Just pasta

Pear & co

I am trying to make my dark photos look a little bit washed out and moody, not shore I have achieved it or if I like it at all...but I keep experimenting :) 

Bread & co

I am really fascinated by the the dark food photography and I am trying to figure out how to take the photos and later how to edit them in order to resemble at least a little to dark food photography or chiaroscuro.  Below are my attempts at this style of photography :)

Onions & co

I am still experimenting with my grey backdrop, unfortunately I don't have a cooked meal to photograph so I have to use wathever I have in the fridge...onions and smoked homemade sausage for now :)

As for the photo below, I am afraid the colour of the meat turned out a little bit too saturated...the meat was smoked and missed the "fresh meat" colur so I changed the hue a little towards magenta and I might have exagerated a bit :))) Anyway....I am still learning.

And the garden yarn seems to end up in every photo I take today :)

Click Click Guten Appetit !

Update: I have decided to reduce the saturation a little bit, and using the invert layer mask in Photoshop, I have changed only the saturation of the magenta, the rest of the picture remained the same........but still, it is to saturated for my taste.....

Just pasta

Grey wood backdrop and some props

Finally I also have a grey wood backdrop! I wished for it for such a  looong time :)  The wood panels are from oak wood and their colour is greyish beacuse of their age, they are pretty old, not that I mind, I was aiming for grey.  I found them in my in-laws barn and had my husband (best in the world by the way :))) shorten them a little in order for them to fit in the trunk. 

Today I decided to take some pictures using these panels as backdrop and I have to admit the wooden texture looks pretty awesome in photos :) The wood panels are pretty freacking heavy but 100% worth the trouble. I have also posted some unedited photos from the shooting while deciding what props to use.

I started only with a bowl of hazelnuts and some walnuts...

... continued with a napkin...

...added a nutcracker tool, some hazelnut shells and a hammer in the background....

...and finished it off with a beige garden yarn.

Hope you like the end product ;)

Meat & co

I have been home for the winter holidays and took a few pictures of the homemade sausages, speck and ribs hanging in the smokehouse. I brought back some wooden panels that I intend to use as backdrop for my foodie pictures.  The panels are made of oak tree and are pretty old, so instead of wooden brown their colour is greyish and perfect for food photography.  Can't wait to try them out, looks like I am sticking to my grey backdrop afterall :) 

Potatoes & Bacon

I am sticking to my grey background, I know it's just a phase and I know it's just a matter of time until I switch to white or wooden backdrop, but until then I try to put to use my grey props as much as I can. There is not much to tell about these pictures, I tried to style the bacon in order to give the edges a wavy look and I sprinkled some dried oregano flakes on the potatoes. That's it for the styling part. Regarding the post editing I did the following: cropped the picture (I almost always crop my photos), sharpened the pic and reduced the noise, enhanced the colors (I changed the hue of the red color in order to be more magenta and increased the saturation of yellow), using the adjustment brush, in Lightroom, I faked some light coming in from the left, as for the camera settings I used f/3.2, so I thought I should blur the edges of the picture a little more, the ISO was 100 and I chose Aperture Priority. 

Click Click Guten Appetit!

Sweet Bread

I have baked this sweet bread for Easter, and it was delicious. It looked pretty nice too so I have decided to take also some pictures of it. For the photo above I've used a kitchen napkin and baking paper as props. I find that baking paper looks really good in food photography, I tend to use it a lot when I can't decide on a serving plate. 

For the picture below I've used again the trick with several plates/trays, in this case I have placed the sweet bread in two loaf pans, and I have also replaced the baking paper, the one that I have actually used for baking the bread turned yellow at the corners. Also, I have put some paper towel under the bread, to lift it up a little bit. 

I have added the honey only for the picture, the bread was sweet enough without it :)

And a close-up :)

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Update: took another picture with a little bit of  strawberry jam :)

How I take my delicious pictures

This is a post about the set/backdrop I tend to use, while taking the photos, in case there is anybody out there wondering how I am shooting my yummy pictures :)

I don't have a professional photo equipment, like reflectors, translucent diffuser panels or light boxes, so I have to improvise and do everything by myself. I always take my pictures using natural light, that's why I try to finish shooting around 3 or 4 pm, I don't really like the late afternoon sunlight, it is so warm and the pictures look so yellowish. During the winter, because it gets dark so quickly,  I try to shoot mainly in the morning.  As you can see from the pic above, the light is coming in from the back and from the sides, and it is quite strong, therefore I use the  curtains as light diffusers, and the result is a beautiful soft light. If you don't have white curtains, and the light hitting the food is too strong, than improvise, put a white bed sheet in your window and you'll end up with a nice soft light. 

As a light reflector I use foam boards, they are easy to work with and you can cut them in different shapes and sizes, like I have with the one in the picture below. 

I always use my tripod while shooting. My lens lacks an image stabilizer, and unless I use my tripod, the pictures get blurry. I find there is a plus side in using it while shooting, you can set up your camera and then arrange the props and food however you want, and you can make little adjustments here and there, place an extra fork or a napkin, while the angle/frame remains the same. 

As backdrop I use these two aluminium (or are they tin?) panels, and the white foam board on the left as light reflector.  I really like having grey as a backdrop, it makes the color of the food pop :)

This is why I like using a tripod, I set my camera up and then I have time to arrange the props in the photo.

Another thing I always use while taking pictures is a trigger. First of all it enables me to take photos of creamy/runny egg yolks, or tomato sauce running down some crunchy fries, or, like in the picture below, of creamy strawberry jam. With one hand I hold the trigger and with the other one I can pour, for example, honey or chocolate sauce on a pancake. Also, as I have already mentioned, I have a lens without image stabilizer, and if I don't use the trigger I risk ending up with blurry pics. 

Regarding props, the sky is the limit :) I brought back from home some tree branches and some cute little wooden logs, they weren't intended for my photos, but they ended up there, and I really like the final result :) By the way, the pot I have used for this pic below was actually the dogs food bowl... What I am trying to say is that you don't need to have fancy shmancy expensive props (not that there is anything wrong with having expensive photo requisites) in order to take good pictures, you can always improvise. 

I am new to dark food photography, I usually shoot on white, or lately I use grey backdrops, but dark photography is totally different. Contrary to a white background you have to stop the light reflecting on the subject, at least from one or two angles, and create shadows instead of trying to get rid of them.  To stop the light bounce back I used these ikea box tops. In the picture below they look shiny, but they are not, they are actually from a soft material, similar to velvet.

Also I set my camera on manual, in order to avoid the picture being overexposed. 

Ok, this is it for now. Hope you like the post :) Click Click Guten Appetit!