{"id":294,"date":"2015-06-11T15:39:21","date_gmt":"2015-06-11T19:39:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.thefoodstand.com\/2015\/06\/11\/2015611take-food-photos-like-a-pro-without-being-pro\/"},"modified":"2016-03-30T14:26:16","modified_gmt":"2016-03-30T18:26:16","slug":"take-food-photos-like-a-pro-without-being-pro","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.thefoodstand.com\/2015\/06\/11\/take-food-photos-like-a-pro-without-being-pro\/","title":{"rendered":"Take Food Photos Like a Pro, Without Being Pro"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>So you like to snap photos of your food. But somehow, other people\u2019s snaps look just a little bit better.&nbsp;You may not be a professional chef or restaurant critic, but your eats are pretty awesome, and your photos should look like it too! That\u2019s why we spent the afternoon with professional&nbsp;food photographer Evi Abeler to get the tricks of the trade on snapping the best food photo in a jiffy.<\/p>\n<p>You can watch the full workshop here, and we\u2019ve pulled out Evi\u2019s top 10 tips below.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>   <iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/--m-al4Oy50?wmode=opaque&amp;enablejsapi=1\" height=\"480\" width=\"854\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"\"><br \/>\n<\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><strong>1. Clean your camera lens.<\/strong> This is a no brainer, but you\u2019d be surprised how many&nbsp;people don\u2019t, and how many blurry photos can be prevented by simply using your t-shirt to clean the fingerprints and dust off your lens.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>2. Don\u2019t use your flash in restaurants &#8211; ever. <\/strong>Flash makes your food look flat and&nbsp;makes everything else look dark. It also disturbs the blind date \/ anniversary dinner \/ birthday party next to you. If you need to photograph in a dark restaurant, get a&nbsp;table near the window, or sneak your plate outside. You can also ask your friend to use her flashlight to light the plate. If the light is&nbsp;too jarring, use a napkin to&nbsp;defuse the flashlight.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>3. Be aware of the 45 degree shot. It may distort your food.<\/strong> Shoot interesting flat food from directly overhead. Shoot anything that is stacked, e.g. cakes. tall salads, big dish of pasta with the camera perpendicular to the plate. Phone cameras have a wide angle lens, so they distort the photo if you hold them&nbsp;at a 45 degree angle.<\/p>\n<p><strong>4. The best foods to photograph have identifiable parts.&nbsp;<\/strong>As&nbsp;much as you love that stew, mac and cheese, or punjabi curry, foods that are one big&nbsp;unidentifiable&nbsp;mush&nbsp;simply don\u2019t photograph well because they don\u2019t have much dimension. Try adding a garnish or&nbsp;plating in simple dish or bowl.<\/p>\n<p><strong>5. Use your body. &nbsp;<\/strong>You don\u2019t need fancy tools. You just need your body. Use your hands to create a tripod by holding your phone-holding hand\u2019s wrist. Cup your hand around the side of a plate to cast a necessary shadow. Position your body differently to block the shadow of your hand and phone.<\/p>\n<p><strong>6. Add a human touch. <\/strong>Food is inherently social and we all&nbsp;need to spend more time&nbsp;eating&nbsp;with friends and loved ones. When they are around, get their hands in the food &#8211; holding a fork, picking up a strawberry, or holding a dish. A human touch in a food photo always makes the&nbsp;photo better.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>7. Get a cheap&nbsp;iPhone tripod for your kitchen. <\/strong>A tripod like the&nbsp;<a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/joby.com\/gorillapod\">Gorilla Pod<\/a>&nbsp;is a great tool to use while cooking.&nbsp;You can hook up your phone for the perfect overhead shot above your workspace, so whenever there is a good moment, you just need to tap to snap a photo.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>8. For once, move the champagne glass. <\/strong>It\u2019s always nice to add flowers, a salt shaker, a coffee mug, or other table accessories in your photo. But tall accessories, like champagne glasses ruin the photo because of their height.<\/p>\n<p><strong>9. Use small, matte plates.<\/strong> You can use beautifully decorated plates if you want, but make sure the food is the hero.&nbsp;Evi\u2019s general rule of thumb is simple and matte. Glass plates catch reflections, which may distract focus from the food.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>10 . Pro tip on tool &#8211;&nbsp;here are Evi\u2019s favorite tools.<\/strong>&nbsp;Museum wax,&nbsp;brushes,&nbsp;water spritzer,&nbsp;syringe for piping sauces, and<a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/foodphotography.about.com\/od\/Lighting\/fl\/Photographing-Food-With-Fluorescent-Light.htm\"> a&nbsp;good light fixture.&nbsp;<\/a><\/p>\n<p>If you have any more questions, feel free to find <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/eviabeler\">Evi on twitter<\/a>. You can also check out <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/appstore.com\/foodstand\">Foodstand for all food all the time<\/a>. We\u2019re still invite only, but you can use the code EVI. Download our iPhone app <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"http:\/\/appstore.com\/foodstand\">here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>So you like to snap photos of your food. But somehow, other people\u2019s snaps look just a little bit better.&nbsp;You may not be a professional chef or restaurant critic, but your eats are pretty awesome, and your photos should look like it too! That\u2019s why we spent the afternoon with professional&nbsp;food photographer Evi Abeler to get the tricks of the trade on snapping the best food photo in a jiffy. You can watch the full workshop here, and we\u2019ve pulled out Evi\u2019s top 10 tips below.&nbsp; 1. Clean your camera lens. This is a no brainer, but you\u2019d be surprised how many&nbsp;people don\u2019t, and how many blurry photos can be prevented by simply using your t-shirt to clean the fingerprints and dust off your lens.&nbsp; 2. Don\u2019t use your flash in restaurants &#8211; ever. Flash makes your food look flat and&nbsp;makes everything else look dark. It also disturbs the blind date \/ anniversary dinner \/ birthday party next to you. If you need to photograph in a dark restaurant, get a&nbsp;table near the window, or sneak your plate outside. You can also ask your friend to use her flashlight to light the plate. If the light is&nbsp;too jarring, use a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[52],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.thefoodstand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.thefoodstand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.thefoodstand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.thefoodstand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.thefoodstand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=294"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blog.thefoodstand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1151,"href":"https:\/\/blog.thefoodstand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/294\/revisions\/1151"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.thefoodstand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=294"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.thefoodstand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=294"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.thefoodstand.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=294"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}