More food for C&C!

[graecyn]

I'd love to learn more about food photography and I am very much just learning. For now, I'm just taking photos of food that I make and eat every day, to learn the basics. Any feed back appreciated!

 

[ToadMum]

well now I'm hungry.

 

[OrionsByte]

well now I'm hungry.

+1

I don't know anything about the standard practices for food photography, but a couple things struck me about these.

In the first one, the DOF is really shallow, and it makes the top corner of the bread above the grapes look almost stale, just because it's so sharp compared to the rest of the shot.

In the second one, I think the shallow DOF works okay here, but I don't like the bowl being cut off on the right, since there's so little of it out-of-frame.

I guess it comes down to, what are you shooting? Are you looking for an interesting shot that just happens to be of food, or are you looking for an interesting way to present the food? I'm not sure if that makes sense. I think these are interesting shots, but I don't think they necessarily do a great job of presenting the food.

 

[tookie]

(noob so take with a grain of salt) get it salt/ food? HA HA
anyway...as Orion said depends what you are going for.
The DOF you are presenting wouldn't work for a restaurant website/advertising
(as a restaurant owner i DO have experience here tho)
for that you need the entire dish in focus (no cut off corners). you can then have other items in background OOF (cutlery, salt and pepper shakers etc)

If you are going just for an artistic expression I like # 2 but I think the DOF is still too shallo in #1. My eyes wander looking for a focal point

 

[Ron Evers]

I agree with the others that your DOF is way too short, get the dish contents all in focus.

 

[graecyn]

In the first one, the DOF is really shallow, and it makes the top corner of the bread above the grapes look almost stale, just because it's so sharp compared to the rest of the shot.

Good point! I'll keep that in mind for next time.

In the second one, I think the shallow DOF works okay here, but I don't like the bowl being cut off on the right, since there's so little of it out-of-frame.

I guess it comes down to, what are you shooting? Are you looking for an interesting shot that just happens to be of food, or are you looking for an interesting way to present the food? I'm not sure if that makes sense. I think these are interesting shots, but I don't think they necessarily do a great job of presenting the food.

I guess what I'm going for is an interesting way of presenting the food! I'm really very new to food photography, so... I guess we could consider this as me trying to get my feet wet! LOL!

Thank you for your feedback! Very useful stuff.

 

[graecyn]

(noob so take with a grain of salt) get it salt/ food? HA HA
anyway...as Orion said depends what you are going for.
The DOF you are presenting wouldn't work for a restaurant website/advertising
(as a restaurant owner i DO have experience here tho)
for that you need the entire dish in focus (no cut off corners). you can then have other items in background OOF (cutlery, salt and pepper shakers etc)

If you are going just for an artistic expression I like # 2 but I think the DOF is still too shallo in #1. My eyes wander looking for a focal point

See, and I had no idea that the entire fish should be in focus, with no cut off corners, so you guys are helping me already. Love the input on the salt/pepper shakers and background dress up too. That's awesome.

Thanks you guys! Will work on these points for the next shot.

 

[bazooka]

While I don't agree that the entire dish needs to be in focus, I would also like to see the DOF a bit deeper. Also, the lighting seems a bit flat... perhaps a different lighting setup would take these to the next level?

 

[graecyn]

While I don't agree that the entire dish needs to be in focus, I would also like to see the DOF a bit deeper. Also, the lighting seems a bit flat... perhaps a different lighting setup would take these to the next level?

Yeah, this is another thing I know I need to work with. I hear that food looks best in natural light. These are all taken in my apartment kitchen under florescents. I'll have to see what I can do about that for next time. Thank you!