Photographing Food? 3 Things You Should Know!
There’s a lot of misinformation out there about how it works, for one thing.
For another thing, food is a difficult thing to photograph—much of the time, if you don’t shoot food when it’s at its absolute freshest, you miss your moment, and the result could actually take away your appetite.
And finally, there are different kinds of food photography, which is important to know if you’re either (a) a food blogger, or (b) a restauranteur.
But why talk about this on the AG journal? Well, because a small percentage of the businesses that hire AG are actually food brands. We’ve worked with multiple food bloggers, at least one cakery, multiple coffee shops, a chicken joint, a Brazilian sweets manufacturer, and probably several other food brands that just aren’t popping to mind at the moment. And the way I, Alexis, approached these different projects varied greatly!
If you’re a foodie who is thinking of bringing AG on for a project, here are a few things you should know ahead of time about food photography.
No. 1:
Instagram Inspiration: Not all of it will work for you
There are two broad categories of viral food photography on Instagram: The kind that’s shot in a studio, and the kind that’s shot in a live, Instagrammable food spot.
What’s the difference? Well, food shot in a studio is highly controlled. This is the photography being pumped out by food bloggers like Broma Bakery and Tasty Co. These photos aren’t captured in places where customers are coming and going, servers are swiveling around people and tables and chairs, the music is blaring, and there may or may not at any given moment be a spot to shoot food that has perfectly balanced light.
The photographer in this situation may have a window they can use for hours to get that stunning natural light look—or they may have studio lights. They may have a cooler next to their photo spot that allows them to keep ingredients or dishes like ice cream chilled until it’s time to snap the shot. They can use toothpicks and twine and most likely their pick from shelves and shelves of props to make the scene complete.
Here are some examples:
Food photos shot in an active kitchen or restaurant, on the other hand, don’t have these luxuries. Unless the restaurant reserves a table for the photographer where the photographer believes the light will be best, light will be a huge variable. If the restaurant is busy, there may be people who are in the way of a perfect shot, or your kitchen staff may not be able to get fresh, beautifully-styled food out to your photographer quickly.
Plus, in a restaurant or other food-service setting, you really want to manage expectations with the photos you take. You don’t want to mislead potential customers by styling plates that are piled with food, or desserts that have mouthwatering drizzles when the dish they’ll order won’t look like that. You don’t want to use backdrops that look nothing like the setting in your restaurant or café.
Here are some examples of photos that feel a little more real-time for active food establishments on Instagram:
So when you’re pulling together inspiration for your photographer, look carefully at the content and ask yourself, “Is this concept something that will translate to my situation?”
If you have a restaurant and want more studio-style shots, you’ll want to schedule a time to work with your photographer either when your restaurant isn’t open, or when your photographer can take products and style them off-site. You’ll want to provide your photographer with cutlery, glasses, and other items you actually use in your space, and you’ll want your photographer to have seen the space so she can duplicate the energy and color scheme in the images.
No. 2:
Food Needs Context
This is a big one! Context is everything. People need to be able to hear the whole story of your food from the images they see. For instance:
Is this food hot or cold?
Is the food here fast and easy, or more of a fine-dining experience?
Is this establishment a morning place or a night-life spot?
Is this place likely to have WiFi?
How should I expect to dress when I visit this place?
How big are the portions?
Is there indoor and/or outdoor seating?
Is this place kid-friendly?
Is this a place I’ll want to tell my friends about?
All of these questions can be answered in your food photography, making it easier for the people who are “right” for your business to come and visit you. (For instance, I recently was photographing in a place that wasn’t kid-friendly—no booster seats, no kid section on the menu—and after a family sat down, they actually got up and left without ordering because they realized the place wasn’t a good fit for their toddler.)
When you only capture your food, however, a lot of these questions can go unanswered. If people can’t see your space, your servers, the other dishes they could order with the one in the picture… If they can’t tell whether there’s seeing light of the morning or bar lights overhead… If the food doesn’t tell a story they can see themselves slipping into, they’ll move on to eat somewhere else they’re more sure they’ll fit in and feel happy about.
So think about what makes your restaurant a special experience and for whom, and plan out your shot list based on that intel!
No. 3:
You may want to step up your plating game
Time for me to nerd out or a moment on my background in the restaurant industry!
In the food service space, “plating” refers to how food is presented to the guest or customer. The average person may think of plating as how 5-star restaurants smear some kind of reduction on one side of the actual plate and then on the other side place a “meal” that’s portioned to the size of a mini muffin… but in actuality, plating is all parts of the presentation:
It’s whether the meal comes in a basket, in a bowl, in a cone, or on a plate
It’s whether it’s open-faced or closed; whether the sandwich is sliced in half or served whole; whether it’s held together with a toothpick or stacked just-so
It’s whether the sauce is ladled over, drizzled, spread, or served on the side (and so on)
In many places, the way dishes are presented are part of the kitchen staff’s training, so as to ensure that meals always look the same to the customer, regardless of who prepared them that day. Even at places like McDonald’s and Dunkin’ Donuts, foods are prepped in the same way and even wrapped using the same steps because consistency is important for customer satisfaction.
Now.
A really savvy restaurant plates according to their target customer. For example, a customer who is grabbing food in a hurry on the way to work needs convenience and security—i.e., something that can be grabbed quickly and won’t spill. So if that’s your target customer, you want to plate for that specific need.
But if that isn’t your customer—if your customer is a digital nomad, a family of four, the business team getting out of the office for a brainstorming session, or anyone else who will sit and stay a minute—you should be plating food the way you’d want it to be photographed… meaning you should be plating to showcase what the customer is getting, so that the experience and perceived value goes up.
Do you know why some bar-and-grille type places serve a burger open-faced? It’s certainly not because you eat it that way. It’s because you get to see how fresh your lettuce, tomato, and onion are. It’s so the lettuce doesn’t go limp from the sizzle of the meat. It’s so you can see how your burger was cooked, that the bun was lightly grilled with butter to golden perfection. You can’t see half as much of that information if the kitchen served the food the way you’ll actually eat it.
How does this pertain to photography? Photography for restaurants needs to set the expectation for what a new customer will receive when they order. If a photographer photographs a burger open-faced, but that’s not how it’s served, that creates a disconnect between the expectation and the experience. It’s actually smarter for your photographer to capture the burger closed if that’s how you serve it.
But if you already plate your food to show off what the customer is getting, this closes that gap and creates photography that will attract new customers and it will help existing customers to perceive greater value in the food they receive.
Book Your Food Photography Session with AG!
Now that you know some of the pillars of food photography, are you ready to book a session to capture your food in a way that makes sense for your brand and makes sense to your target audience? Then let’s talk! You can reach me here with your food photography inquiry.
HELLO! MY NAME IS ALEXIS.
Coffee lover, day dreamer, foodie, and creative. I believe in doing what you can with what you have where you are. I blog to help you do more with what you have. I hope you love it here!
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