As a first-time food photographer for this assignment, the goal I made for myself was to make something simple and clean, and as appetizing as possible without letting any added retouching or elements get in the way of the focus being on the food itself. Luckily, my partner is a chef, and on a night that he cooked dinner for us both, I got the opportunity to take my plate down to his at-home studio to shoot. We both love eating healthy, and I allowed my partner full creative reign, while I acted as a documentarian in the process. Since it was my first time shooting food, I’m not very satisfied with the outcome, though the final output I think definitely reaches in the direction of my intended goal.
If I could do this over again, I’d find ways to better eliminate the shadow coming from the right side of the frame, while balancing out the glare from the light on the table mat noticeable in the left side of the frame. I also should’ve taken the time to wipe the oil from the sprigs of Thai basil that garnished the dish for a more consistent texture throughout the leaves and a better sense of contrast between the different textures on the plate. I also would have made sure that my depth of field was wide enough that the entire plate of food was in focus. The lighting setup was a simple constant light in a soft box, with a white canvas bouncing that light from the right side of the frame (though not placed close enough in my opinion.) Something I do like about this image, is that the design of the plate and the little black specs of seasoning on the dish blend together in a beautiful – very subtle – way.
I kept my post production process limited to Lightroom after finding what I wanted to be my final image in adobe bridge. Something I noticed about food photography is that to get what I wanted, the majority of that was found in simply boosting the whites in the image to get that “appetizing” look.