Catchup day!

We have five days left of the program,  and I am already behind.  Whew!

Days 22+23.  Make a list of images you would want to create and then sketch what it would look like, and then create the image.

I found this to be a very good exercise and I bought a notebook so I can do more of these before I shoot my sessions.  At the beginning of this month when I took the challenge   we were ask to tell a story.  It was very challenging for me.  But now that we are writing things down and drawing it out,  it makes it easier for me to tell the story.  Love it!  One thing I also learned was,  just because I can draw it, does not mean it will really work.  The herbs on the books was a cute idea,  but I do not think it really works.

Still need to make a "Not to use" list  (Day 24).  It's normally all in my head when I sit down.    For instance,  in the first image,  I wanted it to be more contrasty,  so I knew using a reflector (or bounce card) camera right would add too many highlights and reduce contrast.  So... the bounce card was on the do not use list.  Where as the opposite was true for the lower image.

Day 21?  Make a food styling kit:

Had fun with this challenge!  There are still some things I need to add, but if I go on location or where ever I am in the house,  I now have access to everything I need in one place.  So awesome.

Here are some other images I created from this past session.  Which one is your favorite?  Leave a comment below and let me know! :D

Days 15,16,17

Whew,  I'm behind a few days. That should make for some interesting reading, eh?

It's been crazy, but in a good way.  I've had a few other projects pop up,  and so I had to put this on hold for a few days.  Glad to be back though!

DAY 15  Using napkins

Now,  I collect napkins on clearance.  If I go to a store, and see some awesome napkins on clearance,  I snach them up.  I have quite the collection.  I never really though too much about them being food photography props,  we use them for family dinners to make the table look nicer.  I don't mind washing and folding them (too much). :D

I did what the assignment asked,  took a picture without a napkin, and then chose a napkin or two to fit the subject.  I love the desgin on the yellow napkin,  but as a rule,  shooting with dark subjects keep everything dark.  The yellow napkin was too bright for the whole "story".  My favorite image was with the green napkin.  Next time I will have to watch for the fuzz balls.

DAY 16  Plates

I have an ample amount of plates to play with.  I was torn between the blue plate and the red plate.  Mr. Neel said to avoid plates with designs around the edge, mostly if they are contrasty.  Does it really detract from the strawberry in the middle? 

DAY 17  Balance

This was a wee bit more of a challenge for me with my chosen subject matter.  A huge problem I have, is that I cannot cut anything straight.  Could I attain a balanced image?  I think I may have.  Now I am second guessing myself.   Which is your favorite?

Days 12 and 13 Rose petal jelly and a sneek peek

So Day 12 was about backgrounds.  I set up my tea set, and worked with a creation I cooked up the night before,  rose petal jelly.  I have a huge rose bush in my yard and I have always wanted to make rose petal jelly.  Finally fulfilled that dream.  It's pretty good! My son and I made buiscets together for this one.  It was a blast.

I also took advantage of this to practice the story,  so I have moved through the backgrounds,  I finally got my story right in the end.  Whew,  that was challenging!   Here's the final image:

Here are my other attempts with different backgrounds.  As I said before, it took me a while to get the set up right.

Last, but not least,  today we have to talk about organizing our food photography props.  HA!  Organize.  I've actually done that.  I have noted where all my extra stuff is,  and I have a special cabinet space for the food photography props that will only be used for food photography.   MY favorite, is the spoons I just collected.  I went to the antique village and bought up a whole bunch of old spoons.  While I was there I found a cheap old cigar box and figured it would be great for holding all of my spoons.  Loving it! :D

My lone shelf with food photography props

My box of old spoons.

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Day 11 --- White Balance and Strawberries

Today, I decided to keep things simple in a multitude of ways.

1) Only natural light.
2) One food.
3) One dish no props.

I'm still struggling with the whole story telling thing.  Today I decided to skip it, and just play with white balance, orientation, blocking/reflecting light, and using my light meter.

Here's my submission for the assignment:

It was fun to see what the other white balance settings would do.  My dream as a professional photographer is to manually do white balance and not let the camera chose what kalvin to use.  I have finally mastered doing everything else manually,  maybe for the rest of the month,  I should challenge myself to do the white balance manually.  I did calibrate the WB for at least one of these above shared images.  

I have included some more strawberry images for practice and fun.

Before adding a blocker and adjusting WB

After adding a blocker and adjusting WB.  Some final adjusting was done later in post processing.

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Day 10-- lighting with diffusers and such.

I think I jumped the gun yesterday,  I showed in detail what things looked like going from stark lighting to diffused lighting, and then adding a reflector of some sort.  So,  today,  I skipped over that, and made sure to do different postions with my dishes in relation to the lighting.  You can see yesterdays post here.   Not too thrilled about the subject matter or how the images turned out.

Today was a bowl of soup that turned into a bowl of noodles.  The noodles kept absorbing the broth, but it still ended up working out in the end.   I did two different lighting set ups.  One with with artificial lighting, and the other was with natural lighting.

Artificial Lighting:
Main light was metered at f8 (light with umbrella)  and the kicker light (light with softbox) was metered at f5.6.

Camera Settings:  ISO100  f11  1/125  50mm

L1 for first lighting set up.  L2 for second lighting setup.

Basic lighting set up:

L1 Used this lighting set up for most of the shoot. 

L2 Used this lighting set up for one shot.  

Used L1

Used L1

Used L1  Overheadshot

Used L1  Backlit the dish with the main light.

L2  Flat lighting,  looks horrible.

Then I tried to create a story with the natural lighting, and failed.  Sigh.  I used a diffuser to diffuse the window light and a reflector camera right to fill in some of the shadows.

Day 9-- Lighting

Now we get into some fun.  I love playing with lighting.  Today,  even though we were supposed to still set up a story,  I just went with one dish (albeit weird dish).  I still a little sick and exhausted from this cold,  so I just focused on lighting.  I decided to just go step by step adding my lighting till the final image.

Here's the first one with artificial light:

First image: Just bare light. Camera right.  ISO 800  |  f8  |  1/250  |  50mm lens
Second image:  I added an umbrella to the main light ISO 800  |  f8  |  1/250  |  50mm lens
First mistake,  I forgot to meter the light!  When adding a light modifier like a soft box or umbrella  you can lose one stop of light resulting in an underexposed image.  I had to adjust this image in aperture. 
Third Image: Added rim light. Avocados look more evenly lit now.  The rim light was one stop lower than the main light.
Final image:  I added a reflector camera left.  This helped bring out some of the detail in the hotdogs.

But wait!  Why stop with artificial light,  when I can play around with natural light too!!

First image:  Window light camera left. No curtains or diffuser of any sort.  ISO 400  |  f5.6  |  1/125

Second Image: Added a diffuser and lost a stop of light. ISO 400  |  f4  |  1/125

Third image:  Added reflector camera right of the dish.  Helps bring out avocado  ISO 400  |  f4  |  1/125

Some extra images just for kicks.

Photographers note:  I did not do any extra editing on these images except for levels.

Day 7-- favorite Image

For Day 6, we needed to write a story and then create an image from that story.  I did not do well at all on this assignment.  Sigh.

Here was my story for a refresher:

My subject will be fresh herbs.

I am still working on which of my countless herbs will be the main subject.  For now,  I feel that at least three of them will star.  All herbs are like notes in a song.  When the right notes are placed together they make a wonderful melody.  The three correct pairings will be placed in a natural light setting.  Bundled together like a bouquet garni.  It’s going to have a fresh, simple feeling,  like how I love all my images.  It should convey that.

At least I tried.

For day seven we had to pick our favorite image from the whole week.  Easy Peasy!! 

I love the colors, the feel, and the freshness from this image.  The lighting, the sharpness, and the point of view all came together quite nicely for this one.  I may even get it printed for my kitchen someday! :D

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Brain Fart---Day 6

::Note, there are no images in this post, just random thoughts.::  

Early this morning I got the assignment from Mr. Neel.  Fun part was,  we got to take a break,  in a way.  But we still had to write a food photography story.  My brain froze.  For me,  I cannot start creating till I have my subject in my hands,  till I’m moving the dish around and studying it.  I had to write a story about the main character of my dish.  And without my dish,  I could not think of anything.  I decided to pass on this assignment and wait till day 7.  Going back and looking at the assignment,  I’m wondering if I had my brain fart because I did not understand the assignment the first time around.  But since I have had time to sleep on it a bit,  I think for the “editorial” type of image,  I know who my main subject will be.  

It all started with a book....

A book now out of print, but it sits on my cookbook shelf.  My inspiration for my herb garden, and for a fresh push into my love of cooking.  It’s not by one of my favorite food authors,  Mr. James Beard,  but rather, an unheard of lady, who married an Italian.  She was forced to learn how to cook flavorful food, to understand herbs and seasonings and how they worked in a dish.  Because of her book,  I have been working on an herb garden, with more than 10 herbs,  with more than 20 herbs, but rather with 30 various herbs to help hone and grow my culinary skills.  

My herbs,  my main subject.  But now to narrow down to a few, to star in this image.  That’s where the fun begins...

My subject will be fresh herbs.

I am still working on which of my countless herbs will be the main subject.  For now,  I feel that at least three of them will star.  All herbs are like notes in a song.  When the right notes are placed together they make a wonderful melody.  The three correct pairings will be placed in a natural light setting.  Bundled together like a bouquet garni.  It’s going to have a fresh, simple feeling,  like how I love all my images.  It should convey that.

There, for tonight, my brain fart is over, and this artist can now sleep. :D

Care for a spot O'tea?

Day 5

I am currently doing a food photography challenge.  Everyday for 30days I get an email, and a blog post to read of the challenges I have to do.  It's been fun!


Today we had to think about how would the picture orientation fit our subject matter the best as we told the story of our image.

For me, determining which way my image may go depends on many things.

1) In which what is the set up going.  If everything is in an horizontal plain,  I would be more than likely to make the image horizontal (not unless I wanted some empty space in the top of the image for a dramatic effect).

2) Is there anything distracting in the image?  I may choose to crop and orientate my image to keep the offending item out of the image (or just remove the offending thing and move on.)

My subject was an awesome cup of mint tea.

This is the image I chose.  I chose to shoot it straight on so I could capture the tea pot in the background.  I chose to use a shallow depth of field (DOF) F4.0.  I also chose natural light and my tabletop, as I felt it would tell the story best and give the feeling of sitting at the table drinking some tea.  Lots of decisions to make whilst creating an image!

my lightmeter

My setup:

Diffuser and white board

 I used my lightmeter so I could pick what setting I was going to use for my camera.  I have a pretty good idea (not perfect yet) of what effect I want to get when working with an image.  I'm now wishing I would have gone with a f5.6 instead of the f4.0 because the cups handle was not in focus enough.  I also use a white board I purchased at my local craft store to bounce some light back into the darker areas, and my 1stop diffuser (I would have gotten to shoot at 5.6 if I did not use the diffuser, but the window light was too harsh for my subjects).



Other images:

We had to take some other images and work with the different orientations as well.  I even took advantage of trying different positions and DOF.  My second favorite is the overhead-horizontal image.   Would look even more powerful possibly if I moved it over and had some "negative" space off to the side.