Your Love Means Everything

elking · Jul 23, 2008

Hello everyone ..
Please tell me what you think ?

manaheim · Jul 23, 2008

Hey... just being honest and hoping it helps.

The lighting here is a little off... almost looks like a direct flash, but it's also undexposed, so I'm not quite sure what you did. The color balance is off as well... yellow orange... which implies that you didn't use a flash. Odd. Harsh overhead incandescants???

On the subject... it's not all that interesting, unfortunately. Well, to me anyway... It also looks like it sat out a bit and is getting melty, which is a little distracting. It also looks a bit like someone made a dent in it with a spoon or something in the front there... that's a bit distracting, too... it's not enough to be a statement of "SOMEONE ATE THIS!" but enough to be a detractor from a "look at this beautiful item of food!"

In general, the crop is a little odd for me too...

I dunno. Some of this stuff is technical and easily fixed on a retry (such as the light)... not sure how to better compose it or prepare the food.

Food photography is a whole dark art unto itself... one which I have no personal experience with other than to have admired other people's work. I've also seen some amazing documentaries on the topic. Others may be able to give you some more direct feedback on presentation. The best I can say is I might have brought the whole plate into frame and put some garnish around it with a bit of color... like mint leaves or something.

saltface · Jul 23, 2008

Wow, Manaheim pretty much said it all.
I'd also say to work on the background, either get more cabinet in the background, or shoot it on a solid color like poster board.

elking · Jul 23, 2008

manaheim said:
Hey... just being honest and hoping it helps.

The lighting here is a little off... almost looks like a direct flash, but it's also undexposed, so I'm not quite sure what you did. The color balance is off as well... yellow orange... which implies that you didn't use a flash. Odd. Harsh overhead incandescants???

On the subject... it's not all that interesting, unfortunately. Well, to me anyway... It also looks like it sat out a bit and is getting melty, which is a little distracting. It also looks a bit like someone made a dent in it with a spoon or something in the front there... that's a bit distracting, too... it's not enough to be a statement of "SOMEONE ATE THIS!" but enough to be a detractor from a "look at this beautiful item of food!"

In general, the crop is a little odd for me too...

I dunno. Some of this stuff is technical and easily fixed on a retry (such as the light)... not sure how to better compose it or prepare the food.

Food photography is a whole dark art unto itself... one which I have no personal experience with other than to have admired other people's work. I've also seen some amazing documentaries on the topic. Others may be able to give you some more direct feedback on presentation. The best I can say is I might have brought the whole plate into frame and put some garnish around it with a bit of color... like mint leaves or something.

WOW , manaheim .. That Did really help ..
it was my first food-photo. so you should execuse me for that ..
the cafe which i took the photo in uses many different colourings ,, maybe thats why the color balance wasnt good enough ..
anyway .. i worked on it on PS ,, and this looked better to me ..

so what do you think ?

manaheim · Jul 23, 2008

Well, to some degree I think the composition you have is going to be hard to fix... more of a crop almost seems weird. Dunno. Again, not a food guy... feels like you want more of a plate, not less. Nothing you can do about that unless you have a larger crop as source, though... (or go back and order it again! mwuahahah...)

Aside from that, I think your colors and stuff are still a bit off. Here's my quick take on it...

What I did:

I brightened it up a touch... +5 I think.
I pulled a TON of red out of it (swung it more towards cyan on color balance... by like 50 points. pretty significant)
I ran NeatImage on it to remove the noise from the underexposure.
Did a quick unsharp mask (50%, 1.2 pixels, threshold 2)

I still think those harsh reflections are a bit much, but if you happen to like the look, this might not be too bad for you.

Again, not trying to pick on you or anything- just trying to help. :thumbup:

MarcusM · Jul 23, 2008

Just curious what you shot this with? It looks to me like it was with a point and shoot, and the subject and the setting in which you shot it are pushing the camera beyond its limits - the shot seems really noisy, it looks like there chromatic aberrations around a lot of the edges, it looks slightly out of focus and there is not a lot of detail.

I just think this kind of shot really can only be accomplished well with a DSLR and a tripod.

manaheim · Jul 23, 2008

MarcusM said:
Just curious what you shot this with? It looks to me like it was with a point and shoot, and the subject and the setting in which you shot it are pushing the camera beyond its limits - the shot seems really noisy, it looks like there chromatic aberrations around a lot of the edges, it looks slightly out of focus and there is not a lot of detail.

I just think this kind of shot really can only be accomplished well with a DSLR and a tripod.

Oh good point... he's running a Sony DSC-T7.

elking · Jul 24, 2008

Thank you so much , everyone

Wyjid · Jul 24, 2008

for white food either a really diffused flash, a light box or good old fashion window light. also, simple, clean backgrounds. and you can take a napkin and gently dry the chocolat. even better, take the shot in a fridge, or at least very very shortly after you take it out of the freezer. have one nearby so you can keep it cool while you resetup the shot.