How to photograph dishes/recipes!

hope it is of help to you.

1. Basic lighting requirements Even experienced photographers will admit that photographing food is not easy.

Although food does not have rich expressions like people or animals, they still have "life". If the "heat" of the photo cannot be controlled, the popular food will become completely unappetizing.

The difficulty in photographing food comes from two aspects: 1. How to express the texture of food, such as soft, crispy, delicate, plump, oily, etc.

2. How to highlight the freshness, deliciousness, hygiene and beauty of food, making people salivate and move their index fingers.

The former is mainly about the arrangement of light, while the latter is also related to decoration, props and background.

For foods with rough textures such as cut bread and cakes, the light should be soft and directional, so diffusers and honeycomb covers are used more.

For vegetables and fruits, it is common to use scattered light because of their irregular shapes that easily produce shadows.

For some foods with greasy surfaces, such as cooked dishes, braised or grilled meats and poultry, the lighting should not be too realistic. Average light can only make the food dark in color and lack of aesthetics, so the lighting

It is very important to be surprised at times.

Special attention should be paid to the lighting on the subject. The light should be transparent, and it doesn’t hurt to be a little harder. The light does not necessarily have to illuminate the food from the front or above. You can try to use a side main light and a personalized secondary light.

When photographing foods with a certain degree of light transmittance such as vegetables, slices, jelly, and drinks.

The intensity and softness of light should be combined skillfully, and it is very critical to appropriately use edge light and backlight to express the attractiveness of the subject.

When photographing food, most people pursue the normal restoration of color, especially when photographing cold dishes, Western-style snacks, and fast food. However, sometimes warm light is used to illuminate foods, such as fried foods, baked pasta, etc., and the golden color hints at the food.

Fresh and crispy.

2. Special techniques In order to maintain the deliciousness of food, you can also spray or apply some special liquid on the food, or inject certain substances into the food to maintain its color, surface texture and fresh appearance.

The most typical example is when photographing fruits, applying a thin layer of oil on the surface of the fruits and then spraying water mist will make the fruits produce a delicious and crystal-clear effect. Then, through side lighting, it will really make people

Coveted.

Specifically, first pour a few drops of glycerin on the palm of your hand.

Rub your hands together, then take the fruit in your hands and rub it between your palms.

After applying a layer of glycerin, put the fruit in a bowl and arrange it as you want.

Then, take a plastic spray bottle filled with water and carefully spray the water onto the fruit.

In this way, a layer of crystal water drops appears on the fruit, achieving the desired effect.

It should be reminded that when using a spray bottle, you must pay attention to the surrounding scattered lights. You should turn off all nearby lights before starting to spray water, and then turn on the lights when you are ready to take pictures.

In addition, when spraying water, cover other areas, because if water is sprayed on both the bowl and the seamless paper, the entire image effect will be destroyed.

Don't apply too much oil to the fruit or it will have an unnatural shine to it, just apply a thin layer of oil.

If you want to express the heat of food, you can flexibly handle it according to different foods.

If you want to enhance the steaming effect of general food, after all lighting is completed, you can find a thin blowpipe, such as a straw for smoking, take a puff of cigarette smoke in your mouth, aim the straw at the inside of the food being photographed, and use force

After blowing out a puff of smoke, leave quickly and press the shutter in time when the smoke rises to the best state.

Note that to make the above smoke effect more obvious in the picture, it is best to use backlighting or backlighting when lighting, and choose a dark background. The swirling smoke will curl up in the dark background.

It's so imaginative.

Of course, this is an advertising photography method, so we don’t need this fake stuff!

When photographing vegetables, in order to show the fresh and tender texture of the vegetables, you may wish to soak the vegetables in alkaline water in advance, so that the vegetables can obtain a bright green and fresh texture.

And when some food may change its initial state as soon as it is served, special countermeasures must be adopted, using some artificial materials to simulate the shape and texture of the dish to make some fake food to restore the best state of the food.

The most typical example is photographing ice cubes. No matter how quickly you do it, the ice cubes melt under the light much faster than you think.

Therefore, when shooting pictures of ice cubes or food containing ice cubes, choosing an ice cube specially carved out of plexiglass can achieve quite realistic effects.

When photographing cut apples, they should be soaked in salt water or lemon water to avoid discoloration over time when exposed to air.

When taking pictures of cooked meat and fish, you can apply a layer of refined cooking oil before taking pictures to make the food look particularly fresh.

The composition of food photography can generally only be used as a reference, because all the atmosphere and effects can only be reflected after the food is prepared.

Then improvise some local adjustments to make it as close to the original idea as possible.