Food photography tips · Photography

Make time for your food photography

Gabriela Lupu

mix_christmas_res

Food photography has become more and more important through the years. Food photography is considered as one of the most difficult genres of photography but has more commercial value than wedding or portrait photography.

Many people asked me why is so hard to take good food photos? I will answer that everything in life is hard. Good photos come with years of experience, equipment, a stylist, a vision, etc. Many of food bloggers don’t have time to loose on settings or money on expensive equipment. They just want to take better photos of what they do right now.

I will say MAKE TIME. Make time to understand your camera, make time to read about styling a plate and how to improve your photos. A good photo  can save a bad food and can attract more people to read your recipe.

It took me a few years to decide what type of photography I wanna do. I did portraits and travel photography. After having the baby I continued to shoot portraits and travel and I start shooting food. It looked so simple, but when I shoot the first photos I did not like the result.

So I start reading and watching videos, bought a book, and shoot as much as I could. I don’t have a studio room, so every time I shoot I improvise a studio on my terrace or in my living room. It takes me 1 hour to put the lights and 30 min to take everything down. My baby sleeps 1.5 h – 2 h, so I don’t have enough time for studio lights. So I start learning about natural light and shooting with different backgrounds.

It’s a lot of work and not all the time I am happy with the final photo, but is good for the learning process. I have a huge list of food photographers and food bloggers that I like. I am looking everyday at minimum 20 great food photos. I have a notebook and I write down ideas.

Don’t invest a lot of money in an expensive camera just to take photos of your food for the blog. Is a huge mistake and you will be sorry. Don’t compare yourself to a professional  food photographer. You will never gone win. The only one person to compare with you. Your photos 2 months ago before learning about food photography and now.

This is what I do. I look back at my work and try to see if my photos are better or not.

In February 2012, I decided I wanna become a food photographer. It’s a long process but I am happy I found something that I love. Here you have an example of my evolution over 2 years and 10 months. The fist photo is actually the first food photo that I took.

food photo

As you can see  with a lot of reading and practice I managed to improve my food photography a lot. (using props, styling,lights, story)

Another example is some home made cookies. The same recipe, different photos in different years:

food photo

Exactly 2 years between these photos. I love the second one. Gives me a cold feeling, a winter feeling .

Photography changes every day, so I need to be aware of the new trends. I want more from my photos and I MAKE TIME to make them look good. So MAKE TIME.

Good light and great photos!

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Published by Gabriela Lupu

Hi. My name is Gabi and I am a professional photographer, a new mom and a wife. I wanna learn to cook healthy food for my little one, so I made this blog to share my cooking experiments with everyone. It's gone be a long and a bumpy ride but a funny one, so stay tune for news and enjoy my ride.

242 thoughts on “Make time for your food photography”

  1. I really enjoyed this post – taking photos for my recipes is my least favourite part of blogging because I’m never happy with the end result! You’ve inspired me to keep learning and working on taking better photos, thank you.

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  2. Wow, you have spent a lot of time learning your craft. Your photos DO tell a story; elicit a feeling. Thank you for sharing the back story. I know when I explore other people’s blogs I am generally mezmerized at their talent and never really consider the time it took them to creat what I get to view. Your post is a good reminder. Thank you.

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  3. You’re absolutely right, it takes time to take good pictures, but if it’s important to you, you have to make time. I sometimes think about going back to my early posts to replace the pictures with newer / better ones, but then I don’t because you wouldn’t see the development, which I think is important for oneself.

    I think a lot of food bloggers don’t realise that seeing phone pictures or out of focus pictures doesn’t make people want to read the recipe…

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  6. Great, inspirational post and good advice. Like you, I feel that we should never stop learning and it really is fun practicing and trying. Happy New Year,
    Karen.

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  11. Your blog topic came at the right time for me. I have been stuggling to take better photos, especially after being rejected by a certain food website many times. I have a greater appreciation for food photography…it is an art. You are so right that most of us bloggers will never reach the level of a professional photographer, but we all can be better, if we take the time. I had always been a point and shoot person (Canon Powershot), then an iphone photographer. So this Christmas I treated myself to a beginners’ DSLR camera, some inexpensive lighting equipment and a book on food photography. When I have the spare time, I watch You Tube videos on my camera, Nikon d33000, and food photography. The lighting in my kitchen is bad for photography, especially the winter time, so I am experimenting with other parts of my house, inside and out. My biggest problem now is lighting, finding the proper white balance; and food styling, finding props that I like. I’m an a minimalist by nature, so I will always be simple. Thanks for the wonderful article and inspiration!

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  12. Thank you. It is a great help for me to keep shooting food.
    I usually shoot food in natural light. The photo turns out good, but it limits time. That is why I have few picture of dinner. Now I would like to expand the time I shoot somehow..
    Happy New Year for you!

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  15. Hello there fellow foodie and blogger ! I do love the way you tell a story with your photos. Looking at your shots and reading about how you have worked so hard to improve – makes me realise what a carefully constructed art form they are, just like the hand made cards I make.
    I’m not that good at taking eye-catching photos but your photos have definitely inspired me to try to be more creative! Thanks.

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  19. Totally agree with you – I do love to see the learning curve in food photography. It shows really well in your example. It is the same on my blog, you can see the difference between when I just made pictures of the dishes I cooked and when I started to read about food photography as well as the importance of Natural light. Beautiful article, I’d love to read more from you on this!

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  20. This is such a great post! I’ve just started my blog and realised how important the photography is, especially food photography. I think you are absolutely right in saying that you can’t compare yourself to a professional photographer but it’s great to take some inspiration from these people. 🙂

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  22. It was a very captivating read. A couple of days ago my friend was mocking me for wanting to improve the design of my blog, as he claims that the content is much more important (which I agree with). Another thing I realised after reading your post is that the idea behind the picture makes a stronger impact than the general look of it. Thank you for the inspiration!

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  23. I really enjoyed your post. I love to take photos for my blogs.. I think it can show your passion! And sometimes it takes me longer to take my shots than actually writing the blog 🙂 Still lots to learn, but it’s fun

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  24. Extremelly helpful post!!! I am always trying to improve my post through my photos…..very hard…. And i totally agree….food is so difficult to photography…..i guess it is the same as natural and vegetal cosmetic DIY ingredients…..? Thanks to your post…i will work on the story…..at least on that i can work on….. I am always shooting on daylight…..and with my ipad……
    Thank you for this beautiful post….and beautiful photos.
    France

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  27. Thanks for this post! I’m not a food blogger but have been doing a bit of blogging about my recent cooking and baking experiences and I’m not always super happy with my pics but I hate to see a recipe without an image to associate with it. I’m going to use these tips to try and improve.

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  28. Your food photography is technically beautiful and so elegant! I also like your compositions like the missing cookie from the board – just the outline remains. It creates great interest: where did it go?

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      1. Oh, yes, that was my first thought! I just found your blog today, and you are doing a lovely job. I am starting to toy with food photography, I’ve been a photographer for ages, but with a focus on macro work. So this is new, and lighting is a huge challenge for me right now. I look forward to a post on that.

  29. Yes! I am so new at the recipe blogging, and I did just snap my photos quickly with my iPhone, but I definitely see the difference from what I did, and others ‘thought-out’ photos. I attended Culinary School in Santa Francisco, and I learned that food styling/photography is one of the more challenging career pursuits!

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  30. I’m new to food blogging and the photography is a bigger learning curve than I expected. So so so much I want to achieve with just a picture, I’m never quite satisfied but this post is inspirational. Thank you!

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  32. Your blog is really beautiful! I find taking the time to take photos of food or any of the small things in life is so important and helps us be more thankful for the little things. Thanks for the post like 🙂

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  37. Although long overdue, thank you for stopping by my blog a few weeks ago… Holidays!! Anyway, I appreciate it, and I’m glad it brought me to your blog – your photography tutuorials are phenomenal and your knowledge about food, etc… is vast! Again, thanks, and Happy New Year to you!

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  40. Thanks for liking my latest post – I clicked on your blog and started following right away :). Just the kind of blog I’d like to read on photography and food. There’s a lot to learn on food styling and photography, and I like your simple terms of explaining it all 🙂

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  44. thank you, i find i oft forget to take photos of my food, and when I do remember they are hurried and taken on my phone… thanks for the advice and encouragement to improve, for sharing how you have progressed and developed – I love the simplicity of that last image and the eaten chiristmas tree cookie – it is beautiful, effective and powerful… i hope that this year I will start to consider how i present the food i am making in images – rather than just making recipes available to those with food allergies. happy new year to you and onwards and upwards!

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  45. Very nice post. I am just getting into blogging and photography. I am a culinary school graduate and a baker so I naturally gravitate to food haha. This post helped me look at food photography differently. Any tips to make my blog interesting or how to improve the look of my blog page.

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  49. This is such a timely post. I’m struggling with making my photos the way I want them to be, and know I have a long way to go. I took a photography class over the fall, and am slowly learning. Seeing your progression in two years time is impactful as well, thanks for sharing!

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  50. Thanks for liking my post big bang new year! Im not good at taking pictures of the food i cook so your post inspired me to try and try harder. Maybe one day i’ll get the hang of it 😀

    Reply

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