to be. 

I could sit you down and discuss all the cringe-worthy ways I have tried to get new clients and all the challenges I have had, but that would be a whole different article. Instead, I have listed the five key points that I wish I had been told earlier in my career. Had I known these, it would have saved me a lot of trouble, sleepless nights, and second-guessing myself. 

Portfolio

Your portfolio is, hands down, the most important part of your business. This is what you want to give as a first impression, what you want the client to know and how you want to be portrayed. 

Creating a photography portfolio in the shape of a website is a crucial way to reel in potential clients and immerse them in your work. Obviously, it is key to use your best photos and list the services you offer. If you have reviews it is vital to include them, but don't worry if you are just starting out as it won’t detract from getting booked. 

However, an often-overlooked aspect is using your SEO (search engine optimization) to attract organic leads. Work on identifying keywords within your photography niche and include them on your website. This will help your ideal client find you simply by searching what they are looking for on Google. 

Nailing all these things will do one thing – encourage the client to book you.

The truth about networking

"Network to secure paid jobs" is the one piece of advice everyone seems to give. But why? I am still trying to figure that one out. When I first started my photography business, I spent a lot of time networking, trying to crack the secret code to landing clients simply by sparking up a relationship with someone. However, I stopped as quickly as I started. 

I agree that networking can be beneficial in some situations, but times have changed. Focus on your craft and do your own research on clients and businesses you want to work with. This approach will be far more beneficial than trying to cultivate relationships that, most likely, won’t land you a paid job – in fact, networking encourages favors over paid work. Personally I can’t remember the last time I went to a networking event, but my business has never suffered because of it.

Referrals are another story, though. These are based not solely on your photographs themselves but on how well you have worked with a client – so learn to harbor those types of relationships instead.

Sales and marketing 101

Although it may be daunting and uncomfortable at first, putting yourself out there as a photographer is crucial to getting noticed. By this, I mean taking a chance and reaching out to clients, sending over your portfolio and proposing how you can make a change to their life or business through beautiful photography. 

This is where the magic happens! Such a self-confident approach will set you ahead of your competition and encourage clients to work with you, based on your eagerness to work with them. Essentially, it shows passion and determination. Over time, this will become your biggest asset.

Starting afresh in a new location

Of course, being a freelance photographer comes with its perks: you can work from anywhere, travel for a living and still make money. Although moving to a new location can seem daunting in terms of feeling as if you're "starting again", look at it as a way to begin anew. 

Moving to Dubai, I researched differences in the market and had a rethink on how I presented my photography. In the end, what really worked for me was simply having a physical copy of my tailored portfolio professionally printed in an A4 booklet – and handing it out to the restaurants and hotels in the Emirates that I wanted to work with. 

Although this "cold call" approach may seem hard and somewhat embarrassing, it was a successful one and that is how I booked my first shoots out here. 

Another way that I started getting my name known was by refining my pitch and appeal on Upwork, a website for freelancers. That meant that I could hit the ground running. If, like me, you can work with clients remotely, focus your attention on this, as it will allow for multiple sources of income without having to rely on commissions from where you currently live. It certainly makes it easier to travel around.

Pricing yourself

I would easily say this is one of the biggest frustrations in the photography industry. Pricing varies massively depending on genre, experience and the nature of the project itself. Although I can’t necessarily tell you what to charge, I can't stress enough that you need to take everything into account when pricing yourself. 

I am a food photographer and, apart from the all-important factors of time and creativity, I include the pricing of backdrops, props, the ingredients needed, cleaning and packing up my studio, dishes that need to be washed – the list goes on. 

Remember, you’re charging for the entire photography process. If you’re struggling to price yourself or know that it's about time to raise your prices, I recommend you make a note of the entire process from the initial idea to the concept to delivery, then include everything involved in a cost breakdown when proposing a price to the client. 

Honestly, this will educate them on all the behind-the-scenes elements of their shoot. If this process is followed properly, clients won’t second-guess you – trust me.

Catch up on our career features

Digital Photographer magazine has regular features on professional photography and navigating the business side. Get your back issues here.

Take a look at the best cameras for food photography, along with the best lenses for food photography, to make your subjects look as delicious as possible!

To capture the title-winning shot, Jon travelled to Mumbai, India, one of the busiest cities in the world. “I read an article years ago about food colourings in sweets, with candy floss as an example, so I could vividly see what the photo series would look like,” he says. 

Although Jon won the title, he does not describe himself as a food photographer in the traditional sense. “Taking images of lasagne doesn’t interest me, I focus mainly on the human side of the equation. As a food image, it’s a bit different and in the world of photography different is your superpower”. When creating a personal project, Jon finds a back story that initially inspires him that has certain criteria he is looking for – and this idea ticked all his boxes.

Photographing in Mumbai brings challenges, including the relentless heat and humidity and the sheer amount of people. Shooting at night was a good option, as the temperatures are slightly lower, it’s a bit less busy and the jet lag is less of an issue. Therefore, lighting was one of Jon’s first considerations along with the initial practicality. “What lighting can I take on the plane with me, what is portable and flexible as I don’t know the city layout. Then I ask myself what atmosphere I want to create from the lighting setup. It’s all about the atmosphere – enhancing what’s naturally there,” Jon says.

“Getting around in Mumbai is a nightmare and our setup with all the lighting attracted a lot of interest. We had an amount in cash for smoothing the way with local police, which is an unusual item to see on the production plan,” he explains. As the images were shot at night, Jon could control the lighting, and give it an unusual take. “I had a crew of two assistants, and we set up the shot with the lighting as quickly as we could with the crowds building up around us. The portrait was shot with a Canon 5DS R, with 50mm Sigma f/1.4 lens at 1/160 sec at f/5.6 and ISO 400,” Jon explains.

Get inspired

Let your environment influence you to develop ideas with impact 

“I allow inspiration to come to me in any guise – it could be something I see when walking around London, on TV or online. The smallest unusual item can spark an idea. I let my ideas stew for a while, if the concept keeps popping up, I know I’m onto a good idea. Once I’ve made a decision to do a personal portrait project, I don’t hang about. I get it planned and booked, often in fear that someone else will complete a similar project. Ideas are the key – original ideas are gold dust.”

Career Advice

First-hand tips to build, form and develop your photography business

1. Take every opportunity

“My most important tip for early career photographers is always to grab every opportunity that is offered to you. You don’t need to emerge fully formed. Take the opportunity and make the most of it – at the very least you will learn how to get better. There are great images everywhere, you have to get out there and find them.”

2. Build your team 

“I have a small and loyal mix of people I call upon so I can scale up and down for any shoot. I work with assistants, as you might expect, but as you grow, this will extend to other areas, such as accountants, kit hire houses, stylists, makeup artists and designers. Treat people well and they tend to put a shift in for you when you need them.”

3. Invest in yourself

“I put a fixed percentage of turnover into a separate bank account and 100 percent of that has to be spent on creative development. It’s a simple trick but one that works for me. If I have a few spare days between commercial assignments, then great. I can reinvest some of the cash into shooting a little personal project.”

Shooting food is one of the easiest ways to enjoy still-life photography. A bowl of fruit and a basic camera are all you need to get started. If you want to take it further, you’re only limited by your imagination and creativity.

Bea Lubas is a leading practitioner of food photography and will speak at The Photography & Video Show this month. As a Lightroom Ambassador, she will share her tips for editing food photos in the popular software application. 

We caught up with Lubas to find out more about her and her upcoming talk. ‘Tools and techniques in Lightroom’ with Bea Lubas takes place at The Photography & Video Show on 18 March at 1pm, in the Editing & Post-Production Suite, and is free to attend. Click here to buy your tickets.

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Working with natural light has one great advantage: it gives photography a unique and natural atmosphere that is difficult to recreate in the studio. But daylight is anything but uncontrollable and, used correctly, it can have a great influence on the overall look and visual language of your image.

To control the light and shadows, it is necessary to remember that the quality of light changes throughout the day. If you photograph under an overcast sky, in the morning or in the afternoon, the light creates soft shadows and reflections, whereas the midday sun tends to create more extreme effects. The harsh incidence of light emphasises the shadows and produces graphic and unnatural results. 

Food photography offers the opportunity to learn and understand how to use light in a natural way. In this genre, many photographers work with daylight, as it makes the food more appetising and realistic looking but also shows off the special features in a stylish way. Low ISO settings, wide aperture and long shutter speeds make it possible to get the best results, even when shooting in lower light. 

With products however, don’t try to increase the brightness by working with extremely large apertures. This affects the depth of field and reduces the sharpness of the elements. Instead, use a tripod and a longer exposure to balance the light. Learn the optimal camera settings, perspectives and compositions to get the most out of daylight and you may not need to work in the studio anymore.

Before and after

Shooting steps

1. Find your spot 

Build your set close to a window and avoid extraneous light sources. In this way, you avoid yellow tinges and elements will benefit from soft light reflections and shadows. If needed, use a reflector to brighten up the shadows.

2. Think about light 

Try out different arrangements of the food to analyse the individual effect of the light and find the best perspective. A 45° angle shows off the main features while
a bird’s eye view provides a wider overview. 

3. Secure your camera

When you have decided on the perspective, mount the camera on a tripod to capture maximum light when working with long exposures. To reduce the risk of movement, work with the built-in camera timer or use a remote shutter release.

4. Switch to manual

To master natural light, take full control of the settings. Use low ISO values and correct the overall brightness by varying the exposure times. Select the smallest aperture and increase it until the desired image sharpness is achieved.

5. Find your style

Try a range of different backdrops, keeping an eye on how each one affects the visual appearance of the main elements and overall atmosphere. Focus on both texture and colour and make sure to bring out the details as much as possible.

6. Use negative space

Sometimes, less can be more, so don’t try to add too many components. Instead, focus on the main subjects to enhance their visual properties. Negative space can help your composition, the eye focuses on these and balances the image.

More tutorials 

• Ditch your tripod – try handheld HDR instead!
• Long exposure flash photography can give you mind blowing results
• Street photography: how to remove distracting elements with long exposures

More about food photography

• 10 tasty food photography tips
• Best camera for food photography
• The best lenses for food photography: make your supper the star
• The best books on food photography: whet your appetite for picture taking!

Leading global second-hand photo and video equipment retailer, MPB, has announced a partnership with the prestigious Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year awards. Together they will host an in-person masterclass for aspiring and professional food photographers, to raise money for the Square Food Foundation charity based in Bristol, England.

One of the most esteemed food photographers in the industry, Rob Wicks, will be hosting the masterclass and teaching up to 20 participants an array of skills – including the art of storytelling, lighting, texture, styling and post-production in food photography, followed by a chance to put their skills into action. 

• Make your meals look irresistible with the best cameras for food photography

Bristol-based aspiring food photographers, listen up! There's a great opportunity taking place right at your doorstep next month, as on April 03, you could attend a professional masterclass hosted by none other than Rob Wicks.

 You'll also have the unique experience of being shown the tips and tricks of the trade, and all for a good cause too. Have you ever wanted to finesse the art of food photography? Now is the time - And you get to eat the food afterwards too!

The morning session will take place at the Royal West of England Academy to begin your training, and then attendees will be thrown in the deep end with an exceptional opportunity to test out their newfound skills at the multi-award-winning Poco Tapas Bar restaurant in Stokes Croft, Bristol. 

Tickets to the masterclass will cost £20 (approximately $25 / AU$35) plus fees, with all proceeds being donated to the Square Food Foundation, which aims to reduce hunger and improve health and wellbeing by connecting people through food and the joy of cooking. 

Attendees will also benefit from the chance to borrow professional camera kit, courtesy of MPB, to use for the event. Slots are beginning to fill up quickly, so book now to avoid disappointment.

Any images that are captured on the day could also potentially be entered into the upcoming Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year 2024, which will open for entries at the end of summer. 

Entries for the 2023 edition of the competition closed in February, which means that we can expect to see the anticipated winners of this latest edition announced in due time.  

For more information about this amazing event and fantastic opportunity, head over to MPB  – and grab yourself one of the best cameras or best lenses for food photography for a bargain price while you're at it! 

• You might also be interested in the best books on food photography. Why not take a look at these 10 tasty food photography tips to help you get started, as well as the top 10 food photographers you should follow on social media. 

Entries will soon be closing on February 5, 2023 for the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year competition. As we enter the festive season, now is your last chance (and the perfect time!) to start shooting some creative foodie images. 

To help with inspiration for your next food photography shoot, the competition organizers have put together a collection of mouth-watering festive food images from previous entries that will have you making flour angels in no time. 

• Look at our picks for the best cameras for food photography

The Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year competition also welcomes film submissions as well as still images, and the twenty-plus categories celebrate the range, diversity, creativeness, and breadth of food photography as a genre. 

New for 2023, the competition has announced a new category for food photographers to enter, titled The Pink Lady Moments of Joy category, for images that show or represent the joy experienced through cooking, preparing, serving, or consuming food. The category winner for Moments of Joy will be awarded the prize of £1,500 ($1,800 / AU$2,675 approximately).

Other categories that you can enter in the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year competition also apply to the festive season, such as the Food for the Family category, as well as the Food at the Table, and Champagne Taittinger Food for Celebration categories. 

There's also a category called On the Phone that accepts images captured using your smartphone, when times call for you to put the "proper" camera away at the dinner table. These categories are all perfect opportunities for capturing your festive food photographs, as family traditionally comes together. 

Don't miss the deadline of February 5 to enter the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year competition 2023, and get your best food photographs entered for your chance to win a prestigious trophy as one of the several category winners, or £5,000 ($6,000 / AU$8,900 approximately)  as the overall chosen winner. 

• You may also be interested in The best lenses for food photography, as well as the best books on food photography. Check out these 10 tasty food photography tips and discover how to use a white napkin as a reflector in our interview with food photographer, Emilie Franzo.

Entries for the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year 2023 have just opened. Now in its 12th year, the internationally renowned competition shares important food stories from around the world documenting where it comes from, how it's enjoyed, who harvests and cooks it, and, how the cost of living crisis affects people's ability to eat.

Since its inception, the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year competition has received more than 100,000 entries from almost 100 countries and every year the award is split into several different categories. This year the 25 categories include a food stylist award, on the phone, MPB award for innovation, food at the table and many more.

• Read more: Best camera for food photography

Caroline Kenyon, the director and founder of the competition said, "Governments across the world grapple with the cost of living crisis, food banks struggle to keep pace with demand, battleships are on standby to escort grain from the port of Odessa. Meanwhile, in the every day, we continue to grow produce, to gather in, to cook, to eat, to celebrate."

Last year's winning selection included photos of fishermen in Mandalay, Myanmar, casting their nets for the morning catch, a table full of Chinese Hakka dishes from the Jiangxi Province, a colorful aerial view of pineapple fields in Chiayi, Taiwan and a mythical Medusa inspired portrait created from vegetables.

The competition is judged by a panel of more than 30 chefs, food photographers, recipe book authors, publishers and restauranteurs who have years of experience and endless knowledge between them. 

Suzanne Becker Bronk, a 2022 finalist said, “I do not usually enter competitions but entered Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year because the imagery is so stellar and the contest focuses specifically on food and wine. Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year has elevated the art of food and wine photography with their well-run and beautifully curated competition. I am inspired by many of their winners and have discovered excellent food and wine photographers from all over the world.”

A cash prize of £5,000 will be awarded to the overall winner while category winners could receive anything between £1,500 in cash to £300 worth of vouchers to use at various photographic and imaging retailers. Winners will also have their work shared by some of the biggest media outlets in the world such as The Times, Forbes and the BBC.

To enter this year's competition, head to the Pink Lady Food photographer website to register. Entries cost £30 for five images, each additional image is £6 and the deadline for submissions is 5 February 2023.

Scroll down to see some of our favorite winning and shortlisted images from the 2022 award.

If you find yourself out for a meal with the family for a special occasion, of course you'll want to grab a group photo while everyone is together, and it's no secret that some people really can't take a clear photo, even when using a basic smartphone. This is where Hilton's newly trained Waitographers can come in useful. 

Group selfies can actually be a tricky thing to organize in most settings, deciding who will take the photo, who has the best camera phone or the one with the widest lens… and more often than not, there'll still be a thumb in the bottom corner of the image, and maybe a little blur from holding the phone at an absurd angle. 

• Wondering which is the best camera for portraits?

Hilton Hotels has identified this group selfie problem, and has decided to certify its team of waiters and staff as smartphone photographers, providing extensive and official training by renowned photographer, Roger Moukerzal, to ensure that its guests have an exceptional dining experience.

These staff are now being referred to as what Hilton is calling Waitographers, and will be around to offer smartphone photography assistance at all times during your evening meal, at participating Hilton hotels. 

"We want to make sure that every memory at Hilton lives on forever and so we’re launching a new first – the Waitographer," says Hilton. "New, unforgettable memories are waiting for you at Hilton, and so are our certified Waitographers… When you want to capture the moment perfectly, it matters where you stay!" 

While the Hilton chain of hotels are certainly known for being very high class and fancy (and expensive!), this latest advertising campaign oozes privilege, whether intentionally or not, and is portraying through subtleties in its promotion that only a certain type of higher class individual could be a guest at the Hilton. 

The video (above) almost makes you feel sorry for the waiter dealing with unpleasant and entitled diners, and many have pointed out that the overall marketing of the recent Waitographers initiative could be sending the wrong message by implying that only those who can afford to dine at the Hilton deserve great images.

It's pretty admirable that Hilton employed the help of a professional photographer such as Roger Moukarzel to train staff on phone photography practice, as opposed to just expecting them to improve their skills via their own methods as a job requirement. We suspect other restaurant chains may eventually follow in the footsteps of this approach, and expect their waiters to be able to snap decent phone photographs as a way to promote better customer service.

But, isn't it a little entitled for someone to expect an on-demand photographer at the snap of a finger to capture their evening? Surely waiters and service staff have enough on their plate (pun intended) as it is doing other elements of their jobs without having to please influencers, when really it should be the person's own responsibility to snap group and solo selfies? 

This certainly says a lot about the reliance society has put on quality photography required at a moment's notice, that it is now even being considered as a requirement for service hosts to be able to supply smartphone photography to guests on top of having to do their usual jobs.

Everyday photography, including self-portraiture, can now be captured accurately with smartphones, though this may have the alternate effect of reinforcing the need for clients to pay professional photographers for their services, if people and influencers are desiring the top quality standards that a smartphone can't achieve. 

What do you think as a photographer? Is this idea from Hilton great for business, or in poor taste? Let us know!

Read more:

Best lenses for food photography
10 tasty food photography tips
Best books on food photography

As food photography has continued to blossom in popularity in recent years, and with so many of us stuck in our homes over the past two years, a new era of talented creators have taken the scene by storm. 

But out of all of these incredible innovators, Emilie Franzo stands out from the crowd with her unique take on classic, rustic French cuisine – known specifically for her mouthwatering rustic pie creations among other tasty treats she concocts. 

Having written a collection of well-received cookbooks in recent years, as well as amassing an Instagram following of 168k, Emilie has been sharing her professional photography journey, what kind of food makes her tick, and her creative process for taking such wonderful images.

Q. How did you become a food content creator? What drew you to food? 

It was pure coincidence really! I never expected to make it my full-time job. I’ve always had a passion for cooking as it’s always been a big thing in my family, making lunches and big dinners together for everyone. When Instagram started to become popular, I thought it would be a nice way to share my passion for food with the world, so I just started posting pictures of the food I was making for my family and friends. 

Over time, people started taking notice and asking for my recipes, but these were too lengthy for Instagram – this is what kickstarted the idea for my blog. From there, I knew I needed to put more effort into my photography – I was creating something bigger and I needed my images to reflect that. I bought my first professional camera and started focusing on growing my platform and upping my photography skills. 

These are the best cameras for food photography.

The decision to go full-time as a content creator came after quite a discouraging experience when I was working full time in communications, I thought, “I’m 25 and I’m going in to work unhappy everyday – this can’t be my life”. With both my Instagram page and blog doing really well, and more companies approaching me to work with them, I knew it was the right time to start something of my own.

Q. What are the most popular photos on your feed you have captured? Why do you think they’ve garnered so much attention compared to your other creations?

Right now, my best performing posts are my signature rustic pies, which is something I’m known for in France. I think this is because people are really into pastry content at the moment, and it’s also appealing to the eye. The look of the crust, the mouthwatering filling – it really invites you to dig in. 

They’re also great for telling a story. Sometimes I take the pictures while I’m making the pie, and I include the ingredients all around the scene, like eggs and sugar. This makes people feel like they’re in the kitchen with me, and that helps create a warm energy around the picture. And then at the end, with the pie finished and some nice plates framed around it, I can create that personal connection that makes people think they’re at the table with me and they can take a slice of it.

However, the most liked picture on my Instagram so far this year is a picture of crepes I made for Candlemas. In France, it is tradition to make crepes on this day and we all love to get involved. This picture worked because it's a dish that a lot of people like, but also because of how the image is framed with different kinds of ingredients, such as lemons and honey.

Q. Do you use a particular camera for food photography and why? 

I used the Canon EOS 6D for about three or four years of my content creation journey. I’m always travelling around or on shoots for clients, and the 6D was an easy, professional camera to carry around. I also loved the built in Wi-Fi capabilities, it was super useful for sharing work with clients straight to their smartphone or work laptop.

Nowadays, I use the Canon EOS R. About a year ago I wanted to try something new and shake up my content – and I haven’t looked back! It’s also helped up my video content game. Videos are becoming more and more important for engagement on various platforms, and I needed to have the right camera for the job as my clients are looking to me to produce more video content for them.

Q. What competitive advantage do cameras give vs smartphones in helping to capture your unique style of content?

To me, using a professional camera has really allowed me to elevate my business. And clients notice the equipment I bring to shoots. The details, the recording capabilities, lighting options, it’s just much more versatile with a professional camera.

Q. You have quite a dark, atmospheric vibe in your photos – how do you go about creating this? Is there a specific lighting set-up you use? What would be a simple lighting kit/set-up for beginners who want to level up their food photography game?

It’s funny because most people doing what I do tend to live in the countryside, you know – in big country houses and massive, homey kitchens – I’m doing all of this in my apartment in the middle of a big city.

However, I’ve done my best to create a signature atmospheric style with what I have to hand. One of the most important things to think about when taking up food photography is to have a nice, big surface to frame your food and props. 

For this, I simply use a piece of wood that I found on the street. So you don’t need to spend a lot of money to achieve this look. And then for the lighting, I use natural lighting. Sometimes I’ll use some dark materials and fabrics to help create this moody vibe as well, but normally my shoots are done pretty cost-effectively.

Q. What is your process when you set up a shoot? What settings and kit would you advise using when photographing food?

It depends if it’s for clients or for my own platforms. With clients, they usually have their own needs and demands, so I have to work around that. For myself though, it’s a much more natural, instinctive process. 

It’s just like, I could be walking down the street to the market and I see beautiful produce, e.g. strawberries and think about what I can make with these. Once I have decided on the recipe, I start arranging things on my board. It’s designed to feel random and natural, so I play around with putting dishes in the centre or corner and then constructing the food and ingredients all around those, as well as glasses, other props, etc. 

Q. How do you come up with new ideas for your feed? How do your techniques and style differ across your Instagram posts? 

It’s definitely the food that influences and inspires my content – it’s better this way for me. I have my own personal brand and know how I like to construct a story. However, there are also colours that I love to use such as green, orange and brown and these colours are pretty consistent in my pictures. This is my way of developing that personal brand that’s unique to me and that helps me get recognised across social media. 

Q. What are some of your favourite creative techniques for foodie shoots (e.g. the photo of a photo shot, photographing through a glass)? Do your dishes influence the content you create? Or are they just your subjects?

I love playing with the depth-of-field in my images. I’ll often use flowers or fresh herbs as it’s nice for the aesthetic of my content. Also, it’s great for beginners because it shows you don’t need to invest much to develop your own techniques and style. You can typically find flowers or other plants around where you live or buy them quite cheaply from your local florist or even a grocery store. As you can tell, I like to use whatever is around me.

Q. How do you work creatively with props (e.g. cutlery, ingredients, flowers, candles)? What are the essential props any aspiring food photographer should have at home?

Ceramics – it’s a bit of a trend. I’m noticing a lot more shops are opening up at the moment where you can find some great, rustic style ceramic dishes. But if you want to create that vintage, rustic style you don’t necessarily have to spend a lot of money. You can usually pick them up from relatives, like your grandparents or parents. Same with vintage cutlery – it doesn’t need to be a big investment. 

I also like to play with different materials for my shots, like dish towels or napkins. They’re easy to find and you play around with different colour and texture combinations to define your own personal style.

Q. What is your process when doing a tapas style set up?

I love to create big tapas boards. It's something I usually do when friends are coming over. Instead of having a classic dinner with starter, main and dessert, I prepare several little snacks that I put all together on a big board so that everyone can get involved. It's very colourful and tasty.

When I want to take a shot of this kind of board, I usually place different colours, textures and styles of tapas close to each other so that they stand out more. I also put some in bowls or on little plates to create different levels and to structure the picture. For this kind of dish, it's better to take a top shot picture to see all the different elements. 

Q. How do you tackle shooting in a dimly lit restaurant or environment?

Now that’s a big question! I get this quite a lot from my followers such as, “How do I take pictures in a restaurant? The lights are always so dim and yellow”. There are some simple steps you can take to try and remedy the scenario at times. For the light, always try to nab a seat by the window so you can get some natural light onto your food. 

If that’s not possible, a little trick I picked up when shooting in dark restaurants is to create a makeshift reflector using a white napkin. Just stand them up next to your plate and you’re good to go. If you’re not too shy, you could also take your plate and go outside.

I would also leverage candles they often light if you’re going at nighttime. You may not get a lot of light, but you can replicate that dark, moody atmosphere, using the shadows to create some really interesting shots. 

Q. How do you select your photos for Instagram? For example, how do you decide between what goes onto your website, your socials or your portfolio?

I usually decide in the editing/touch-up process. I use a mobile editing app which kind of lets me get a sense of how the images will look on my Instagram feed. It’s never really premeditated – during the shoot I’ll just take pictures as I go along. If I don’t have a picture for every step, that’s ok – I don’t hold myself to a set plan or structure. Otherwise, I feel I would be flooding my feed with too many photos. 

Q. How do you leverage Instagram’s tools to make creative content on Instagram Stories (e.g. with boomerangs)? Anything hacks you can share with budding creators?

I actually don’t use many of Instagram’s tools. Instead, I use a mobile app which gives me a bit more creative flexibility with tools and filters. It helps me create the narrative of the work before downloading and posting straight to Instagram. It’s much easier for adding in links, hashtags, etc. As well as just organising the content. It’s also great for Instagram Stories as well, as I can plan them in advance rather than having time gaps between Stories.

Q. Are there any food photography trends that you think will become popular in the future? Or are on the way out?

It’s hard to say at the moment. The moody, dark vibe came about around five years ago – but it’s still popular. It’s more about the way you adopt the trend and twist it to fit your own brand. You can also see it in the reverse, where a lot of food photographers are making really bright pictures, with pops of colour throughout, and that’s also working very well. 

There’s also a trend around close-ups, immersive images of food that lots of creators are using to show more textures, creating a sense that you’re actually at the table, about to dig into the dish. I guess a lot of creators are enjoying this style because it makes you want to replicate what you’re seeing, really dig into the nitty-gritty of the recipe. 

Q. What advice would you give to up-and-coming food content creators looking to showcase their work to a wider audience?

Be true to yourself. If you’re replicating what you’re seeing other creators do on Instagram, you’re not going to stand out from the crowd. That’s the big issue with trends, you see something is working for someone else and you expect it to work for you also. Just be happy with the work you’re putting out there, that’s the most important thing you can do for yourself. If you want to grow and have your work shared by more people, focus on creating new, exciting things that are inspired by trends, but not totally dependent on them. Create your own universe!

Q. What would be your ultimate kit bag?

I would definitely include the EOS R or the 6D, both are exceptional cameras and the built-in Wi-Fi capabilities are a must have for beginners. In terms of lenses, I would suggest the Canon RF and EF 24-70mm. It’s a nice wide lens which allows for decent close-ups as well. It might be more expensive, but it’s worth it, you can do almost anything with it, especially in smaller spaces (like a city apartment). I used to work with 50mm in the past, but you have to really stretch to get that good table shot. 

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The overall winner of the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year competition has been awarded to Indian photographer Debdatta Chakraborty for the image Kebabiyana taken at a lively street food market in the Kashmir province of India. 

The vibrant, smokey photo was taken at Khayyam Chowk - an ordinary Indian street that by night is transformed into a mouth-watering hub for tasty food. Popular Kashmiri foods cooked on charcoal grills fill the streets with smoky aromas as people flock to the area to enjoy wazwan kebabs and other traditional foods. This year's winner shows a man, engulfed by smoke as he tends to what looks like chicken kebabs. 

• Read more: Best camera for food photography

Caroline Kenyon, the director and founder of the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year Awards said, “It is always a source of excitement and wonder when one single image rises to the top in the Awards. In today’s world, more than ever, we feel the need for comfort, for love. There is so much to reassure us here - the beautifully captured billowing embrace of the smoke, the golden light, the subject’s expression as he prepares the food for sharing. Sparks fly from the skewers, whose roasting we can almost smell, we imagine the warm, delicious aroma. This image, gentle but powerful, nourishes our soul.”

This year's winners were announced by restaurant owner, Masterchef judge and internationally-renowned chef Monica Galetti in a ceremony live-streamed on YouTube. Thousands of people entered this year's competition and for each category, an overall winner was selected. 

In total there are 35 categories that range from food in the field, to MPB food influencers to the Pink Lady Apple a Day and the Fujifilm award for innovation. National winners are also selected from the US, Chile, South East Asia, New Zealand, The Gulf, Europe and Africa and the young person category is split into three age groups: under 10, 11-14 and 15-17. 

Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year has now been running for 11 years and it continues to uncover where our food comes from, who grows and how it's harvested. It documents people enjoying traditional cuisines may that be on the street or at home, the devastating effects of food shortages and how food can bring people together.

Owner of Pink Lady and CEO of Apple and Pear Australia Phil Turnball said, “Huge global events - war, famine, the end of lockdowns, the revival of the hospitality industry, the chance to celebrate with family and friends again - all these are recorded in the Awards which show so vividly how food touchers every aspect of our lives.”

An exhibition will take place from 20 November - 12 December at The Royal Photographic Society in Bristol. All finalist's photos will be on display and it’ll be free to enter. 

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A love of food and a passion for photography is what led Karen Thomas to become a successful food photographer. The pleasure of food has been a long-time obsession for the London-based photographer who has worked with high-profile clients such as M&S, Nestle, Costa and Waitrose.

Her interest in photography started when she was gifted a film camera as a child – a very different system to the Hasselblad H6D-100 she now shoots on. Working in both photography and videography, Karen gets an immense amount of satisfaction working to briefs, planning a shoot and executing a project with beautiful imagery. Whether she’s working with flash, constant lighting or natural light, Karen’s aim is to ensure her subject is brought to life with the lighting choice. 

This year, Karen was chosen to be a Hasselblad Heroine, but it isn’t the first time she’s received recognition for her stunning work. She’s won The Food Photographer of the Year and Tifa award, she’s been selected as one of Shutterturff’s top food photographers in London and she’s even had her own BBC Good Food podcast where she discusses her work.

Following Hasselblad's announcement, we caught up with Karen to discuss her background in photography, her achievements and her inspirations.

How old were you when you first took up photography?

I’m not sure the exact age but my Dad bought me my first 35mm red plastic Halina camera when I was at school. 

Who or what inspired you to do so?

My Dad is really into photography and so I learned a lot from him and then I went on to college and then university to study photography.

Do you have a favorite photo or project you've worked on?

I don’t necessarily have a favorite as there have been so many amazing shoots over the years. I love shooting tests and I recently did a project with a 28mm lens. I don’t usually shoot wide angle as it’s not generally flattering to the food but I wanted to really immerse the viewer into the action, whilst at the same time giving a sense of the environment which the wide angle allowed me to do. 

If you could give one piece of advice to your younger self, what would it be?

Get an agent early in your career otherwise when you eventually get one, you’ll wonder why you didn’t do it sooner! 

What does it mean to you on being chosen as a Hasselblad Heroine?

It’s a great honor to be chosen. I’ve always loved the cameras and it’s fantastic to get recognition from a brand that I have so much respect for.

What has been your biggest obstacle in getting to where you are?

I wouldn’t say there was one particular obstacle. Each step of my career has taken a lot of hard work and motivation. You can never sit back, you always need to stay relevant and keep evolving.

To view more of Karen's work, head to her website.

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The shortlist for the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year 2022 has just been announced and the entries aren't all that you might imagine.  Submissions include everything from mouth-watering, restaurant-worthy shots, to imaginative sculptures of vegetables and even a Salvador Dali-inspired collage. 

Thousands of images were submitted from all over the world, each displaying incredible technical abilities, outside-the-box creativeness and powerful storytelling. While some mages tell tales about where our food comes from, how it’s harvested and how it’s cooked, others capture the enjoyment food brings, the craftsmanship of haute cuisine and the dedication to deliciousness. 

• Read more: Best camera for food photography

The language of food culture is one that breaks down borders, brings people together and provides communities with a reason to interact and enjoy each other's company. Food is a vital lifeline that is easily taken for granted by those who have it and cherished by those who don’t. 

Winners will be announced on 26 April 2022 at 2:30pm EST / 7:30pm BST via the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year’s YouTube channel. It will be hosted by a very special celebrity Master of Ceremonies and broadcast all over the world so people can enjoy the film from the comfort of their homes. 

This year the judging panel is made up of photographers and foodies including cookbook author, photographer and columnist, Nik Sharma, art director and curator of Inter Art Gallery in Beijing, NA Risong, Fiona Shields, head of photography at The Guardian News & Media and Tanseem Alsultan, an investigative and national geographic photographer. Other judges include Phillip Prodger, Rein Skullerud, DCW's Chris George and panel chair, David Loftus. 

A cash price of £5,000 will be awarded to the overall winner and they will also have their work displayed at the Royal Photographic Society in Bristol. Individual category winners can win anything from £200 - £1,000 in cash to vouchers for photography services or even a hotel stay. 

To see the full list of prizes, find out how to enter next year’s competition or view the full 2022 shortlist gallery, head to the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year website.

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For the second installment of The Photography Capture Online series, Sony ambassador and food photographer Kate Kirmnan will guide you on how to make your images look extra delicious. The free session will go through techniques, tips and tricks on how to create Instaworthy shots.

If you’re a serious foodie, chances are you want to take photos of all the yummy food you eat. Making food and drink look mouth-wateringly good isn’t hard - but you do need to know what goes into taking that perfect shot of your favorite meal. Experienced food photographer Kate Kirkman will help you understand all the elements involved in taking that perfect snap including lighting, styling, composition and camera settings.

• Read more: Best camera for food photography

Coming from a background in fine art and art history, Kate started to pursue a career in photography in 2010 and launched a portraits, wedding and boudoir business which she still runs today. Alongside her husband and fellow photographer Brent, the pair started a photography school called Training by Lumiere which is dedicated to food photography and filming.

Ahead of the session, Kate has shared two of her top food photography tips. The first is that food and drink photography really benefits from stability so if you can attach your camera to a tripod, a c stand or a boom it will not only help prevent blur but will allow you to focus more on lighting, composition and styling. 

Kate’s second top tip is to not forget about styling - just like you would style a fashion shoot, food photography benefits from the same careful consideration when it comes to putting items together. Kate will explain what works and why and what doesn’t. If you seriously want to pursue food photography you’ll have to start collecting some props but there are plenty of ways you can do this without spending too much money. 

The Photography and Video Show is the UK's largest indoor photography event which brings together professional and enthusiast photographers, the biggest camera brands and the latest photographic innovations. This year the event takes place between the 17 - 20 September at the NEC, Birmingham, UK and as always there will be a range of talks, workshops and masterclasses to attend. 

While the online seminar is free to attend, registration is required via The Photography Show website. The workshop starts on 10 February at 7.30 pm (GMT) and anyone who registers will receive joining instructions at least 24 hours before the seminar starts. 

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It's the home stretch for the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year 2022! There are just a couple of weeks to go until entries close for the prestigious (and delicious) food photography competition, which closes on at midnight GMT on Sunday 06 February.

There's a category for everyone in the 11th edition of the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year, whether you're a food stylist, a photojournalist, a student keen to polish up their skills, or a phone photographer who loves to take snaps of their breakfast (now's the time to get revenge on all your friends who whinge about you posting photos of all your meals!). 

This year's leading food photography competition features a prize pool of £20,000 - with a top prize of £5,000 for the overall winner.

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Categories such as Wedding Food Photographer sponsored by Champagne Taittinger and the fiercely competitive Food Stylist Award inspired around 10,500 entries from 70 countries last year, so make sure to bring your A-game in your submissions! The head judge is David Loftus, internationally acclaimed food photographer who's shot for the likes of Jamie Oliver, Prue Leith and Rachel Khoo.

Previous winners include 2019's Jianhui Liao, whose overhead shot shows villagers from Handan in Shexian County of China wearing Qing Dynasty costumes gathering around a giant pot of noodles in a feast to celebrate the birth of goddess Nüwa. In 2020, the £5,000 top prize was shot by Bangladeshi photojournalist KM Asad, with an image shot in a Rohinga refugee camp.

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Once again, the deadline for entering the competition is this Sunday, 06 February, at midnight GMT, so don't delay! All you need to do is complete a registration form, log into your account with your email address and password and upload your photos. Good luck!

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Looking for the best books on food photography? Then you are in the right place! Food photography was once a genre reserved for a few skilled professionals, but now it’s one of the biggest areas of imaging, largely thanks to Instagram.

The roots that social media has established not only motivate sharing your own meals but compel every food creator – from food bloggers to Michelin-starred chefs – to get the best images of their meals.

So, food porn is an essential part of any photographer’s skillset. What you might not know is that reading about some of the long-established techniques that pros use to make soggy, cold fast-food burgers look juicy and appetizing under studio lights can be compelling and even a little stomach-churning.

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How do you simulate melting cheese? What’s the best way to make fruit shine? How do you perfectly position steam? Some photographers use glue for milk. Others aim to grab truly authentic images with a phone and natural lighting. The different books on food photography below will take you down different paths – find the perfect pages to take you to new #foodphotography success with the books I’ve chosen.

Best books on food photography

Author Beata Lubas is an Instagram sensation, so she is well qualified to produce a book that will interest food bloggers – and anyone looking to diversify into food photography. Alongside food styling and camera skills, Lubas also covers the business side, including how to meet the needs of a client.

But you don’t need oodles of time or equipment to get started in food photography; as Lubas notes in the first chapter, start with the kit you have and develop your skills from there. With an uncluttered design that gives the text and photos room to breathe, How to Photograph Food is a tempting entree to a photographic genre, and the strategies recommended by Lubas will definitely give her readers an edge in a field that more and more people are taking up.

From a publisher with a real understanding of photographers’ needs, it’s no surprise that this book offers the reader a complete journey, from a grounding in manual exposure to food styling, with a solid emphasis on camera skills, from technical to composition.

Those more accomplished with camera techniques might feel that they are already beyond this point, but even where core skills are covered, it is all from the perspective of the food photographer, so they are not wasted words. The book also includes handy hacks and projects you can follow to master salads, soups, mains, desserts, and drinks (though be prepared to put some salt in your beer if you want it to look good on camera!)

Joanie Simon is the person behind the YouTube channel The Bite Shot, which shows the tricks of the food photographer's trade through "bite-sized" tutorials. The book uses this same no-nonsense approach – aiming to teach you the essentials of the craft through 52 mini lessons – from camera settings to props and styling.

A book that oozes style on every page, this is a mainstream book that has garnered attention in the Sunday Times. The author is a stylist for top chefs, including Michel Roux, and is produced to the same design and print standards that you’d expect from the recipe books themselves. Even the equipment photos are gorgeous.

That journey-like approach is sure to please foodies and make every shot inspiring. It is also a preparation book, so it includes some recipes for you to follow, along with a nice balance of the author’s own stories, and her attention to detail shines through.

With a reasonable heft, this will rest nicely on the coffee table of advertisers or gourmands alike, providing a rich compilation of the best in contemporary food photography. It does not limit itself to the mere practical marketing or the technicalities of tweaking “tweezer food”, nor is every image an Instagram-ready plate.

Instead, your mind will gorge on more artistic imagery to reach a wider cross-section of markets. The richly printed pages are packed with photographers who have captured striking and thoughtful representations of the food we eat.

While most of the practical books concentrate on achieving the look you see around you, Susan Bright has long worked as a curator of photography, with exhibitions in the Tate in London and the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Chicago.

As such, she doesn’t shy away from placing food photography in the political, commercial, creative, and regional context of its era. Including excellent reproductions of Roger Fenton, Edward Weston, Laura Letinsky, and Martin Parr imagery (amongst many others), the tome is no simple dissertation either, but a joy to absorb.

This book is in its second edition, which is not only proof of popularity (the publishers must have been happy with sales) but also means that the author has taken the opportunity to respond to feedback, adding more on social media and reining in some of the most basic photography tips.

The result is a book that concentrates on what an enthusiast photographer-turning-food photographer needs to know, making it easy to follow with numerous diagrams. A sizeable post-production and a separate section of behind-the-scenes examples complete a thorough overview.

This book is well over 10 years old, which means you won’t find an extensive section on social media. But as a book aimed squarely at photographers, there can be no complaints. In terms of techniques, the author's list of clients includes McDonald's, Sara Lee, and Baskin-Robbins, and it’s fair to say their products are still very much in vogue.

So, rather than worry about the publication date, take advantage of the illustrations, step-by-step photos, supply lists, and tips on choosing real food or photographer-friendly equivalents. It's definitely more for the aspiring pros than Instagrammers who will only be shooting their latest restaurant orders.

Though not specifically a food book, author Leela Cyd’s other books (including Food with Friends: The Art of Hanging Out) and online profile make clear she has the credentials to help anyone trying to present their daily bread, special fare, or anything else via social media’s most popular visual forum.

This book leans toward food and food preparation, thanks to the author’s obvious enthusiasm, but its real message is just how much can be achieved with your phone’s camera.

In a genre that so often focuses on adding supplemental light to create great shots, this book concentrates on delivering delicious images using nothing but natural light.

It's not the longest volume at 72 pages, but author Fran Flynn is a degree-qualified graphic designer and commercial photographer with over 25 years of experience – so the information here is creative, concise, and gets you quick results.

I love the title of this book, which pithily sums up what every food photographer should be trying to achieve! It is written by the food photographer for The New York Times, Andrew Scrivani, and aims, as its subtitle suggests, to show you how to approach the genre for both fun and for profit.

In five chapters, he takes you from Seeing the Light, through Telling a Story and Decoding the Setting, to a final section on Making a Living. The book is full of great advice, structured from the author's experience of teaching regular three-day workshops on the subject, as well as his own professional experience.

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If you enjoy setting up shots in the comfort of your own home, this is the perfect project for you! Not only will it test your technical skills, but it’s also a fun creative challenge that will push you to be experimental with your photography.

First you'll need a backdrop – this could be a piece of card or a sheet. You'll also need two flashguns. You can make do with one if you don’t have two, but you will need another light source like a lamp to light the backdrop. 

• Read more: Best lens for food photography

You'll need a reflector, or you can use a make-shift one by wrapping some tin foil around card, if you don’t have one. You'll require a diffuser panel; again if you don’t have one, don't worry, just wrap some greaseproof paper over a cardboard frame – that will do the trick. And finally, you'll need some food and props.

I fired my flash units using a remote trigger, but if you don’t have one of these, you can use on-camera flash. I fired the flashes through two separate channels, as they were set to different strengths.

Finally, just a word of warning: as you are throwing food around, it will get messy, so a cloth and a vacuum cleaner are essential after your shoot!

01. The setting

To create the fast food setup, I hung up a gray backdrop and placed down a colorful table cloth. As a bonus, the circles in the cloth mirrored the cereal hoops! I then positioned a breakfast bowl in the middle of the frame and filled it with cereal. A couple of daffodils were dropped in on one side to bring in color and fruit was scattered around, again to add color and variety. Mount your camera onto a tripod and keep tweaking the composition and the positioning of objects in the frame until you’re happy.

02. Light setup

Next I set up the lights. For this shoot, I used two external flash units and a reflector. It’s easier to build your lighting setup one light at a time. That way you can see where the light is falling from each unit, and tweak the positioning for perfect results. The key light was placed at the front of the setup, and I used a diffuser panel to spread the light more evenly. To light the background behind and remove most of the shadows there, I placed one of the flashguns behind the cereal box. The reflector was placed to the side of this flashgun, to bounce light back in on the backdrop.

03. Camera and flash settings

I put the camera into manual mode and synced the shutter speed to the flash, firing at 1/200 sec. The ISO was set low at 100 and the aperture was f/16. To balance the flash light to the camera settings, I had the front flash on channel A firing at full power, and the flashgun at the back on channel B, at its lowest setting of 1/128 power.

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04. Getting the timing right

Achieving the falling cereal was simply a case of me dropping it into the frame, and experimenting with the timing and quantity. I found the best method was to drop a full bowl at once, and to fire the shutter straight after the release. You will have some mistakes and some keepers, so keep trying! To make it easier, shoot two separate exposures of the milk and the cereal. If you have an extra pair of hands, you could try and do them together, but it might turn out to be much trickier!

05. The final edit

I edited the two images (of the cereal and the milk) together in Photoshop. You need to bring both images over into one document, with the milk layer on top. To cut out the milk, I used the Pen Tool to get accurate results. Simply zoom into the picture and place markers around the falling milk. The Pen Tool will create a new Shape Layer. Once you’re happy with your selection, you can move the milk layer above the Shape Layer in the Layers Panel, right-click on the top layer, and select Create Clipping Mask to paste the milk into the shape. 

Where the milk had made a splash at the bottom of the bowl, I opted to duplicate the milk layer, add a black Layer Mask and use a white brush to paint back the parts I wanted to reveal. Finally, on a merged top layer, I used a gray paint brush at a reduced Opacity (around 20%) to smooth out the background for a flawless result.

This article was first published in Digital Camera magazine.

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Canon has launched a Ramadan food photography campaign, Food for Cause, in aid of a philanthropic organization providing life-changing educational opportunities for children in the Africa and the Middle East. 

For every original food photograph submitted to Food for Cause, Canon will make a donation to Dubai Cares – a member of the United Nations Department of Global Communications, whose goal is to raise desperately-needed funds for children’s education (particularly in the wake of the COVID crisis). 

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Canon's campaign combines two central themes of the holy month of Ramadan: food and philanthropy. The company will donate US$1 to Dubai Cares on behalf of everyone submitting an original Food for Cause photo from now until 21 May. 

“The holy month of Ramadan is a very significant time of giving," says Mai Youssef of Canon Middle East and Canon Central and North Africa. "We are proud to actively support Dubai Cares during this period and encourage our customers, fans and ambassadors to get involved and make their contribution. 

Simply share any original food-related image on the website before 21 May. It could be a traditional dish, a favorite meal or celebratory feast, it’s an opportunity to share your food story and give to children in extremely poorly-resourced areas.” 

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The specific programs that Canon is supporting are Girls in Crisis in Uganda and Recovery and Resilience in Iraq.

With over a million refugees, Uganda's education system has come under immense strain both for local and refugee children, with resource challenges amplified by language barriers and gender-based violence. Dubai Cares is building a new school and improving existing facilities, which is benefiting over than 11,150 adolescents.

The Iraqi the education system has yet to recover from years of war, which saw thousands of schools severely damaged. Dubai Cares is rebuilding schools in Baghdad and Mosul to help 14,400 children get access to education.

For more information, campaign conditions and to submit an image, visit Canon's Food for Cause website.

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Best Canon cameras
Best Canon lenses

Picture this: You walk into your favorite bakery to buy a sandwich. Enticing scents fill the space. Your eyes move from one color and shape to another. You can hear the crunch of freshly baked bread being sliced, and as you take the sandwich in your hand, you feel its texture. And then there’s the taste… that incredible taste!

Eating is a multi-sensory experience, and so is great food photography. But in photography there is no sound, smell, touch or taste to support your message, so you need to get to your viewer’s tastebuds through their eyes. 

• See also Best camera for food photography

You do this by drawing attention to visual details in your images to wake up their imagination. Your viewer is not there with you, so you’ve got to show them what you see, what you experience, what’s important and what they should know about the dish you are photographing.

Food photography is like taking your viewer by the hand and saying, "Here, look at this! This is what I love the most about this dish, what inspires me about this ingredient, what excites me about the preparation process." 

A good photo makes you feel something. It brings back memories and puts a smile on your face. It makes you want to jump into the kitchen and cook. It awakens that ‘I want to eat it right now!’ feeling. It tells a story. 

A good photo inspires. It draws you in. It grabs your attention, it keeps you captivated, it leads your eye around the frame and it encourages you to explore more. 

A good photo surprises. It enables you to see something in a way you’ve never seen before. And the magic ingredient that adds something special to your images? That’s you, and the way you see.

Top tips for shooting food photography

01 The test shot

Here is the test shot. As you can see, I tried out some different backgrounds before making my final decision. I chose the lighter blue as it highlighted the cake beautifully. I tested the light, too, and I spotted right away that I had a problem to tackle. Notice how bright the left side of the frame was, and how dark and shadowy the right side appears in the photograph. 

02 Fixing the shot

How did I make this image work? First, I moved about one meter away from the window to reduce the contrast between highlights and shadows, and make the light in the frame more even. The shadows were longer but also paler than when the table was right next to the window. I placed a small reflector close to the scene to brighten the right side of the cake. I used a shallow depth of field and a technique I call ‘hide and seek’ to add depth to this photograph. And finally, I chose a cooler white balance to achieve a fresh feel and to add crispness to the colors.

03 Analyzing the image

The flowers in this picture are the tallest, but by keeping them out of focus and behind the main subject, they lose their significance. They would be much more distracting if they were next to the cake and in focus. Using a glass vase was a great move too, as the material makes the prop feel lighter, making the cake the heaviest – therefore the most important – part of the image. Additionally, its warm colors contrast with the rest of the scene, ensuring that the viewer will notice it right away.

Find out more

Bea is an award-winning food photographer based in England and runs a successful food photography business. How to Photograph Food by Beata Lubas is published by Ilex Press, priced $£25/$£25 www.ilexinstant.com 

Read more:

Home photography ideas: Exploding food photography!
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One of the difficult aspects of working from home as a photographer is that the household environment is rarely the optimal location for the majority of subjects and image styles. If you are used to using a studio, whether it is your own or a space you share or rent, then the lighting found in the average house can seem impossible to manage. 

Most halogen lights are far too warm for most images and cannot be adjusted in terms of colour balance. The yellowish tint they emit can pollute your carefully arranged lighting setup and spoil the theme you were hoping for. Unfortunately with social distancing rules in place, many studios are either closed or can only admit one person at a time. Therefore it is essential that we learn to cope without large studio lights and to overpower strongly coloured home lighting, with only speedlights to work with.

 For this product photography - an area which can strongly show the pitfalls of being without a full studio -  the idea was to create a summery feel, in line with the Sicilian branding of the fragrance. However we had very little space to work and ambient light was in short supply. The challenge was to figure out a way to put together a set on a single kitchen worktop and control the lighting with a single speedlight.      

What you'll need

• Short telephoto lens
• Tripod
• Props
• Speedlight
• Radio triggers
• Photoshop or similar

Shooting steps

1- Lay out your props

Find a surface on which to shoot your items which has neutral qualities and a plain background. Where possible create depth by arranging props at different distances from the camera, to suggest an environment larger than your kitchen! Avoid regimented layouts - introduce some randomness.

2- Set camera height

The level of your camera is important as it controls depth-of-field and how much background is visible in the shot. Here we wanted to see a focus fall-off behind the subject but shot slightly down to include the shimmer of light shining through the bottle. 

3- Crop tightly

Zoom in to exclude all of the extraneous details of your home. The aim is to create a new context for your subject so control this with the frame boundaries. Shooting at f/2.8-3.5 also limited focus while the focal length compressed the scene. 

4- Set lighting

Since we’re working in a confined area the flash power does not have to be set too high, or this will flood the scene and overexpose highlights, especially in glass items such as this. Here 1/64 power was enough to overpower warm ambient light.

5- Cut ambient light

Lower the ISO and increase shutter speed to give the flash illumination more dominance. This doesn’t mean the scene will get darker necessarily, just that you have more control over global lighting. Ambient light is barely visible so you can adjust all areas of the scene. 

6- Shoot multiple variations

Since we only have one flash we can’t light multiple areas simultaneously. With the camera stationary on a tripod, take multiple frames with a new flash position in each, for different effects. We also moved the foreground foliage between shots for later blending in software. 

Edit your shot

1- Edit for area 

Load all of your RAW files from the shoot in your main editor - here we’re using Lightroom CC. Find images for each area of the shot which have the ideal lighting balance and edit each of these for optimal sharpness, colour and contrast.. 

2- Lens corrections

Perform standard lens corrections on all of your segments now, to remove distortion and chromatic aberration if present. Doing this now avoids any accidental mismatch between frames, which can mean they no longer align perfectly. Also apply any noise or moire reduction now if necessary.   

3- Open all segments 

Flag all of the selected segments if you need to take a break, so you know which ones you have chosen for the final blend. When ready, open all of these in Photoshop arranging the tabs in the same order as the elements they contain.

4- Quick stacking

Drag all of your segments into a layer stack, with the ‘back’ elements at the bottom of this. Add layer masks to each layer and create a rough collage using a mix of Marquee Tools and Selection Tools, filling areas with black to reveal the layers below.

5- Refined blending 

With all of the segments arranged you can now make refined masks, using the Brush Tool to gradually reveal and hide elements and lighting zones. To reveal shadows use a large, soft brush, while ‘hard’ elements benefit from precise masking, using Lasso or Pen Tool Selections

6- Precise retouch

With the image components stacked and blended, perform local dodging and burning, sharpening and cosmetic retouching. We used the Spot Healing Brush Tool (J) to remove dust and blemishes on the product, leaving the environment more naturally imperfect. This pushes the outdoor feel of the shot.

Read more

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Food photography has taken on a new lease of life in recent years. No longer is it the niche preserve of cookbooks and the menus at cheap restaurants – social media has made food photography one of the most popular genres in the art form, with the cooking (and even eating) of the meal often being secondary. 

• The best lenses for food photography
• The best books on food photography

The current lockdown situation makes food photography an even more appealing choice for frustrated photographers unable to head into the real world. With little more than your core camera kit and your kitchen surfaces, you can create some truly tasty looking shots. 

While the general principles have much in common with still life and product photography, shooting food has plenty of pitfalls all of its own. Either way, you will need solid foundations of photographic theory and technique – and obviously practice makes perfect! Just like cooking up your favorite dish, getting things just right can be a lot more complicated than it seems.

• See also Best camera for food photography

To get you on the right track with capturing your culinary creations, we popped into the kitchen with professional food photographer Ewen Bell to examine both the equipment and the key skills to get shots that are as much a feast for the eyes as they are for the stomach…

1. Work in good light

The most common mistake is trying to shoot beautiful food in bad light. Cameras see light, not subjects, even when that subject is delicious! 

Food photography always begins with the light. The perfect light is soft, abundant and angled. You want lots of light to play with, but you definitely don’t want direct sunlight streaming onto the scene; it’s too harsh and too contrasty. The best table in the restaurant has the window seat, with bright daylight outside and only filtered light coming through. 

This scenario turns the window into a large softbox, filling the table with useful light that offers a range of shooting angles. The starting point is to shoot at an angle across the light source. That angle gives sufficient contrast to reveal detail in the scene, and brings up the colors. You don’t have to fill in the opposite side of the scene with a bounce board, or fill-in flash, because you can brighten underexposed areas of the raw images when you process the files – it’s often quicker and more precise to fine-tune the raw files than trying to get it perfect in-camera. 

As you change your angle, you create a different quality of light for the scene. The more you shoot into the light the more contrast and drama you build. Color richness gets reduced, blacks are hardened and some areas might even blow out, and that’s acceptable for the purpose of style, if drama is what you’re looking for. 

Alternatively, when you change your angle to have light coming a little more from behind you, the scene fills in more and the contrast flattens out.  By controlling the angle at which you shoot relative to the window, you control contrast and color as well – even when the light is very, very soft. 

It won’t matter how amazing your food looks on a plate if the light isn’t working for you – good food in bad light makes for failed photos. In the right light, on the other hand, almost any scene can be made to look inviting.

2. Editing your shots 

The treatment of your Raw files is just as important as the shoot. The most natural colors often result from going easy on the saturation, or even pulling back on it a little; if you’re struggling with color balance, it’s likely that you have the saturation dialled up too high. 

In very flat light you may need to bump contrast a little in order to give hardness to edges – adding contrast only at the blacks end of the histogram will help to preserve tones elsewhere in the scene. 

Additionally, shadow detail can be lifted to balance out the scene. Be sure to use selective adjustments to add exposure or more shadow detail if critical elements are lost in shade.

3. Consider flash

The problem with relying on natural light when shooting food is that it isn’t always that natural. Color casts can be thrown across the scene by trees outside, interior lights can add color spots to the room, and the movement of clouds throughout the day can cause dramatic changes to contrast and color temperatures. 

You’ll never get a nice, clean white light unless you bring your own. Flash gear will bring consistency to your photography and reduce processing effort. Reliable strobes deliver the exact color and quantity of light from one frame to the next. If you’re shooting content across several days but need the look and feel of each frame to be consistent, then studio flash is the way to go. 

Aside from being very practical and reliable, once you get your flash gear under control you’re freed up to concentrate on your creativity.  Scale is critical here. Just as we enjoy soft, abundant, angled light in the window seat of a restaurant, we try to achieve that same result in the studio. 

A large softbox is required, powered by a sufficiently capable light source. 100W of flash is more than enough to shoot a table scene and pull out moments of inspiration within it. 

Battery-powered flashguns can do the job, but you’ll burn through the batteries, and they’re painfully slow to regenerate as the power drains. For the same price as a decent flashgun you can buy monoblock kits that offer a plug-in unit with a inbuilt receiver; just connect to the mains power and slip the trigger unit onto your camera, and you’re ready to go. 

A reliable light source is essential, and so is consideration for how you want to shape the light. Softboxes for food photography should be very large, and offer generous amounts of internal diffusion. You need to get the softbox close to the scene, as close as possible to keep the light as diffused as possible. 

If your light-shaping boxes are not soft enough, and too much contrast is coming through to the scene, simply add an additional diffusing screen between the food and the flash.

4. Stop motion

Consistent lighting from studio flash gear is perfect for making short stop-motion clips of the step-by-step assembly or presentation of a dish. 

Lock down the camera on a tripod, and lock off the focus and exposure – you need these to be the same for every scene. Make small adjustments between frames to mimic a scene in motion. 

Process the raw files to perfection before you output the individual frames, then bring the stills into your video-editing tool, and use soft transitions to smooth the motion.

5. All the magic happens at 50mm

The field of view from a 50mm lens is the sweet spot for still-life photography, including food. As your field of view goes wider, such as 35mm, you start getting perspective issues, and the wider you shoot the closer you need to get, which can further exaggerate perspective. It also gets difficult to control the background with a wider lens; you don’t always want the rest of the room to be drawn into the frame. 

Narrowing the field of view with a telephoto lens can be a problem too. Longer focal lengths, such as 100mm, will compress the scene – you can lose the sense of depth, and your compositions can look flat. Longer lenses also create logistical problems when you’re working in confined spaces, as you may not have the room to step back far enough for a shot. 

Everything works much better when you start with 50mm. If you’re shooting on a full-frame sensor the other advantage of 50mm is that there are lots of affordable primes on the market. 

An aperture of f/2 is ideal, and it’s tempting to use a 24-70mm f/2.8 if you already have one, but then you won’t be t enjoying the full effect of a prime lens at f/2 – and you also have to deal with a big, clunky lens which can be a drag on your creative process. 

The equivalent lens for APS-C cameras is a 35mm f/1.4, or for micro four thirds cameras a 25mm f/1.4. the smaller your camera sensor, the greater the depth of field you get at a given f-stop, so you may want to experiment with going all the way to f/1.4 instead of f/2 with these smaller camera bodies. The difference between f/2 and f/2.8 is significant for background bokeh, and it’s even more pronounced at f/4. 

Shooting shallow is about bringing attention to one element in the scene, and the degree to which you melt away the rest of the scene is essential to your composition. 

Your depth of field expands as you step back from the subject too, so the bigger the scene you shoot at 50mm, the further south you may have to drop the f-stop to get the desired degree of blur. 

Shooting at f/4 might look dramatic when your frame is the size of a tea cup, but it offers zero impact once you step back to capture a full table setting.

6. Consider scale

We have a tendency, when we have a lens in hand, to keep stepping inwards, trying to tighten the composition by cutting out all the things we don’t want in the scene. This is a reductive process. We end up with very simplistic compositions, and no idea where we went wrong. 

The trick to building richer and more detailed compositions with still life and food is to step back and bring more into the frame, not less. It’s not just a matter of a different lens, it’s a different perspective; thinking bigger is better. We get obsessed with what’s on the plate, without realising that there’s a bigger scene on offer. 

As you step back a little you find yourself shooting the table, not the dish. Now you have options for your compositions. Step back a little further and you have a restaurant, not just the table. At each level of scale you get different options for composition. 

Stepping back lets you put the dish into a bigger context, with room to include a sense of place. When working in the studio, it’s a common mistake to keep the scale small. Limiting yourself to a fraction of a bench, or a small piece of plywood you painted to look like weathered timber, is limiting your creativity as well. 

For big results you need to think bigger than a bread box. Expanding the scale of your shoot zone also enables you to make room for multiple dishes. One plate offers far fewer options than two or three. 

With multiples of the same dish on a table or studio bench, you create the potential for layered compositions. As you move around you’ll find shots within the scene, and those multiples of a dish give you multiple moments of inspiration. 

7. Include a little action

Still life doesn’t have to be still when it comes to food. Get a little movement into the scene, and bring it to life. Capturing motion within your scenes adds impact to good composition – for example the pouring of liquids, steam rising off hot dishes, or simply the sprinkling of salt onto a dish. 

Additionally, the preparation of food, and the people who prepare it, are great elements to include in a photo series. Messy is magic; a sense of the chaos in a kitchen, or ingredients on a workbench, add interest.

8. Style the shot 

Building an interesting composition requires a spectrum of approaches, with food styling at one end and photojournalism at the other. You can either create the exact scene you want from scratch using props and styling, or you can look for moments within a scene that already exists in the real world; the best results often come from a combination of the two. 

Styling is a dedicated skill – on a commercial shoot the stylist can actually earn more than the photographer. Stylists supply their props and ideas, and typically the concept of the overall shoot rests most heavily in their hands. 

The photographer will have to take their lead, manipulate the light to their advantage, and ensure that the final scene is technically competent. 

As a photographer, it’s a joy to work with a good stylist, because they carry so much of the creative load. With the stylist preparing the scene, you’re able to devote your attention to the task of finding the ideal composition – for one person to be handling both the photography and the styling can be demanding, as your brain is jumping between two tasks and you may not be able to successfully complete either to your satisfaction. 

When you’re shooting on location it’s important to consider how much of the original character from the restaurant or kitchen you want to pull through into the images. Photojournalism imperatives dictate that you reveal the nature of your subject, while styling is an attempt to create it through art. In practice there is always a degree of both. 

I like to ‘shoot around the scene’ when I visit a restaurant or other location. I ask the staff to set tables as they would for guests, and to present dishes with wines poured – I want to see how they present their work. With a fully dressed table I then start to look for elements within the scene. 

I seek out a ‘hero’, and dig out compositions that pull through multiple elements. And then I might start styling the table a little – not a lot, just a little. I make adjustments, I remove distractions, and I add layers to the background. I do this with location shoots, and when working with a stylist in the studio. 

Bringing these two approaches together yields diversity in the images you’re able to collect, and opens the door to innovative compositions that are unexpectedly rewarding.

9. Remember to use props

The key to great food styling is having props on hand to complement the scene. If you’re planning to shoot a lot in the studio, you’ll want to start collecting some interesting props to spice up your scenes. 

Ingredients to a recipe can be used as props, as well as crockery and tableware. People can act as props too. Think about hands involved in the scene, or perhaps kitchen staff handling a dish – scaling out to shoot wider allows room to bring those props into the composition. 

The right prop can add context to a scene, like a pot of tea and cups alongside a slice of cake. Props can also be used to carefully add specific colors to a scene that embellish the main subject.

10. Take full control

What makes food photography so different to other genres is the degree of control you have over the subject. You can do just about anything you like to the scene – you can even eat it! It’s easy to control the light over a scene the size of a table, compared to shooting a full studio set or waiting for sunrise over a landscape. 

Food doesn’t have to pull a pose or deliver an expression; it sits there and silently accepts the attention without moving. Within limits of course – do be careful with ice cream, as it can melt in minutes if you’re not ready for the shot.

The scale and inanimate nature of food photography means you have excellent opportunities for composition. It’s a great genre for exploring the use of color, perspective and repetition. 

Don’t feel that you need all the colors of the rainbow jammed into a single frame – instead try initially working with a limited color palette, and find ways to repeat colors through the scene. And use more than one dish in your styling, taking advantage of a bigger scale and bigger ideas. 

Change your perspective as you shoot – try the top-down view, but then look for different angles that reveal more or less of certain elements.

Food photography lends itself to tethered shooting, and it’s a good idea to work with a laptop and tether cable when in the studio or on location. It’s a big advantage compared to viewing on-camera only, because you get much better feedback on subtle variations in your shots, and more accurate confirmation of where your shallow depth of field is hitting. 

Additionally, the clarity of a large laptop screen also gives you better renderings of your compositions, complete with your preferred processing treatment as each frame rolls off the camera. the prime rule, though, is to always start with the light – it doesn’t matter how interesting the food is if you don’t have good light. Aim for soft, abundant, angled light. 

As you change your perspective you can also change your angle of light – like adding salt and pepper to season a dish, changing your angle is fine-tuning the feel of the shot. 

Read more:

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How to take photos magazines and companies want to use
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The shortlist for the 2021 Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year has been announced - to whet our appetite for the main prizes which will be announced at the end of the month.

In a record year for the competition, over 10,000 images were submitted from over 70 countries around the world. "Once again the standard of entries has not only displayed incredible technical prowess but the most evocative and powerful storytelling", say the organizers.

The winners will be announced on 27 April 2021 at 8pm (UTC) in an online global event on the Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year YouTube channel. The Awards Film, hosted by TV celebrity Fred Sirieix, will be shown live across the world, allowing everyone to enjoy the show from the comfort of their own homes.

Some of this year's shortlist

Read more:

The best books on food photography: whet your appetite for photography
10 food photography tips for getting tasty shots every time
Capturing splashes with food and drink photography
Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year 2018
Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year 2019
Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year 2020 

Baked Beans on Weetabix has gone bananas on social media, thanks to a brilliant bit of marketing by two giants of the breakfast food business. Twitter has exploded with people hashtagging, snapping and sharing shots of their own beans and 'bix concoctions – but if you want your tweet to trend, you'll need to take something worth retweeting! 

That's where some classic food photography tips come into their own. Yes, the current hashtag mania is a bit of silly fun, but that doesn't mean it's not worth taking a bit of time to set up a proper shot and do things properly – and a great photograph is far more likely to go viral than a grainy snap on your phone!

Food photography has taken on a new lease of life in recent years. No longer is it the niche preserve of cookbooks and the menus at cheap restaurants – social media has made food photography one of the most popular genres in the art form, with the cooking (and even eating) of the meal often being secondary. 

• The best lenses for food photography
• The best books on food photography

The current lockdown situation makes food photography an even more appealing choice for frustrated photographers unable to head into the real world. With little more than your core camera kit and your kitchen surfaces, you can create some truly tasty looking shots. 

While the general principles have much in common with still life and product photography, shooting food has plenty of pitfalls all of its own. Either way, you will need solid foundations of photographic theory and technique – and obviously practice makes perfect! Just like cooking up your favorite dish, getting things just right can be a lot more complicated than it seems.

To get you on the right track with capturing your culinary creations, we popped into the kitchen with professional food photographer Ewen Bell to examine both the equipment and the key skills to get shots that are as much a feast for the eyes as they are for the stomach…

1. Work in good light

The most common mistake is trying to shoot beautiful food in bad light. Cameras see light, not subjects, even when that subject is delicious! 

Food photography always begins with the light. The perfect light is soft, abundant and angled. You want lots of light to play with, but you definitely don’t want direct sunlight streaming onto the scene; it’s too harsh and too contrasty. The best table in the restaurant has the window seat, with bright daylight outside and only filtered light coming through. 

This scenario turns the window into a large softbox, filling the table with useful light that offers a range of shooting angles. The starting point is to shoot at an angle across the light source. That angle gives sufficient contrast to reveal detail in the scene, and brings up the colors. You don’t have to fill in the opposite side of the scene with a bounce board, or fill-in flash, because you can brighten underexposed areas of the raw images when you process the files – it’s often quicker and more precise to fine-tune the raw files than trying to get it perfect in-camera. 

As you change your angle, you create a different quality of light for the scene. The more you shoot into the light the more contrast and drama you build. Color richness gets reduced, blacks are hardened and some areas might even blow out, and that’s acceptable for the purpose of style, if drama is what you’re looking for. 

Alternatively, when you change your angle to have light coming a little more from behind you, the scene fills in more and the contrast flattens out.  By controlling the angle at which you shoot relative to the window, you control contrast and color as well – even when the light is very, very soft. 

It won’t matter how amazing your food looks on a plate if the light isn’t working for you – good food in bad light makes for failed photos. In the right light, on the other hand, almost any scene can be made to look inviting.

2. Editing your shots 

The treatment of your Raw files is just as important as the shoot. The most natural colors often result from going easy on the saturation, or even pulling back on it a little; if you’re struggling with color balance, it’s likely that you have the saturation dialled up too high. 

In very flat light you may need to bump contrast a little in order to give hardness to edges – adding contrast only at the blacks end of the histogram will help to preserve tones elsewhere in the scene. 

Additionally, shadow detail can be lifted to balance out the scene. Be sure to use selective adjustments to add exposure or more shadow detail if critical elements are lost in shade.

3. Consider flash

The problem with relying on natural light when shooting food is that it isn’t always that natural. Color casts can be thrown across the scene by trees outside, interior lights can add color spots to the room, and the movement of clouds throughout the day can cause dramatic changes to contrast and color temperatures. 

You’ll never get a nice, clean white light unless you bring your own. Flash gear will bring consistency to your photography and reduce processing effort. Reliable strobes deliver the exact color and quantity of light from one frame to the next. If you’re shooting content across several days but need the look and feel of each frame to be consistent, then studio flash is the way to go. 

Aside from being very practical and reliable, once you get your flash gear under control you’re freed up to concentrate on your creativity.  Scale is critical here. Just as we enjoy soft, abundant, angled light in the window seat of a restaurant, we try to achieve that same result in the studio. 

A large softbox is required, powered by a sufficiently capable light source. 100W of flash is more than enough to shoot a table scene and pull out moments of inspiration within it. 

Battery-powered flashguns can do the job, but you’ll burn through the batteries, and they’re painfully slow to regenerate as the power drains. For the same price as a decent flashgun you can buy monoblock kits that offer a plug-in unit with a inbuilt receiver; just connect to the mains power and slip the trigger unit onto your camera, and you’re ready to go. 

A reliable light source is essential, and so is consideration for how you want to shape the light. Softboxes for food photography should be very large, and offer generous amounts of internal diffusion. You need to get the softbox close to the scene, as close as possible to keep the light as diffused as possible. 

If your light-shaping boxes are not soft enough, and too much contrast is coming through to the scene, simply add an additional diffusing screen between the food and the flash.

4. Stop motion

Consistent lighting from studio flash gear is perfect for making short stop-motion clips of the step-by-step assembly or presentation of a dish. 

Lock down the camera on a tripod, and lock off the focus and exposure – you need these to be the same for every scene. Make small adjustments between frames to mimic a scene in motion. 

Process the raw files to perfection before you output the individual frames, then bring the stills into your video-editing tool, and use soft transitions to smooth the motion.

5. All the magic happens at 50mm

The field of view from a 50mm lens is the sweet spot for still-life photography, including food. As your field of view goes wider, such as 35mm, you start getting perspective issues, and the wider you shoot the closer you need to get, which can further exaggerate perspective. It also gets difficult to control the background with a wider lens; you don’t always want the rest of the room to be drawn into the frame. 

Narrowing the field of view with a telephoto lens can be a problem too. Longer focal lengths, such as 100mm, will compress the scene – you can lose the sense of depth, and your compositions can look flat. Longer lenses also create logistical problems when you’re working in confined spaces, as you may not have the room to step back far enough for a shot. 

Everything works much better when you start with 50mm. If you’re shooting on a full-frame sensor the other advantage of 50mm is that there are lots of affordable primes on the market. 

An aperture of f/2 is ideal, and it’s tempting to use a 24-70mm f/2.8 if you already have one, but then you won’t be t enjoying the full effect of a prime lens at f/2 – and you also have to deal with a big, clunky lens which can be a drag on your creative process. 

The equivalent lens for APS-C cameras is a 35mm f/1.4, or for micro four thirds cameras a 25mm f/1.4. the smaller your camera sensor, the greater the depth of field you get at a given f-stop, so you may want to experiment with going all the way to f/1.4 instead of f/2 with these smaller camera bodies. The difference between f/2 and f/2.8 is significant for background bokeh, and it’s even more pronounced at f/4. 

Shooting shallow is about bringing attention to one element in the scene, and the degree to which you melt away the rest of the scene is essential to your composition. 

Your depth of field expands as you step back from the subject too, so the bigger the scene you shoot at 50mm, the further south you may have to drop the f-stop to get the desired degree of blur. 

Shooting at f/4 might look dramatic when your frame is the size of a tea cup, but it offers zero impact once you step back to capture a full table setting.

6. Consider scale

We have a tendency, when we have a lens in hand, to keep stepping inwards, trying to tighten the composition by cutting out all the things we don’t want in the scene. This is a reductive process. We end up with very simplistic compositions, and no idea where we went wrong. 

The trick to building richer and more detailed compositions with still life and food is to step back and bring more into the frame, not less. It’s not just a matter of a different lens, it’s a different perspective; thinking bigger is better. We get obsessed with what’s on the plate, without realising that there’s a bigger scene on offer. 

As you step back a little you find yourself shooting the table, not the dish. Now you have options for your compositions. Step back a little further and you have a restaurant, not just the table. At each level of scale you get different options for composition. 

Stepping back lets you put the dish into a bigger context, with room to include a sense of place. When working in the studio, it’s a common mistake to keep the scale small. Limiting yourself to a fraction of a bench, or a small piece of plywood you painted to look like weathered timber, is limiting your creativity as well. 

For big results you need to think bigger than a bread box. Expanding the scale of your shoot zone also enables you to make room for multiple dishes. One plate offers far fewer options than two or three. 

With multiples of the same dish on a table or studio bench, you create the potential for layered compositions. As you move around you’ll find shots within the scene, and those multiples of a dish give you multiple moments of inspiration. 

7. Include a little action

Still life doesn’t have to be still when it comes to food. Get a little movement into the scene, and bring it to life. Capturing motion within your scenes adds impact to good composition – for example the pouring of liquids, steam rising off hot dishes, or simply the sprinkling of salt onto a dish. 

Additionally, the preparation of food, and the people who prepare it, are great elements to include in a photo series. Messy is magic; a sense of the chaos in a kitchen, or ingredients on a workbench, add interest.

8. Style the shot 

Building an interesting composition requires a spectrum of approaches, with food styling at one end and photojournalism at the other. You can either create the exact scene you want from scratch using props and styling, or you can look for moments within a scene that already exists in the real world; the best results often come from a combination of the two. 

Styling is a dedicated skill – on a commercial shoot the stylist can actually earn more than the photographer. Stylists supply their props and ideas, and typically the concept of the overall shoot rests most heavily in their hands. 

The photographer will have to take their lead, manipulate the light to their advantage, and ensure that the final scene is technically competent. 

As a photographer, it’s a joy to work with a good stylist, because they carry so much of the creative load. With the stylist preparing the scene, you’re able to devote your attention to the task of finding the ideal composition – for one person to be handling both the photography and the styling can be demanding, as your brain is jumping between two tasks and you may not be able to successfully complete either to your satisfaction. 

When you’re shooting on location it’s important to consider how much of the original character from the restaurant or kitchen you want to pull through into the images. Photojournalism imperatives dictate that you reveal the nature of your subject, while styling is an attempt to create it through art. In practice there is always a degree of both. 

I like to ‘shoot around the scene’ when I visit a restaurant or other location. I ask the staff to set tables as they would for guests, and to present dishes with wines poured – I want to see how they present their work. With a fully dressed table I then start to look for elements within the scene. 

I seek out a ‘hero’, and dig out compositions that pull through multiple elements. And then I might start styling the table a little – not a lot, just a little. I make adjustments, I remove distractions, and I add layers to the background. I do this with location shoots, and when working with a stylist in the studio. 

Bringing these two approaches together yields diversity in the images you’re able to collect, and opens the door to innovative compositions that are unexpectedly rewarding.

9. Remember to use props

The key to great food styling is having props on hand to complement the scene. If you’re planning to shoot a lot in the studio, you’ll want to start collecting some interesting props to spice up your scenes. 

Ingredients to a recipe can be used as props, as well as crockery and tableware. People can act as props too. Think about hands involved in the scene, or perhaps kitchen staff handling a dish – scaling out to shoot wider allows room to bring those props into the composition. 

The right prop can add context to a scene, like a pot of tea and cups alongside a slice of cake. Props can also be used to carefully add specific colors to a scene that embellish the main subject.

10. Take full control

What makes food photography so different to other genres is the degree of control you have over the subject. You can do just about anything you like to the scene – you can even eat it! It’s easy to control the light over a scene the size of a table, compared to shooting a full studio set or waiting for sunrise over a landscape. 

Food doesn’t have to pull a pose or deliver an expression; it sits there and silently accepts the attention without moving. Within limits of course – do be careful with ice cream, as it can melt in minutes if you’re not ready for the shot.

The scale and inanimate nature of food photography means you have excellent opportunities for composition. It’s a great genre for exploring the use of color, perspective and repetition. 

Don’t feel that you need all the colors of the rainbow jammed into a single frame – instead try initially working with a limited color palette, and find ways to repeat colors through the scene. And use more than one dish in your styling, taking advantage of a bigger scale and bigger ideas. 

Change your perspective as you shoot – try the top-down view, but then look for different angles that reveal more or less of certain elements.

Food photography lends itself to tethered shooting, and it’s a good idea to work with a laptop and tether cable when in the studio or on location. It’s a big advantage compared to viewing on-camera only, because you get much better feedback on subtle variations in your shots, and more accurate confirmation of where your shallow depth of field is hitting. 

Additionally, the clarity of a large laptop screen also gives you better renderings of your compositions, complete with your preferred processing treatment as each frame rolls off the camera. the prime rule, though, is to always start with the light – it doesn’t matter how interesting the food is if you don’t have good light. Aim for soft, abundant, angled light. 

As you change your perspective you can also change your angle of light – like adding salt and pepper to season a dish, changing your angle is fine-tuning the feel of the shot. 

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For this DIY, home-photography project, the only thing you are going to need is some food in different shapes and sizes.

I opted to use fruit and chose an apple, an avocado, two easy-peelers, a banana and a grape – attaching them together using cocktail sticks. The trick with the assembly is to make the different fruit items look as if they are balancing, but also defying the act of gravity. 

• Read more: The best lenses for food photography

Fruit is not the only thing you can use to create your tower – you can be as experimental as you like; anything goes, as long as you can attach it together!

When it came to lighting my fruity tower, I opted to use natural light and waited for a sunny day. As I wanted to work with a pleasing soft light, I shot towards the end of the day when the sun was streaming into my kitchen. The light through the window also created wonderful geometric triangle shadows behind and over the sculpture, therefore enhancing the overall effect.

Creating your own balancing tower of fruit

01. Build a fruit tower

Gather a selection of fruit and a few cocktail sticks. You may need more than one cocktail stick to attach each piece of fruit together. Build your formation up slowly so it doesn’t topple over! This can be quite a fiddly job, and don't worry if you can see the cocktail sticks poking out of the fruit – you can sort these out at the post-production stage. However, if you would rather not rely on editing tricks, then make sure you can’t see them when you're looking through the camera.

02. Background and settings

Place a plain background behind your food tower, then switch your camera to aperture priority or manual mode (whichever you prefer to use). Set your aperture to f/8 to keep all of the fruit in the frame sharp. If your shutter speed is reading slower than 1/80 sec, you could either attach your camera to a tripod to keep it all steady, or push the ISO up, if you would prefer to shoot handheld. Now just watch the light pour in, and shoot!

03. Clone out any visible toothpicks

To finish, at the post-production stage, adjust the basic editing settings to tone and stylize the image. We used Photoshop to remove the cocktail sticks that were visible; open your image, duplicate the background layer and go to the Clone Tool. Click on the point you want to copy in the image while pressing Alt on your keyboard, then paint over the parts you want to remove.

Read more:

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Usually associated with high-end portrait retouching, frequency separation is a technique that separates images into high and low frequencies. As such, it’s useful for retouching faces without damaging skin textures. But frequency separation has other, less known uses too – it can work wonders in food photography.

Most high-end retouchers would carry out their frequency separation workflow in Photoshop just because it’s the industry standard software. However, Affinity Photo has a tool that’s arguably better than what’s on offer in Photoshop. 

Frequency separation splits details into separate layers. ‘High frequency’ is fine detail, like the texture on the lemons and leaves here; ‘low frequency’ is the wider spread of tones, like the yellow and green colours. By separating them, you can edit each independently, smoothing out rough patches or fixing distracting textures while keeping the image looking natural.

With Affinity Photo’s dedicated Frequency Separation tool, it’s easier than you might think, and it’s likely to become a go-to tool for all kinds of retouching tasks…

Frequency separation in Affinity Photo

1. Start separating frequencies
Duplicate your original layer, then go to Filter > Frequency Separation. High‑frequency details will be separated from low-frequency tones and colours. A draggable split-screen shows how the split works. By separating the image, you have more control over retouching rough patches and blemishes without affecting the delicate textures in the objects.

2. Set Radius
You can control what is considered as high frequency either by using Radius, or by dragging left and right over the image. Set Radius so the texture in the fruit is visible in the grey image, while the details are blurred on the low-frequency version. It might take a little time to find the right balance. Some retouchers like
to make several passes with different Radius values. 

3. High and Low frequency layers
Once the command is made, the image looks the same but you’ll see two new layers appear in your Layers Panel. The High Frequency layer is set to the Linear Light Blending Mode, which knocks out the grey areas so only the fine detail is visible. You can now grab the Clone Tool and start smoothing out the tones on the lower layer without altering the delicate textures.

4. Fix the textures
To retouch detail and textures, target the High Frequency layer. A good tool for this is the Healing Brush (make sure it’s set to sample ‘Current Layer’). As with the Clone Tool, Alt-click to sample a nearby source then paint over problem areas. Set the brush hardness to 100% to prevent smudginess around the edges of the healing. The tool lets you perfect the skin of the lemon here and remove distracting wrinkles.

5. Where to clone
Part of the learning process with frequency separation is in getting a feel for where to clone and heal, and which frequency to target. In the lemon, bumps and marks can be removed by cloning the low-frequency detail, without damaging the fine texture of the lemon skin. If we wanted to fix finer distractions, like scratches on the surface of the board, we’d target the High Frequency layer with the Healing Tool instead.

6. Make a cloning layer
One of the best tools for tidying up the Low Frequency layer is the Clone Tool. Use it to smooth out rough tonal areas and blemishes in the image. You can edit the layer directly or, for greater control, make a new pixel layer above it, then set the tool to sample ‘Current and Below’ in the tool options. This keeps things non-destructive and allows you to erase any areas that go wrong.

Get started with food photography

Food photography is a genre that seems tailor made to take advantage of Affinity Photo's editing tools – but first you need to capture an image that's worth editing! Here are some top tips to create fantastic food photography…

CONTROL THE LIGHT

Shooting near a window enables you to make the most of natural light. Bright, overcast days will deliver a soft illumination that lowers contrast, and makes it easier to capture tasty details in both the shadows and highlights. If you’re working with light that’s not quite so complimentary to the subject, consider taping some tracing paper or baking parchment to the glass.

A reflector placed on the side opposite to your light source will bounce light into the shadows for more balanced results. It can be a pain to keep a circular, collapsible reflector propped up in the right position, though. We tend to grab the nearest sheet of white card or paper (or even an envelope) then simply fold it in half and stand it in place. If you want to add more contrast and definition, use something black instead. 

Crumpled kitchen foil makes for a brighter, crisper look that can suit fruit and other subjects that you want to add a feeling of freshness to.

PLAY WITH THE DEPTH OF FIELD

When you’re shooting close-ups, the depth of field – the amount of front-to-back sharpness – will be relatively thin. You can increase it by using a small aperture (a high f-number, such as f/16), but using a lower f-number such as f/2.8 or f/4 will reduce the depth of field to a mere sliver. The margarine-smooth blur can make  food look more ‘dreamy’ and a bit less ‘scientific’. 

You can also employ aperture bracketing – taking a series of pictures at different apertures, to give you more choice when it comes to editing. As a minimum, take shots at three apertures: one wide, one narrow and one mid-range.

CHOOSE A BACKGROUND

Your choice of backdrop can make or break any photograph, but when it comes to shots of food, you don’t always need to include a lot of it in the frame. In fact, you might not even need a backdrop at all if you’re shooting a dish from directly above. 

The background you choose largely depends on the look you’re going for. A vibrant piece of paper or card can suit a bright, colourful subject, but if you’re shooting ‘serious’ food, a more sombre backdrop that doesn’t compete with the subject may be a better selection.

We recommend that you build up a collection of portable backgrounds – card, wood, distressed baking trays – so that you can quickly erect them in spots around your house that give you the best light. We’ve even supported a plate on a cardboard box in the bath, just so I could take advantage of some particular tiles in the background.

If you don’t want the texture of the background to show through, place it some distance from the subject and choose a relatively wide aperture (a low f-number, such as f/4 or f/5.6).

COMPOSE YOUR SHOTS

Structuring your food shots is a bit like cooking: start with a few simple ingredients and put them together in the right order. Strip your image back to basics, and think of it in terms of fitting shapes and lines together in a satisfying way. This is easier if you’re shooting from directly overhead, where a circular or square plate will provide a natural frame. 

Not all food benefits from being shot from above. Cakes, burgers and other layered dishes with a bit of height often look better when they’re photographed from a lower angle, although this may bring a background into the frame.

An odd number of elements – three or five – can help to bring balance to a shot, and it’s better to stick with just a few visual ingredients so that each one has room to breathe. Use cutlery to create lines that draw the eye into an image and provide a visual straight-edged contrast to the curves of plates and food. You’ll need to watch out for your own reflection in shiny utensils, though. They’ll also catch the light, which can fool the camera into underexposing the image. 

IT'S ALL IN THE DETAILS

Professional food photographers often work with food stylists on commercial shoots. Food styling, which ranges from sourcing ingredients to cooking food and arranging everything on the plate (as well as choosing the plate itself), is a full-time job. Like photography, it takes dedication and experience to get the best results. But there are lots of small aspects that you can tweak to improve your own shots. 

A sprinkling of bright green herbs or chopped red chillies will give brown and beige dishes a visual lift, for example, while a dusting of icing sugar can add lightness and freshness to puddings and other sweet treats. And, of course, droplets of water from a spray bottle or even simply flicked from your fingers can make fruit look juicier. If you want the drops to be longer lasting, add some glycerin to the water first. It’s small details like these that can make the subjects of your food photos look more appetising.

Food photography top tips

1. Lock your camera on a tripod
This will give you the opportunity to assess your composition carefully and make tiny adjustments to the elements of your shot. It also means you can keep the ISO at a low setting for high-quality results. Fire the shutter using the self-timer, so you can hold a reflector in position.

2. Use fewer ingredients
Avoid loading up dishes with food; rather than being a feast for the eyes it will be overwhelming. A few elements will look more elegant and be easier to digest visually.

3. Accessorise
Build up a collection of interesting tableware you can use to bring variety to your photos. You don’t have to buy an entire dinner service – individual plates, knives and forks will allow you to add variety to a whole range of shots. Choose unfussy designs to ensure that the food is the star. 

4. Clean up
Give your props a clean before shooting, especially if you’re shooting a close-up with a macro lens. That thumbprint on the handle of a knife or the dishcloth lint on a plate might not look distracting to the naked eye, but it will be magnified in the shot.

5. Crop creatively
You don’t have to show the entire plate of food. Cropping part of the dish out of the shot can help give the impression that what viewers are looking at is part of a bigger spread, when it isn’t.

Reader challenge: Food

Enter our latest photo challenge and win a copy of Affinity Photo! This month we’re looking for your hottest (or coldest) food shots. It’s a great time of the year to try your hand at the subject, as the festive and New Year period offers a feast of food photography opportunities.

We’re looking for pictures that really capture the essence of the food, whether that’s through careful lighting, biting texture, creative composition or careful editing in software to selectively boost colours and sharpness. As with last month’s challenge, we’re looking for artistic interpretation as much as we are good technique, so the overall look and feel that your picture captures is more important than anything else.

Don’t be put off if you don’t own a macro lens, flashgun or tripod – work with what you’ve got. Whether you’re shooting fresh ingredients, a slap-up dinner or a microwave meal for one, there's a host of creative techniques that you can use to elevate your images. How about experimenting with multiple exposures or making a panoramic image to create a food landscape? Perhaps go minimalist, or try a black-and-white treatment? The food photography world is indeed your oyster.

To enter your tastiest food shot (one per reader, please) email your entry to digitalcamera@futurenet.com, putting ‘Food photography’ in the subject line; or go to our Facebook page at www.facebook.com/digitalcameraworld, look for the ‘Food photography’ post and upload your entry into the feed.

By entering your image into this competition, you confirm that you own the copyright to the image, and agree that Digital Camera can publish your  image in relation to the ‘Food photography’ competition. You retain full copyright of your image and will be credited if published. The closing date is 08 January 2021. The winner will receive a copy of Affinity Photo for Windows or macOS. Good luck!

Modern food photography – from supermarket ads to Instagram posts – is awash with beautifully curated images of foodie scenes. Most of us love to eat delicious food, just as much as we love pouring over pictures of it, but taking professional shots can be more challenging than you’d think.

Successful food photographers and lifestyle bloggers know how to arrange setups and match colors to make the most enchanting scenes. They also use complementary textures and props behind their subjects to complete the mood of an image. 

• Read more: 10 food photography tips

Food and props aside, if you want to instantly transform your own setups, shooting with a specialist background is a good place to start. 

We’re not going to focus on how you should style a whole still life setup – as we’d need pages for that – but simply how to shoot and choose your settings and camera position to get the best results. Here’s how to get set up!

01 Choose your backdrop

The right board depends on the look and feel you want, as well as the items in your frame. We chose a 60cm board called Foundry from Photo Boards, which had the effect of a rusted metal surface and suited a rustic cake.

02 Position the board

Stand your board on a work surface to act as a metal-effect background. For a realistic table and wall appearance, use two boards and ensure you can’t see any giveaway board edges in the shot.

03 Use window light

Setting up near a large window should give a more even spread of light, but avoid reflections on the board. Shoot your setup straight on (directly above for flat lay shoots), or from a 45-degree angle.

04 Don't get too close

For the best results when using printed backdrops, don’t shoot them too closely or you’ll start to see the dots of the print. When we noticed this, we swapped our macro lens for a 50mm prime.

Read more: best lenses for food photography

05 Camera settings

In Aperture Priority mode, set a low ISO and a wider aperture such as f/3.5. Handheld shooting is more freeing for composition, but mount your camera on a tripod in dim light to avoid blur.

• Best tripod

06 Fill the frame

Use Live View mode to frame your scenes, filling the entire background area with the board so that you can’t see any edges. Shoot a few test images, then introduce the props when you’re happy. 

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Photographing food is becoming more and more popular. Whether it’s snapped on a phone or captured by a camera, it’s a fun entrée to mastering composition and lighting techniques – two essential ingredients of still-life photography. 

And while a keen enthusiast can get great results with a basic camera setup, it’s genuinely fascinating to see how a professional food photographer approaches a shoot. 

• More photography tips • Food photography tips and techniques

So just how much work needs to go into turning an attractive-looking
dish into a fine-art photograph? 

Thanks to spending a day with Donna Crous, we’re about to find out. Donna’s career has risen like a soufflé since making it to the finals of Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year in 2017. 

Donna's distinctive style is built around rich-colored dishes served in artisan receptacles that pop from rustic backdrops, augmented by creative uses of shadow. 

Viewing the images on Donna’s website and Instagram feed, it’s tempting to think that she puts all this together in a $500-a-day-plus studio. In reality, it’s all shot in her house in the home counties of England, UK. 

There’s a very good reason for doing this: unlike some food photographers, Donna actually cooks and styles the dishes she shoots, so she needs close proximity to a kitchen. 

This also means that she has complete control of the creative process: before she even buys any ingredients to make a given recipe, Donna has already thought how it’s going to be photographed and what kind of look she’s trying to achieve. 

Although she favors natural light for her photography, Donna has also incorporated a Rotolight Neo 2 into her current setup. This allows her to balance changes in ambient light levels, and to pick out individual elements of the food and make them come to life.

From food blogger to food photographer  

Before turning to photography, Donna blogged about healthy and natural whole foods, and this continues to be a big part of her work. 

She is a keen advocate of the Paleo diet (eating a balance of nutritionally dense foods in their natural state), and has photographed recipes for four books published by the US-based Page Street Publishing Co, including No-Thaw Paleo Cooking, Paleo Cooking with your Air Fryer and Keto Cooking with your Instant Pot. 

Whether Paleo or non-Paleo, Donna makes all the food she photographs from scratch. For recipe books, she will work from a proof copy, and also follow a shot list if supplied. 

“This sets out if anything specific is needed,” she says, “for example what angle the food needs to be shot from. 

As the images are used in a book, everything has to be in portrait orientation, with the occasional landscape image if a photo has to run over a whole spread.” 

Publishing deadlines mean that Donna has to be very efficient. She tries to cook and photograph four or five recipes a day; certainly a minimum of two. 

“A book can take two months, but most of them I’ve done in one month. For one book, I had to cook and shoot 75 dishes plus some additional shots. 

“As the books are written for an American audience, some of the ingredients are exotic and I have to go to London to get them. Things like coleslaw may have to be freshly made.” 

For our purposes today, though, the only cooking Donna is doing is a delicious roast chicken lunch. 

Behind the scenes on a food shoot

To get things under way, Donna starts with a ‘flat lay’ setup, comprising a tray of eggs next to a bowl of flour, standing on a Capture By Lucy backdrop. 

Daughter Gemma is on hand to help with the styling, dressing the scene with flowers and a cloth (fabric is good for adding texture and light), and precisely arranging the flour around the egg using a brush. 

This is taken from a make-up box that contains a selection of essentials for food photography: foam wedges, masking tape, scissors, string and window cleaning wipes. 

“For a flat lay, the light needs to come in from 45 degrees so it casts a small shadow,” says Donna. 

“There’s a misconception about shadows: some people try to get rid of them, but they’re important for food photography – they make 2D into 3D, so we need them.”

The light coming in through the French doors is the main illumination, augmented by a Rotolight Neo 2 on 10% power and modified by a pop-out diffuser. 

Donna mounts her camera on her tripod’s horizontal arm to get right above the scene, and uses a hotshoe spirit level to check her alignment: “It’s imperative to keep things level,” she says. 

For her next shot, of Gemma clapping with hands full of flour, Donna switches to her 105mm lens, before trying a variation with her 50mm lens. 

Gemma claps upwards to exaggerate the clapping movement, and Donna fires a burst using continuous frame advance. 

Then, against the same backdrop (which Donna painted herself) Gemma pours honey from a jug onto a plate of pancakes. 

Rustic props like this are a key part of Donna’s visual aesthetic. “My images have a homely, country kind of feel that people can connect with,” she notes, with French flea markets being a favorite source for prop buying.

Prop size should match the volume of food

In a pro tip that every newcomer to food photography needs to know, the size of props should relate to the volume of food: “Dinner plates can look too big, so use a sideplate instead.” 

And context matters, too: “Don’t use a teapot when you’re shooting curry dishes.”

As Donna wants the food to be the hero of the image, rather than Gemma, she focuses on the point where the honey comes into contact with the pancake. 

Although this shot has required meticulous preparation, Donna has to photograph it quickly – the honey doesn’t take long to get absorbed by the pancakes, which will cause the resulting image to have more gloop than desired. 

For a different look, and the final shot, Gemma holds a dripping honeycomb over a sideplate. Using the Rotolight as a fill light, Donna sets its color temperature to 4,100K to balance the yellow cast of the natural light and Gemma’s blue clothes. 

“Perfect – the Rotolight just pops the highlights and makes the shot,” smiles Donna. 

And that’s a wrap. Pancake, anyone? 

Kit that Donna Crous uses for food photography 

1. Nikon D850. “This camera’s pixel size is ideal for my work,” says Donna. “I’ve been using it for about a year and a half.”

2. Nikon D750 . “This is a backup body now, or my daughter Gemma will use it as a second camera.” 

3. Nikkor 50mm f/1.8. “If you need one lens for food photography, this is it. This focal length is perfect.” 

4. Nikkor 105mm f/2.8. “As well as being great for close-up and macro shots, you get excellent optical compression when shooting from further away.”

5. Nikkor 24-70mm f/2.8 VR. “I don’t use this for studio work. It’s ideal for location shooting, as I don’t want to carry a lot of kit when I’m travelling. It has Vibration Reduction, because it’s heavy, and I’m quite small!”

6. Rotolight Neo 2. “This is perfect for shooting on overcast dull days, and for creating highlights in liquids separation in slower-speed particle shots, and pouring shots.” Donna sets the colour temperature between 4,100K and 5,600K, depending on the sources of light.”

7. Apple iPad mini. “Nikon’s SnapBridge turns an iPad into a remote camera control and gives you a big live view of the image. As you can view shots next to each other, it’s good for reference. Plus, it allows me to work on my own without an assistant – a lot of my photos have me in them, pouring things.” 

8. Capture By Lucy photo background. “These help me to achieve my individual look. I have at least 30 of them, in a wide range of designs.” 

• Best backdrops for photography

Donna Crous's top tips 

Read Donna’s top tips for styling, lighting and capturing tasty cuisine every time… 

1. “Be aware of your lighting: a good image has a balance of shadows, midtones and highlights.”
    
2. “When styling a scene, take the direction of shadows into account when balancing the composition. Always use side or back lighting, and don’t have the light source in the same direction as the camera as the food will look flat and unappetizing. And never use in-built flash.”
   
3. “Light is not static – it’s always moving and changing. Be constantly aware of how the light is changing and tweak it: either add more filler light, bounce cards or diffusers.”
   
4. “Learn to control depth of field. Make sure you understand the depth of field characteristics of a given lens.” 
   
5. “Using a tripod means you won’t have to worry about shutter speed and ISO values, and will allow you to capture beautifully sharp pictures. You can also keep the camera in the same position when you need your hands free to change things. Tripods with horizontal arms are really helpful for getting overhead shots.”
   
6. “Have the scene ready and set up before adding the food. If the food spoils quickly, like ice cream, use a stand-in food to test before shooting the real thing.”

Read more: `

The best lenses for shooting food photography

 The best books about food photography

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How to edit images of food

“Using Lightroom, I’ll increase Contrast and Vibrance over the whole image, but never Saturation. I lighten the food using the Adjustment Brush, and add Saturation if needed. 

“For wooden surfaces, I will increase Contrast, Texture and Clarity to bring out the grain – again, using the brush. 

“If the wood has picked up yellow or blue tints, I can drop the Saturation to push it back. And I always finish off by adding a vignette.”

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Watch video: Home photography ideas – Take minimalist photos in the kitchen

To photograph in a minimalist way, we must first learn what it means to be minimalistic. Minimalism is defined as, “A movement in sculpture and painting, which arose in the 1950s, characterized by the use of simple, massive forms.” 

Although we’re not sculpting or painting anything, we can extrapolate the conceptual values of this movement and apply them to our photography. For this shoot, we have to abide by the rule ‘less is more’, so that means taking everything that isn’t essential out of the frame.

We have the option of either physically removing it, or repositioning ourselves to frame out anything distracting. Some photographers assume that minimalism has to be shot in black and white, but that isn’t necessary. Whether it's color or monochromatic, any photo with minimal distractions from those simple forms counts as a minimalist image. 

In this project, we’re going to look at some simple ways of exploring minimalism with things you already have access to. We’re experimenting with an egg, a glass and some cutlery, but any basic items will do – your kitchen is a goldmine of subjects.

Our camera settings will also help create the minimalist style, as we’ll be using a wide aperture to produce a shallow depth of field, and providing a soft-focus look. Let's see how to go about it…

• Best online photography courses

A simple recipe for minimalist success

01 Build your scene

Remove any clutter from your shooting area. Place a sheet of grey (or the color of your choice) cardboard on your shooting surface, and prop another sheet behind it to act as a backdrop; our shallow depth of field should make the join look seamless. Compose the frame so that nothing else is visible.

02 Raid the kitchen

Crack open the kitchen drawers and use the utensils, food or even the foil. The trick is to use one or two things at a time; don’t try to cram everything into the shot at once. Look for objects that pair well together – for example, the curve of the egg matches the glass’ shape almost perfectly.

03 Set your mode

We can work in manual mode for this shoot without any problem. However, aperture priority enables you to concentrate on your subject and not worry about getting the settings spot-on. This is helpful when shooting with changing light levels, especially when working in natural light.

04 Open wide

For this project, it’s best to use a lens with a mid-to-telephoto focal length. Here we’re using a 50mm f/1.4 and shooting with the aperture wide open, to capture a shallow depth of field. With a little selective focus, even the edge of an egg placed in a glass forms graceful lines and gradated shadows.

05 Change your angles

Don’t settle for a finished shot on your first attempt; take the time to explore every avenue before moving on. Here we shot the glass from above, before placing the egg on top.

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Bangladeshi professional photojournalist KM Asad has won the overall title of Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year 2020 in the annual competition to find the best pictures around the globe of food, wine, farming and produce.

The shot beat nearly 9,000 images from over 70 countries to win the £5,000 main prize, as well as the Politics of Food category.

“This moving image really speaks to our times,” says Caroline Kenyon, Founder and Director of the Awards. “The world is in the grip of Covid19 and normal life, whatever that may be, has stopped for all of us. These Rohingya refugee children remind us of the fragility of life, that our need for food for survival connects us all around the world. We are all the same.”

• The best books on food photography

The photograph was taken in the vast Ukhiya refugee camp in Cox’s Bazaar, Bangladesh; the seaside city now houses a million Rohingas who have fled to from neighboring Myanmar since 2016. Poignantly, the camp has just been placed in lockdown in an attempt to prevent the spread of Coronavirus.

The winning image was shot in 2017 on Asad's Canon EOS 5D Mark IV fitted with a Canon EF 35mm f/1.4L wideangle lens.  The exposure was 1/5000sec at f/1.8, ISO200. Another of Asad's images won the Food for Celebration category. 

Now in its ninth year, the global judging panel was chaired by internationally-renowned food photographer David Loftus. 

The prizes were announced by legendary Blur musician and cheesemaker Alex James, in an online ceremony.

The main category winners can be seen below...

Category winners

Bring Home the Harvest

The Morning Catch by Zay Yar Lin, Myanmar

Champagne Taittinger Wedding Food Photographer

Just Desserts, by Thomas Alexander, United Kingdom

Errazuriz Wine Photographer of the Year - Overall Winner

Meike and Dörte Näkel, by David Weimann, Germany

Food Bloggers

Bowl of Squash, by Aimee Twigger, United Kingdom

Food for Celebration sponsored by Champagne Taittinger

Making Together, by KM Asad, Bangladesh

Food for the Family

Olek Eating Pancakes, by Anna Włodarczyk, Poland

Food in the Field

When the Hive is Filled, by Xiaodong Sun, China

Food Stylist Award

Nicole Herft, United Kingdom

Fujifilm Award for Innovation

Tattoo, by Jonathan Minster, United Kingdom

InterContinental Food at the Table

Looking Too Good to Eat (Just Yet), by Sandy Wood, United Kingdom

Marks & Spencer Food Portraiture

Baked Figs, by Liam Desbois, United Kingdom

On the Phone

Hilsa, by Azim Khan Ronnie, Bangladesh 

One Vision Imaging Cream of the Crop

Vinaigrette, by Kai Stiepel, Germany

The Philip Harben Award Food in Action

Waiting for the Sun, by Nhan Do Thanh, Vietnam

Pink Lady® Apple a Day

Caramel Lady, by Diana Kowalczyk, Poland

Politics of Food

After Exodus, by K M Asad, Bangladesh

Production Paradise Previously Published

Rhubarb, by Patricia Niven, United Kingdom

Street Food

Ramen Art, by Xueping Du, China

Student Food Photographer of the Year

Curry Banquet, by Philippa Askew, United Kingdom

Winterbotham Darby Food for Sale

Vegetable Stall, by Zay Yar Lin, Myanmar

World Food Programme Food for Life

A Ugandan Feast, by Jason Wain, United Kingdom

Young (15 - 17)

Believers Sharing a Meal, by Sangjun Lee, India

Young (11 - 14)

Mulled Wine, by Alex Forbes, United Kingdom

Young (10 and under)

Apples, by Scarlett Blanch, United Kingdom

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Watch video: Home photography ideas: Exploding food photography!

Floating food stacks are very popular in both food photography and restaurant advertising at the moment. This trick shot requires a cunning combo of shooting skills and Photoshop techniques – and as you can see, it's very effective! 

We begin by setting up a series of precarious wire platforms for each item in our burger, so we can take the photograph. Then we remove the stack and shoot an empty frame. Next we piece together the frames in Photoshop and remove the wires at the edges of the image. 

• 10 best online photography courses

However, we are still left with little visible parts of the wire that the food is resting on – ruining the illusion. To fix this, we will need to make use of Photoshop’s powerful Patch tool to retouch the wires and finesse the image.

It’s easier than it sounds, as the full walkthrough in our tutorial video above will demonstrate. You can obviously use this technique to shoot other tasty treats, so head to your fridge and get cooking up a great shot! 

• See also Best camera for food photography

Set up your snack stack

01 Hang the backdrop

Begin by setting up, and consider the background – we used a dark blanket so the backdrop would be completely black. Alternatively, you could arrange a scene with more context – a kitchen worktop or a dinner table would work well.

02 Place two stands

Set up two light stands (or any other vertical stands) either side of the table like this, parallel to one another. You might also want to weigh the stands down to prevent them from shifting, or lash them together under the table to lock them in place.

03 Create wire platforms

Using a roll of thin wire, wrap a piece around the stands to make a thin platform, then cut the wire and continue making more platforms for each ingredient you intend to use in the photograph. Make the wire platforms as taught as possible.

04 Prepare the food

Slice the ingredients you want to use. For our burger we had red onion, curly lettuce, tomato, pickles, cheese, a brioche bun and a burger. We also had mustard and ketchup on hand. Choose the freshest, most colorful foods you can find.

05 Arrange the ingredients

Place each ingredient on a separate wire platform, spacing them apart. It’s best to work from the top downwards so that, if something does fall off, it doesn’t take the rest of the stack with it. Take care that each item doesn’t overlap or obscure the rest.

06 Take the shot

Fix the camera to a sturdy tripod, arrange your lights (see next section) and shoot the stack of delightful-looking ingredients. A prime lens like a 50mm is ideal for food photography, as primes tend to be sharper and faster than zooms. Be careful not to nudge the tripod – we need to take another frame of the empty scene once we remove the food and wires.

07 On the wire

After taking the main shot of the stacked food, we also off a few more frames while holding pickles and onions on another piece of wire. This gives us a bit of extra variation in the heights of the food. We'll combine these later on in Photoshop.

08 An empty frame

Once we'd taken the food shots, we removed everything and took a frame of just the table and backdrop. This is handy for removing the wires later in Photoshop – we'll combine the food shot with the empty scene and use a mask to hide the wires.

03 Dollops and splashes

Finally, we try out a few frames while squirting mustard and dropping dollops of ketchup, attempting to catch them in midair. It’s best to turn off any ambient light so that the speed lights freeze the motion. We do this last, as it’s likely to make a reasonable amount of mess!

Speed lighting

02 Add a second flash

The second speed light is placed in front and to the right of the subject, and fitted with a silver umbrella. A wireless trigger is attached to the other flash, and this one is set to optical slave (S1) so it detects the other light and triggers at the same time.

03 Control the output

Both flashes are set to manual; the frontal light is at 1/16 power, and the rear at 1/4. This creates cross lighting with highlights along the left side of the food, and fill from the frontal flash. The umbrellas diffuse, soften and spread the light.

04 Expose for the flash

Our camera is also in manual mode, at 1/200 sec, f/5.6 and ISO100. The wide aperture means that depth of field is limited, so the table and backdrop should be blurred. After focusing on the burger, we switch to manual focus to lock it in place.

Finish in Photoshop

01 Use the lasso

Now it's time to fire up Photoshop. Open the images of the burger and empty scene, and drag the burger into the other image. Grab the Lasso tool and select the food.

02 Make a mask

Click the Add Layer Mask icon in the Layers panel. Get the Brush tool and paint with black to hide the wire around the edges of the food.

03 Patch the wires

Make a new layer, grab the Patch tool and check ‘Sample All Layers’. Select parts of the wires and drag to clean areas to remove.

04 Perfect the food

Use the Patch tool to retouch any messy parts of the food so that everything look's good. Next open up the other images, like the mustard.

05 Copy in the extras

Select the mustard with the Lasso and copy in, then go to Select>Select and Mask. Select the object and set Output to: Layer Mask.

06 Reshape the burger

When everything is combined, make a merged copy with Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+Alt+E then go to Filter>Liquify to reshape the food and make it plump and sumptuous!

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Watch the video: Home photography ideas – shoot abstract painterly images! 

Feeling in need of photographic inspiration while you're stuck indoors? Well, look no further than your kitchen cupboards! 

You’ll be surprised at how creative you can be with a few household items, and for this project we’re going to produce colorful, abstract images using only tinfoil and some food coloring. It’s a simple setup – all you need is a table and some natural light from a nearby window to create your own tabletop studio, and a macro lens as you’ll need to focus close to the foil. 

The effect is achieved by placing some glasses of colored water next to or on a sheet of foil and photographing the reflections – the resulting shapes and textures create images with a lovely painterly feel. As with everything, though, you’ll need to have patience and experiment to get the best results!

The tricky part is capturing a good composition, so adjust the foil and experiment with the position of the glasses of colored water until you get the desired effect. Using a macro lens is essential as the closer you get to the foil, the better results you’ll capture. All that’s required in post-production is a simple saturation boost, and a negative Clarity setting in Adobe Camera Raw to blur any sharp detail.

01 Position the foil

Lay out a sheet of foil on a table next to a window. A few creases in the foil will give the desired effect, so you don’t need to scrunch it up – just create gentle ripples.

02 Water colors

Add food coloring to glasses of water, and place these on or next to the foil to create colorful reflections. One or two colors work best – any more will look too busy.

03 shoot handheld

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With an unknown amount of empty days stretching before many of us, we wouldn't surprised if you were tempted to venture into the kitchen and try your hand at some new recipes (if you can find the ingredients!). However, why not combine your culinary passions with your photography hobby and try capturing beautiful shots of your scrumptious creations. To help you kickstart your new home project, we've rounded up ten of the best food photographers to give you plenty of inspiration, and food photography tips.

Even if you're more interested in the finished product than the cooking process, these food photographers continuously serve up delectable visual treats that you can feast on all day. 

• Read more: Everything photographers need to work from home

Take a gander at some of our favorite food photographers and get inspired by their creations. Whether you want to create something bright and colorful, or romantic and moody, there's a veritable well of inspiration out there.

10. Sarah Brunella (@sarah_fel)

Sarah's beautiful feed revolves around just a few simple colors: white, grey, black and the alluring rich golden-brown of freshly baked goods. Not only will each of Sarah's posts leave you reaching for your baking cupboard, they're also a masterclass in how to create simple yet effective food photography.

09. Marie Saba (@mariesaba)

Marie Saba obviously never listened to those who say you shouldn't play with your food – and we're glad she didn't! Marie's playful feed shows that you don't have to take yourself too seriously if you want to be a food photographer. Filled with puns galore, we think Marie Saba's Instagram is egg-cellent!

• See also Best camera for food photography

08. Dennis Prescott (@dennistheprescott)

If you're a fan of food flatlays, then you'll love Dennis' Instagram feed. As a cookbook author and the host of Netflix's Restaurants On The Edge, Dennis knows a thing or two about cooking – and the visual feasts he serves up on the 'gram definitely show that!

07. Sarah Crawford (@bromabakery)

Sarah's clean and minimalist feed is perfect for those who love the focus to be on the food, the whole food and nothing but the food. Free from distracting backgrounds, viewers can focus solely on the delectable dishes that she's presenting. It's definitely clear that Sarah knows exactly what she's doing as a food photographer.

06. David Loftus (@davidloftus)

David Loftus is a well known travel, lifestyle and food photographer – and you can certainly see his experience on his feed. David also peppers some personal photos in amongst his professional food photography, which is a great opportunity to get to know the man behind the food photographer.

05. Christiann Koepke (@christiannkoepke)

As a creative director, recipe curator and food photographer, Christiann Koepke is clearly spinning a lot of (beautifully styled) plates, but that doesn't stop her Instagram feed from looking incredible. Showcasing a wide range of recipes, Christiann will inspire you to pick up your camera and rifle through your food cupboards.

04. Joann Pai (@sliceofpai)

Joann Pai is a travel and food photographer who's based in Paris, which means that her feed is filled with a delectable array of international cuisine. Her beautifully muted tones add a classic quality to her food photography, and we're in love with her exquisite compositions.

03. Sveta Violet (@a_violet_dream)

If you're a fan of dark and moody lighting, then you'll love Sveta's account. We adore how Sveta has embraced shadows in her food photography, combining deep blacks with her perfectly lit subjects. We especially love her images that involve movement, which is a rare quality in food photography. 

02. Eva Kosmas Flores (@evakosmasflores)

Eva Kosmas Flores is another food photographer that incorporates movement in her work – and it brings an impressive impact. Her beautifully styled photos are a masterclass in color and composition. If you're looking to take your food photography to the next level, then we'd recommend following Eva yesterday!

01. Valentina Solfrini (@valentinahortus)

Valentina's images show that food photography doesn't just have to be about food – it can also be about emotion and romanticism as well. Valentina is a master at incorporating people into her food photos, and we love the classic imagery she uses in her shoots. Follow Valentina for brilliant escapism and pure visual delight.

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There are lots of great home photography ideas, to keep you and your camera busy during the ongoing coronavirus crisis... but photographing food is always a great wayt of keeping your camera clicking when confined indoors. In this hack, we are going to show you how to make your own lightbox, so that you can take backlit shots of translucent shots of fruit...

You have an old slide lightbox at home, which you could use for this trick. If you don’t own one, just do what we’ve done here and backlight a piece of glass – we simply used a shelf from the refrigerator!

The best subjects for this simple project are ones that you can cut very thinly and which are translucent – onions, citrus fruit and cucumbers are good examples. You’ll need to position the camera at a fairly low level to get frame-filling shots of these small subjects with a close-focusing macro lens. If your tripod has a center column, reverse it and attach your camera so that it’s hanging between the legs, pointing downwards, then position this directly over your lightbox. Use a remote camera release to fire the camera or activate the self-timer instead.

For precise focusing, switch to Live View and manual focus. You 
can always switch back to viewfinder shooting to extend the battery life, but activate the Mirror Lockup function if you do, as this will give sharper results. Alternatively, use your camera tethered to a computer.

1. Makeshift lightbox

For a bright, even backlight, we supported the glass refrigerator shelf on stacks of books and DVD cases. We taped white paper to the back of the glass to diffuse the light from a flashgun placed underneath it, which was in turn attached to the camera using a coiled remote cord. We held our strobe in place with a beanbag (learn how to make your own beanbag).

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2. Camera settings

We used a macro lens and shot in Manual mode, with a narrow aperture (f/18), low ISO (100), and slow shutter speed (0.3 sec) so the ambient light added a little front illumination. We used flash exposure compensation to increase the flash exposure by 2-3 stops. This meant that the background became bleached-out white, but this ensured that no texture in the paper was visible.  

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3. Final touches

To give an artier finish to this picture of a bog-standard red onion, we processed it in Photoshop, reducing the saturation, brightening the whites and increasing the clarity option, which subtly increases the contrast. We also viewed the image at 100% and cloned out any small fibers and dust spots. A square crop suited the circular subject, before adding a thin black border, ready for printing out.

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There are lots of great home photography ideas, to keep you and your camera busy when stuck at home. And out of all of these, food photography is one of the most rewarding – as you can eat the subject after the shoot!

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 Food photography works well under natural window light – so you don't need studio lighting kits to do this. The soft, wrapping quality of window light lends itself to making food look delicious. Moreover, when you need a large light source, for soft shadows, you won’t get much bigger than a window. However, if the sun strikes the window directly, the light streaming through casts contrasting shadows that can ruin your shot – and creating a contrast range that means that a decent exposure is near to impossible.  

A really simple solution to this problem is to tape some baking parchment or greaseproof paper over the window and voilà! You have instantly diffused your light. 

The translucent paper spreads the light and creates soft, wrapping light with diffuse shadows. Combine this with a paper or homemade tinfoil reflector or two and you’re well on your way to taking great food shots.

1. What you need

A roll of baking parchment is all you need - plus something to attach it to the window frame that will keep it in place. Masking tape or insulation tape are great solutions here, as they are less likely to pull away any paint when you take your DIY diffuser down.

2. Placing your diffuser

How much baking paper you need will depend on the size of your window, and also on the brightness of the sun. However, you only need to cover the part of the window that is throwing light on your subject. So it is sensible to set-up your food or still life in situ, before you tape your diffuser to the window.

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The Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year 2020 competition has recently revealed its shortlist, proving that there can always be a ray of light to be found even in the darkest of times – even if all that ray consists of is looking at some beautiful food photography. 

Over 9,000 images were submitted from over 70 countries around the world, with the images displaying not only "incredible technical prowess, but the most evocative and powerful storytelling".

• Read more: Everything photographers need to work from home

The global competition, which is celebrating its tenth year next year, is designed to help connect us and offer an exclusive insight into the universal language of food culture. It's not just impeccably styled photos of sumptuous dishes, the Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year competition also pays tribute to the journey our food experiences from farm to plate. Thanks to its global reach, the competition also shows how food impacts cultures across the world.

Ordinarily, the competition would culminate in an awards evening  at the Mall Galleries, London. However, due to the COVID-19 lockdown, the awards will be presented digitally instead. On 28 April at 20:00 (GMT), the awards will be announced simultaneously on the Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year Facebook page and Youtube channel. 

The pre-recorded video will be shows live, which will allow the global audience, participants and sponsors to enjoy the announcement at the same time and in the comfort of their own homes.

To see more of the amazing images that have made the shortlist, simply scroll down below. To find out more information, check out the Pink Lady® Food Photographer of the Year's website.

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Watch video: Home photography ideas – Add a splash to food photography

If you're running dry of ideas to shoot during the current isolation period, we have the cure for what ails you… a nice splash of your favorite beverage for a still life shoot with a difference!

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Still life photography enables us to take control of every aspect of our image. We can arrange our props how we like and change the lighting to our heart’s content, until we achieve the exact image we want. With the camera on a tripod, we can tweak compositions and shoot in moody low light if we desire; with a static shot, shutter speed becomes irrelevant. 

However, we’re going to show you how to add a little expression to a still life by including a sense of movement in your scene. Our subject is a bottle of rose lemonade, and to add interest we’ll dress the scene with a glass of the sparkling beverage, include an actual rose and a couple of lemons as the backdrop – frozen as they splash into a container of water. 

• See also Best camera for food photography

While our camera is still locked solidly in place on a tripod, timing becomes everything. As well as ensuring that we hit the shutter at the precise moment that the falling lemons enter the frame, we have to freeze the moment to avoid unsightly subject blur – and we’ll achieve this with a set of studio lights. 

We’ll employ some other tricks, too. We want our lemonade to look ice-cold and refreshing, with that straight-from-the-fridge look. However, hot studio lights would quickly melt ice cubes in our drink and evaporate any condensation forming on the bottle and glass, so we’re going to have to fake things a little…

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01 Prep your frame

You’ll need two bottles of your chosen beverage – it’s best to choose stylish ‘boutique’ bottles, rather than something from the supermarket ‘value’ range. Coat the label of one with clear varnish so that it remains waterproof when the water droplets are applied. Then pour some of the sparkling drink from the second bottle into a clean glass tumbler until it’s half-full, and place them on a reflective surface. 

02 Dress the scene

We positioned a rose between the bottle and the glass, in front of a tank full of water. Top up the tumbler with acrylic ice cubes – real ice will melt too quickly. Next, mix a combination of water to glycerine at a ratio of approximately 2:1 and spray onto the bottle and glass tumbler to give them that refreshingly chilled look.

03 Camera settings

Set the shutter speed to the flash sync determined by your camera body – in this case, we're shooting at 1/200 sec. Set an aperture of f/11 to give plenty of depth of field, and your lowest possible ISO for maximum image quality. Focus on the bottle, then switch to manual focus to lock it in place and turn off the lights. A test shot should produce a very underexposed dark frame. 

04 Let there be light

In this project we’re using three Profoto studio lights – a key, a fill and a backlight – all set at different power outputs to light our scene in a subtly balanced way. (You can also use speed lights to achieve the same results, though you'll need to pump up the power as strobes pack less of a punch.) Position the key light to the right of the setup; the fill to the left and the third light behind the tank, with a translucent diffuser in between to soften up the lighting in the backdrop. 

05 Power to the lights

Having lit our scene, the very short flash duration will freeze the lemons as they splash into the tank behind. It’s the varying power of the key and fill that give form to our bottle and props. The rear light diffuses through the liquid in the bottle and the glass, emphasizing the drink. Take a test shot and adjust the power of the lights until you have a balanced setup. We had the key at three quarters power (7.5), the fill at half (5) and the back light at full (10), creating a soft, even light through the double diffuser we used.

06 Take the plunge

Ask your assistant to drop the lemons into the tank on the count of three and estimate when to release the shutter. It’ll take a few attempts to nail the shot, so use a squeegee to clean the front and rear of the water tank of splashes, ready for the next shot. If you shoot tethered, you’ll be able to better inspect the detail on your computer screen.

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There's nothing better than a good meal - especially if it doubles as a photographic subject beforehand. Food photography is experiencing a monumental boom at the moment, with bloggers and Instagrammers launching the genre into the digital stratosphere. Riding the momentum, and giving photographers the chance to hone their skills, the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year 2020 is now open for entries.

The Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year enjoyed a successful year with their 2019 competition, with impressive entries from 77 different countries. According to the official press release, the competition "shines a light on the best photography and film shorts showing food in its every setting in cultures across the world. Stunning shots of cooking, harvesting, farming, eating celebrating and sometimes just surviving - these pictures and films tell stories that move, delight, inform and entertain". 

The 2020 competition's judging panel will be chaired by legendary food photographer David Loftus and will include new names such as Chris Dee, Food and Home Director, Harrods, Tori Katherman, Director of Photography, Food&Wine, NYC, Anthea Loucas Bosha, CEO, Melbourne Food & Wine Festival and Joshua Lustig, Deputy Picture Editor, Financial Times Weekend Magazine. 

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Jianhui Liao from China won the top prize of £5,000 last year, receiving a cheque at the Champagne Taittinger Awards Evening at the Mall Galleries, London. He also saw his winning shot in the press across the world, including BBC News Online, China Daily, The Guardian, The Times and The Telegraph. 

Peter Durose, who heads up Pink Lady in the UK, says, "We are delighted to be headline sponsor again of these prestigious awards. Our brand is all about excellence and to act as a global patrol of the arts in this way to such an important art form is very meaningful for us." 

To enter this year's competition, simply follow the link here to register an account. If you'd like to view photos from last year's finalists, you can see them here. 

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Chinese photographer Jianhui Liao has won the overall title of Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year 2019 in the annual competition to find the best pictures around the globe of food, wine, farming and produce.

 The shot beat over 9,000 images from 77 countries to win the £5,000 main prize, as well as the Food for Celebration category.

The overhead shot shows villagers from Handan in Shexian County of China wearing Qing Dynasty costumes gathering around a giant pot of noodles in a feast to celebrate the birth of goddess Nüwa. 

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Titled Cauldron Noodles, Jianhui Liao use his Sony A7R Mk II with a 24-240mm superzoom set at 54mm using an exposure of 1/200sec at f/8, ISO100.

The prizes were presented legendary Blur musician and cheesemaker Alex James.

Jianhui’s shot won the Food for Celebration category sponsored by Champagne Taittinger. “It stood out from the rest in its category, however, for the way in which he made the subject matter, a community feast, so beautiful and atmospheric.” 

Now in its eighth year, the global judging panel for this year's competition was chaired by internationally-renowned food photographer David Loftus.

Category winners

Bring Home the Harvest 

Kazi Mushfiq, Bangladesh
Harvesting Gold

Champagne Taittinger Wedding Food Photographer

Tiree Dawson, UK
Preparing for the Nightshift 

Errazuriz Wine Photographer of the Year

Jon Wyand, UK
Cleaning the Cuverie

Food Bloggers

Aimee Twigger, UK
Drying Pasta

Food for Celebration sponsored by Champagne Taittinger

Jianhui Liao, China
Cauldron of Noodles

Food for Sale

Elise Humphrey, UK
Ramadan

Food for the Family

Sanghamitra Sarkar, India
Bonda Tribe

Food in the Field

Andrew Newey, UK
Pumpkins at Sunrise

Food Stylist Award 

Kim Morphew, UK 

Fujifilm Award for Innovation

Michael Hedge, UK
Broken Egg

InterContinental Food at the Table

Giles Christopher, UK
Mussels Ready to Eat

Marks & Spencer Food Portraiture

Nick Milward, UK
Tarte Tatin with Thyme

On the Phone

Matt Wilson, Chile
Rosemary Harvest

One Vision Imaging Cream of the Crop

Simon Bajada, Sweden
Basque Heirlooms

Philip Harben Award for Food in Action

Kazi Mushfiq, Bangladesh
Water Collecting

Pink Lady® Apple a Day

Tiree Dawson, UK
The Girl

Politics of Food 

Martin Chamberlain, UK
Cow Tantrum

Production Paradise Previously Published

Cosimo Barletta, Italy
Red Octopus

WFP Storytellers Innovation Award

Eder Estilmer, Guatemala Water Stream

Winterbotham Darby Food Film Shorts supported by Foodism

Jennifer Davick, USA Black Sesame

World Food Programme Food for Life

Avishek Das, India Food Processing

Street Food

Debdatta Chakraborty, India
Risha Kesarwale, Chai seller

Student Food Photographer

Chloe Dann, Australia
The Carnal Supper

Young 15-17

Lily-Mae Franklin, UK
Always Have a Camera in my Hands

Young 11-14

Jemima Painter, Thailand
Fresh Thai Ingredients

Young 10 & under

Joshua George, Bahrain
Passion Fruit Love

View all this year's winners on the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year website.

Read more:
Digital Camera Photographer of the Year 2019 overall winners revealed

The best cameras for professionals in 2019

802 of the best images from Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year 2019 have now been revealed. These shortlisted mouth-watering images have been selected from 9000 entries submitted from 77 countries around the world – the largest number ever received. The shortlisted images now go forward to judging to decide the category winners and the overall Photographer of the Year.

The 802 shortlisted images offer a brilliantly-colored and profound insight into food culture around the globe. Shots of everything from cooking, growing, processing, eating and more. From a hungry young boy feasting of a piece of freshly cut honeycomb in the foothills of the Himalayas, Nepal, to Chef Brian Lockwood in New York city rolling fresh pasta dough in the kitchen of NoMad restaurant. 

Meanwhile, vibrant and fun food portraiture shots of ‘Jello Lego’ have also reached the next stage of judging with images such as a group of young people fishing in the sea of Galilee and a self-portrait of a mother baking with her children. 

A dozen of the shortlisted images are shown below:

12 of the best

Photographer: Andrew Newey
Title: Hunger for Honey
Description: A hungry young boy feasts of a piece of freshly cut honeycomb in the foothills of the Himalayas, Kaski region, Nepal.
Category: World Food Programme Food for Life

Photographer: Emma Boyns
Title: Guava
Description: A graphic shot of a guava fruit, photographed on a vibrant, African-print fabric which links the fruit back to its origins.
Category: Fujifilm Award for Innovation

Photographer: Francesco Tonelli
Title: Rolling Pasta
Description: Brian Lockwood and a cook rolling fresh pasta dough in the kitchen of NoMad Restaurant, NYC
Category: The Philip Harben Award for Food in Action 

Photographer: Laura Wood
Title: Gingerbreads (self-portrait)
Description: A self-portrait taken with my children whilst making gingerbread. I like to take everyday scenes and turn them into images which feel like paintings from the past. It reminds me that there is so much beauty to be found in our everyday moments.
Category: Food for the Family

Photographer: Manos Chatzikonstantis
Title: Fishing in Galilee
Description: A group of young people living in a Kibbutz by the sea of Galilee are fishing on a boat towed by the main fishing vessel.
Category: Bring Home the Harvest

Photographer: Martin Chamberlain
Title: Fish farm in the wild
Description: The landscape of Eysturoy in the Faroe Islands provides a stunning backdrop to a fish farm within one of its northern fjords.
Category: Fujifilm Award for Innovation

Photographer: Sarah Hewer
Title: Solo: Josephine Perry, Winemaker, Dormilona
Description: Josephine Perry is owner/winemaker at Dormilona in Margaret River, a one-person winery.  Her wines are made with no additives, fining & very little intervention. Past winner of the prestigious Young Gun of Wine award, Australia.
Category: Errazuriz Wine Photographer of the Year - People

Photographer: Mick Shippen
Title: I know why the birds don’t sing
Description: Each year in Laos, thousands of migratory birds are caught in nets stretched across fields. Despite being illegal, the tiny birds are openly sold in markets and at the roadside. If they don't sell they are discarded.
Category: Politics of Food

Photographer: Mohammed Shajahan
Title: Drinking Water Suppliers
Description: A water vendor is taking drinking water collected from the deep tube-wells, to the slums of lower income people on the other side of the river as the river water has become polluted from the waste dumped by humans. The photo was taken from the river Karnaphuli at Chattogram in Bangladesh.
Category: World Food Programme Food for Life

Photographer: Sanghamitra Sarkar 
Title: Pig Feast of Dani Tribe
Description: The Papuanese way of cooking: Women heat stones in a fire over a pit, until they are extremely hot, then cuts of meat and pieces of sweet potato or banana are wrapped inside banana leaves and lowered into the pit. The remaining hot stones are placed on top and the pit is covered in grass and a cover to keep steam in.In this picture the women of Dani tribe taking out the boiled meat and vegetables for eating.
Category: Food for Celebration 

Photographer: Teri Campbell
Title: Jello Legos
Description: How to play with your food
Category: Marks & Spencer Food Portraiture

Photographer: Tiree Dawson
Title: Wedding Barbeque
Description: One of the 2018 fantastic heatwave weddings
Category: Champagne Taittinger Wedding Food Photographer

See more of the shots...

You can view the full shortlist at www.pinkladyfoodphotographeroftheyear.com

The category winners as well as the overall Food Photographer of the Year will be announced on the evening of 30 April 2019 at a ceremony in London.

Read more:

10 food photography tips for getting tasty shots every time

147 photography techniques, tips and tricks for taking pictures of anything

Image: Noor Ahmed Gelal

The results of the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year 2018 competition have been announced at a ceremony in London, hosted by TV celebrity and top restaurateur Prue Leith.

This year the gong goes to Bangladeshi photographer Noor Ahmed Gelal, whose shot titled 'Praying with Food' depicts the breaking of a day-long fast for a section of the local Hindi community at a temple in Swamibag, Dhaka, Bangladesh. It is the Hindu belief that fasting is necessary to cleanse a person of sin.

The image also won in the Food for Celebration category, sponsored by Champagne Taittinger.

Belal was presented with his £5,000 prize by head of Pink Lady, Andy Macdonald, at the awards reception held at the Mall Galleries, London, this evening.

“The competition was fierce,” Macdonald said. “There were 8,000 images entered from 60 countries and the standard was exceptional. 

“Noor’s shot stood out from the rest in its category, however, for the way in which he made the subject matter so fascinating and distinctive.”

At the ceremony, legendary British social documentary photographer Martin Parr was honoured for his work showing food in its cultural place in various sectors of society, and was presented with the Outstanding Achievement Award by Frances Morris, Director of the Tate Britain.

The judging panel for this year’s awards was chaired by food photographer David Loftus, and included Emily Luchetti, Chair of the James Beard Foundation, NYC; celebrity chef Ferran Adrià; Global Photo Director at Buzzfeed Wajmar Yaqubi; and His Excellency Ali Bin Thalith, Secretary General, HIPA.

Other category winners included Jade Nina Sarkhel from the UK, whose image of one of a bakery in Mumbai, titled 'Rex Bakery', triumphed in the Food for Sale category.

“Straddling a gutter, I captured the bullet-stricken walls of one of Mumbai’s oldest bakeries,” she said. “The bakery churns out 18,000 paos a day, operating 24/7 selling bread through the keyhole counter overnight. Bread is given for free to those who can’t afford it. It’s places like this that knit communities together in India.”

Derek Snee won the Marks & Spencer Food Adventures category for an image titled 'Tapas upon Tyne', depicting a chef selling Catalan tapas on a cold evening at Newcastle-upon-Tyne’s Christmas market.

The Fujifilm Award for Innovation, which celebrates photographers who are doing something different, was given to Philip Field for his image titled 'Ostrich Horizon'.

Describing the process of taking the image, he said: “Whilst travelling across the Serengeti, our driver stopped temporarily whilst navigating a dip in the terrain. At that moment, I spotted a flock of ostriches walking across the brow of a hill in the fading light and was able to quickly capture this shot before they disappeared.”

The awards weren’t just for stills photographers – videographers were also honoured at the event, with the Unearthed Food Film Shorts supported by Foodism category winner being the With Love Food project, for a film titled “For the Love of Food”.

“We travelled to Skye to meet some of the island's most exciting food producers and then on to see Michael Smith at his new restaurant 'Loch Bay' to bring together all the produce we collected,” the company said.

Many other photographers were praised in the many categories on offer, everyone from food bloggers and professional wine photographers to children as young as 10. To see more shots and stories from the Pink Lady Food Photographer of the Year Award, head to the competition's official site.

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With the season to eat, drink and be merry upon us, the holidays are the perfect time to brush up on your food photography skills. Preparation is key when it comes to working with food. From cooking and presenting the cuisine to setting the scene, there’s lots to consider – and that’s before you even turn your camera on!

As we didn’t have a professional chef on hand, we kept things simple by shooting some mince pies with a cup of steaming tea. When it comes to photographing food, the background is just as important as the subject; a contrasting backdrop makes your subject stand out and helps to emphasize the food, and in this project we’re going to show you how to give it a bit of festive sparkle with the addition of some fairy lights twinkling in the background to create some beautiful bokeh. ‘Bokeh’ is the aesthetic quality of the out-of-focus points of light. This is determined by the way the lens renders these points of light, so wide apertures are a must to achieve those beautiful, soft circles from the fairy lights. 

With the subject and background sorted, don’t forget the smaller details; a sprig of holly, dusting of icing sugar and some swirling steam from our hot cuppa will help bring all the elements of our shot together. 

TABLETOP STUDIO: Let's get festive

We’ll be relying on natural light to illuminate our subjects, so get set up near a window

01 FAST LENS

Good bokeh requires a wide aperture of at least f/2.8; a fast prime, like our Sigma 50mm f/1.4 DG HSM A, is ideal. When shooting at wide apertures, the smallest of movements could knock the focus, so set your camera on a tripod for full support.

02 BACKDROP

Use a festive red or green backdrop and position the fairy lights in front of it. Check the Live View display to ensure you’ve got an even spread of lights. Keep the amount of ambient light hitting the backdrop to a minimum by closing the nearest curtain.

03 COTTON WOOL TRICK

Microwave some wet cotton wool, then place the wad inside the cup to give the illusion of a steaming hot drink. Be quick as the steam doesn’t last long. Give it a squeeze to create more steam, or pop it back in the microwave and reheat.

04 SMARTPHONE

A dark, contrasting background will reveal the steam well, but if it’s too subtle you can add some backlight. Use the torch on your phone and position it next to the setup. Lean your phone at an angle to ensure the light is shining up at the rising steam.

05 FESTIVE FOOD

A hot cuppa and some mince pies is a sign that Christmas is on its way. Include other festive accessories, such as pine cones and a sprig of holly. To add an extra bit of Christmas sparkle, give your subjects a light dusting of icing sugar.

06 TABLETOP SETUP

For the best bokeh effect, your subject needs to be a few feet away from the backdrop; the greater the distance between foreground and background, the greater the effect will be. Position the table near a window for diffused daylight.

STEP BY STEP: Food for thought

Set the table – and your camera – for some scrumptious food photography

01 FULL SUPPORT

Place your camera on a tripod and position it slightly higher and angled down to your setup. To ensure you include both the subject and bokeh backdrop in the frame, pop the camera in portrait format and enable Live View mode to help you compose the scene.

02 SET A WIDE APERTURE

Switch to Manual mode and set ISO to 100. We need a wide aperture to render the fairy lights in the background into beautiful bokeh. Our lens opens up to f/1.4, but this won’t capture much of our subject in sharp focus, so we set f/2 as a happy compromise.

03 EXPOSE THE SCENE

Set a shutter speed for a balanced exposure. The fairy lights in the background may fool the camera’s light meter, so overexpose the scene a little. Ensure your camera is set to record in Raw and set Auto White Balance; this can be changed in post-production.

04 GET FOCUSED

Decide on your main focal point; ours is the second-closest pie. Zoom in at 10x magnification, set the switch on the lens barrel to Manual Focus. Twist the focus ring to bring your subject into sharp focus. Take a test shot and adjust the exposure, if required.

STEP BY STEP: TRICKS OF THE TRADE

Heating up a wad of wet cotton wool is a classic trick for creating steamy shots in food photography

Soak a wad of cotton wool in water, squeeze out the excess liquid, then pop it in the microwave for 30 seconds. Be careful as it will be hot to touch. Gently squeeze the cotton wool to generate more steam and place inside your cup.

For the best results you’ll need a dark, contrasting background. Our fairy lights are reducing the visibility of the steam; to make it pop out more create backlighting with a torch (we’ve used our phone) positioned behind the cup and out of sight.