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 We’ve been doing food photography for almost three years now.

 In the beginning, we’d be lucky if we got two dishes shot in one day, we cooked it ourselves (Justin can really smoke out an office without half trying), we’d last minute shop for table settings until we’d find just the right set up for the shot. Our side dishes were basically just a mix of vegetables picked up in the morning, although somehow always included caramelized onions. We’d get the shot set up on a tripod with stunt food or other props.  And after a long day of shooting we’d have one shot to use on our home page, maybe another to use in a promotional email, but that’d be it.

Oh how I miss those days.

Now the shoots are a big production. There are plans made well in advance with a shoot list of 10 or more dishes planned plus many pulled from each recipe as separate dishes. There is another half day of shopping, and packing. Then the day of the shoot we all meet at the appointed place, Justin the CEO and resident dishwasher, a food writer, a chef, and the photographer. Each step of the dishes is caught on camera, inside on a stove, in an oven, over a sink, or out in the garden, on the grill etc.

As the days have grown so has our collection of tableware. I was spreading them out for easy access between shots the other day and thought how much easier it was back when we had one plate for the day.

To make sure we get the most different food photographs out of a product we’ll often use the same cooked food in a few different ways in order to create as much value as possible.

For these two shots, the chef cooked two duck breasts at the same time and then used them in two similar, yet different dishes yielding two separate applications and two different sets of photos from the one product.

I have found that a bright, but overcast day, of which we have plenty of here in Seattle, makes the best light in which to photograph food. The clouds make a great natural diffuser for the sun creating an even glow to the dish. This is really helpful as we shoot many, sometime upwards of 15+, dishes in a day plus all of the process shots during the cooking, so we don’t usually have much time to set up lights for an individual dish. Sometimes though we get a peak of Sun that can really change the look of a dish.

The first shot was taken early in the day when we had a strong overhead sun, the second was later once the clouds moved in and a little bit of time had elapsed in the pickle making process. Which do you prefer?

We escaped the studio last Friday and headed up to Bellingham for some fish photography …  some collaborative creativity … where our vendor shares their access with us and we develop some creative content.  We both receive photographs for our libraries that we otherwise wouldn’t have without considerable expense. 

We shot it in a journalistic approach, documenting the action without poses, or without interupting their work in anyway. It catches things more as they really are, no cheesy smiles, nothing faked. It also allowed for the fish to be sorted and processed without delay, therefore protecting the quality.

The catch with this shooting style is that you don’t get to set your lighting for each photograph (we didnt even use lights) or perfectly balance the image composition. We had to quickly adjust camera settings as we moved about the warehouse. It also requires a lot of mindfulness of your surroundings, keeping one eye in the viewfinder, and the other watching the surroundings. I will sheepishly admit my nearness to being run over by a forklift on at least one occasion this past week.

Below is a montage of our fish photographs.

Food photography involves a lot of waiting.  Waiting for the dish to be cooked, waiting for the food stylist, and on location, you do a lot of waiting for people to work.  This is a perfect time for taking random, no pressure shots.  Sometime these photographs can help tell the story more than just the food photographs themselves. 

In our latest trip to a fish processing plant in Bellingham we had time to kill as the factory floor left for a lunch break. The whole place cleared out and the fish stored for safety.  With 30 minutes to kill we were free to do what we wanted. I decided to document the sheer size and industrial nature of the place, even though all the work was done by hand. 

As I’m fairly new to the food industry, its still surprising how industrial it always feels. Rows and rows of racks, big oily fork lifts and such.

Although these photographs aren’t of the fish themselves, they make great imagery if we need to talk about the process of turning a fish out of water into a fillet on the plate.

We love doing food photography out of our Seattle studio and kitchens.  The food styling, the food photography and the eating are always super fun, usually pretty exhausting, and consistently delicious.   We don’t use any of the synthetic funky photo tricks that you may have read about, so shoot days are always a day of good eating. 

We look forward to sharing some of our tips and tricks with you here on this blog, so stay tuned…