Recently I received a comment on one of my posts where a fellow blogger expressed her frustration with her food photography – all her pictures look the same – was her complaint.

Upon checking out her blog, I noticed that she has only been blogging for a few months and that her pictures look just like mine did 4 years ago: very one-sided.  I remember back when I first started blogging and taking pictures of my food that I was always so frustrated that my pictures never ever came out the way I had seen them with my eye.  The “simple” explanation is that my eyes are much better lenses than the one on my point-and-shoot camera and that the brain compensates quite a lot – much like the brain of a digital camera.  Except, that, well, a human brain can do much much more…so far.

So, for those of your who are just starting out, planning on starting out, or wishing to advance to the next level, this post will help you.

1. buy a tripod and use it…if you aren’t already.  A big mistake made by myself as well as many food photographers when first starting out is that pictures look like they are over-head pictures – like you are standing above your food to take the picture.  This is fine, but if you want to change it up, a tripod will give you the most versatility and stability.  I can’t say that I always use mine, but I do have to admit that when I don’t use it I often regret it.  The two pictures above are good examples.  The pictures on the top of the ceviche was taken with a tripod and I was able to create the exact look that I wanted.  The picture on the bottom of the Irish stew was taken without a tripod and the focus is on the group of carrots to the very left – leaving the rest of the food out of focus in varying degrees.
2. don’t use a flash & take pictures next to a window.  This is hard/impossible for me to do in the winter because it is always dark…that’s the only time of the year when I use my flash.   I also use a flash that allows me to flash away from what I am taking a picture of.  Otherwise, I remove the flash from my camera, set myself up next to the brightest window in my house before the sunlight is directly coming through – I don’t want the light too be too harsh and cast shadows.  If the sun light is too harsh, you can draw a white sheet, or sheer white curtain in front of the window to soften the light.
3. a camera with a big lenses is a big plus!  For years I used my Minolta point and shoot, but when my son was born back in 2007 we made the switch to a Nikon D-40 DSLR (Digital Single Lens Reflex) – I was very very reluctant to do this because of the huge price jump..I mean, I had a working camera anyways…but it was worth every cent.  The larger lens allowed more light in and gave a more realistic look to my pictures.  Then, last summer I broke the lens on the camera and bought the next larger lens…it was so very painful to pay as much for the new lens as the entire camera had cost,  but, again, it was worth every cent.  The even larger lens allowed even more light in and gave me even better results.  Look in my blog archives and compare:

from March 2005: http://forfood.rezimo.com/?m=200503

from April 2007: http://forfood.rezimo.com/?m=200703

from June 2008: http://forfood.rezimo.com/?m=200903

For an even better example of what my “new” lens (Nikon 18-200mm) can do check out this picture I took after the sun had already set (May 2008):

I ran outside with my equipment and set everything up on my mom’s driveway, with the already set sun to my left and snapped away.  There was still plenty of twilight, and, NO, I did not tweak this photo one bit!

4. get a white board.  A plain 3-D white board (see this post for more details) .  This will help reflect any light back onto the side of the plate that is not directly in front of the window and remove any shadows. This is one of my most important pieces of equipment..and I think I paid $4US for it.  This is also a great food photography tutorial from one of my favorite bloggers, Tartlette.  I have learned a lot from her and made some changes to my set-up after reading this post in December of 2008.

Just to give you an idea of what a picture looks like with and without a white board:

the tweaked version (notice the shadows are harsh and the colors are not true):

in this image I used a white board and required no tweaking:

5. read books on food photography.  This is only something that I started-up last year.  Two books that I can recommend are: Food Styling For Photographers (read more about it here) which will give you lots of tips and tricks.  I only photograph food that is completely edible…since I always photography my meals, it’s important that I be able to eat them after the fact!  But, there are still plenty of helpful tips.  The other book is: Still Life And Special Effects Photography.  It is a really boring book to read, but it really showed me all the different equipment that is used to get different effects. I found the book more for professional photographers that used special lights in a studio, but it’d be good to flip through it in a book store.

6. save your favorite food photography pictures from other sites.  I have a nice little folder saved on my computer where I save any pictures I come across that I think look awesome.  Then, later on when I can’t think of a way to set-up a picture or want to try something different, I look to these photos for inspiration.  It’s fine to copy the food “poses” or styling, but eventually you will be well practiced and you will need less and less help.

These are some of the many blogs that continue to inspire me:
HomeMadeS
Tartlette
Steamy Kitchen
La Tartine Gourmande
mattbites
Milk and Cookies

Bellow are some of my favorite pictures that I have looked to for inspiration over the years.  They are all copyrighted under Creative Commons which allows me to share them with you in this post:

via: Flickr/chez pim

via: Flickr/neon.mamacita

via: Flickr/chocolate monster mel

via: Flickr/chocolate monster mel

via: Flickr/jen_maiser

via: Flickr/joshbousel

via: Flickr/joshbousel

You may also find these posts of interest:

What is Creative Commons & How it can Help you – how to get free advertising for your blog

Baked Potato Chowder & Bacon For Food Styling – recipe

Tips on Food Photography (by Tartlette)

Part 1: How to Get More Traffic from Search Engines

Part 2: How to Get More Traffic from Image Search Engines

My 36 Hour Chocolate Chip Cookie Studio

I am very excited to share with all of you that my 10 money saving tips for in the kitchen have been featured on the Chew On That blog.

Every month I receive an email from Chew On That asking for my opinion on a food-related matter as part of their Monthly Mouthful. I have been lucky enough to be taking part in it for at least a few months now. This time when Hillary emailed me I just couldn’t stop writing…I had such much to say and so many tips to give that she decided to feature my words as a guest post! I am truly honored.

You can find the whole post here.

A small example of what a 25 square meter (250 square foot) garden can produce in one day by early summer.

This is a very short synopsis of the tips/topics I covered (there’s about 1 paragraph worth of comment from myself on each topic):

1. Buy your meats from a butcher, preferably local, and NOT from a store that only sells prepackaged containers of meat

2. Buy staples in bulk

3. Plant a garden / Plan your garden

4. Learn to can and then do it

5. Make your own condiments and spice mixtures

6. Make your own salad dressings

7. Wash your own lettuce

8. Cook from scratch

9. Buy in season

10. Plan ahead / Make a grocery list

I am also happy to make myself available via email to anyone who’d like personal help cutting their kitchen budget, planning their garden, making the move to homemade foods, etc. myamii [at] rezimo [dot] com.

So, slowly I have been opening my home to you. And, I have been putting off showing you my living room, bedroom, and hallway. Decorating takes a while when you want it to grow organically, but I have hit the proverbial wall when it comes to parts of my living room, so I am asking for some help.

For those of you solely interested in the Music Cabinet Hack: please see this post with all the details.

Ok…so about my living room.

For those of you who don’t remember or know, this room used to be my dining room.

The colors were originally chosen for the previous set-up:

• Our bedroom was a light colored aqua to to give a cool and bright relaxing feel

• Our living room was supposed to be beige but the color reminded my husband too much of the color of the bare plastered walls we lived with for so long that he nudged me towards a dark beige/purple/brown color.

• And, our dining room was a warm terracotta red/pink that went perfect with our oak table

In order to expand my photography we had to move rooms around because our bedroom had the best light exposure in our apartment.  So, now I have an aqua dining room, beige/purple/brown bedroom, and terracotta pink/red living room.   And, I am still having trouble adjusting to this move when it comes to the colors.  So, if you have any tips for me  *anything* would be greatly appreciated.

This is my least favorite corner of my living room – that brown/beige old gas heater is such an eye-soar in my mind.  I like to put things on it in the warmer months, but the heater itself gets so hot when we are using it in the winter that there’s not much I can do about it.

This is the area right next to my ugly heater.  The sewing machine makes a great table…I’d use it more if I could figure out how to thread it..no succuss up to now.  On it is my terrarium that I made from an old wine-makine jar that I found at the dump a few years ago, a Christmas tree painting resting on a terracotta pot covered in moss, and some wooden African status perched on an up-side-down Ikea wooden planter.

This is another Ikea buy and it is a major storage facility for us.  It holds everything from books to game to unique art pieces.  Recently I saw some beautiful glasses on the Urbanoutfitters website and saw these awesome Astrology glasses with all the astrological signs.  I went ahead and used some of the zodiac signs to make water color paintings for my cabinet.

This is my new couch.  I’m still not sure I like it, but it’s really hard to find a soft, large sofa bed here in Germany – especially when it comes to the soft part.  My god, these people can sit on the most rock hard couches.  Above it is a batique that my husband picked up while in Cameron for a few months.  I have some other African art I painted in a water color class, but haven’t had time to hang it up yet.

Currently this is how we store our son’s toys in the living room…we still don’t have anything for him yet.  I need something multipurpose and functional.

My favorite part of the niche in our living room is the light my husband installed for me – the star is just for the season.

On the walls of the niche I have these mini hanging pots that my grandma gave me.  I still have not been able to find a plant that can live in such a confined space that I can’t kill.

This is my (computer) work space.  I am still looking for a smaller table for this space – as well as a less intrusive AND comfortable chair.

Now, on to the highlight of our living room: The multi-functional music cabinet.

There is a thirft store on the out-skirts of town that I frequent once a month just to see what I can find.  While I was there I saw a music cabinet and thought, hey that would be a great way to hide/store our computers/server, video games, etc.  But, the one that was there was neither pretty nor the right size to fit our needs.  So, we scoured Ebay until we came across just what we needed.

I have to say that it is the most exciting piece of furniture in our apartment because it works as a tromp l’oeil because it goes from being this:

to this:

and this:

This cabinet houses 1 vacuum tube radio, 1 server, 1 personal computer, 2 DVD drives, a stereo, speakers, 2 USB docks, wireless keyboard and mouse reciever, a Wii, Nintendo 64, TV, Subwufer, remote controles, liqure, glasses, and other odds and ends.

So, today I did my practice set-up for the big Thanksgiving dinner this week. I am so excited!

However, there are still a few “kinks” to work out, which is why I’m asking for your help.

The main Issue is the sled I am using to elevate the desserts.
1. I need a box behind it to extend the space behind the sled – how should I make this “disappear”?
2. What can I put underneath the sled so it doesn’t look so empty?

Any other suggestions would be greatly appreciated!
…like another color I could paint my dining room walls