I'm often asked for my "go to" food photography lighting setup. There is no single setup that's going to work for all food, but there are some general rules. Today we will focus on a cheeseburger lighting setup and talk a bit about why it works for a shot like the above. This is an in-restaurant shot done in a short time on a modest budget without a professional food stylist, the marketing team at Burger Lounge styled this in…
A genre I really enjoy shooting is studio and outdoor head shots. Professional head shots can be highly useful for Linkedin, modeling agencies, acting profiles, dating apps, YouTube thumbnails and so much more. A professional head shot can give you an edge over other individuals in your field and help elevate your professional image. Although technically a head shot is a closeup of head and shoulders, the concept of "head shots" here in San Diego can range from a tight…
I didn't select these photos. There was around 500 of them. Todd Gloria selected these images with the input of his trusted friends and San Diego-based team. I thought it would be cool to show Todd's selects here instead of mine. Often the head shots the client chooses are quite different than what I would pick for them. Here we actually aligned pretty closely on the choices. Maybe we can attribute that to the frequency with which public figures are…
When I learned this simple trick for simulating the look of "golden hour" sunlight with flash, my life as a photographer changed for the better. Suddenly those overcast days were just an extended golden hour, providing the benefit of soft front light with the always-welcome golden back light. I'll give you the simple breakdown so you can start using this to get that sunny look when weather doesn't cooperate. All of the images were made on an overcast day with…
Meet Mary Katherine and her best friend Atti. Over the years I've had the pleasure of doing some work for Paws'itive Teams, a top notch service dog organization here in San Diego. I've been able to photograph their teams at annual events and also get involved with their website development. More recently I've decided to photograph some of their teams as a personal project and hope to do more with them this year. It is pretty amazing watching a highly trained…
Recently I had an opportunity to shoot a portrait of one of my food photography clients. Bliss and Baker is a mother-daughter team in North County San Diego making some really delicious crispie treats that you can find at local retailers and restaurants around town. Just looking at the behind the scenes iPhone snap above of our setup, one can instantly recognize the challenge with shooting a portrait in a home kitchen. In most cases you'll be presented with multiple light…
Earlier this summer I had the opportunity to shoot Ballet Folklorico in San Diego for AAA, documenting the people and dance. I was traveling around my hometown like a tourist to various locations to see rehearsals and performances both indoor and out. The shoot resulted in three magazine covers for AAA and I'm stoked with how these turned out! This type of dance is a photographer's paradise, utilizing a lot of color and controlled movement in combination. With this type…
Over the past couple of years, I've had the opportunity to shoot quite a few restaurants in and around San Diego and the Inland Empire. Often, my primary assignment is to capture the food but one of my favorite parts is to grab a portrait of the chef or restaurateur. Sometimes its at the request of the client, but often its for my own creative exercise and portfolio. Chefs are generally personable and passionate but they also tend to be…
One of the questions I get asked a lot in classes and workshops is how to achieve a pure white background without a lot of Photoshop knockout. Well, the short answer is to simply light your background about one stop brighter than your subject. In this case, my background is a 9 foot wide roll of white Savage 107X12-1 Seamless Background Paper - Super White. . For the floor, I've used white tile board from The Home Depot which…
It's no secret that the 'ol Book of Faces can be a great marketing tool for photographers as well as just a generally fun place to show off some family photos. Facebook, however, has a tendency to compress, convert, or otherwise mangle your photos if you don't do some image prep ahead of time to maximize their display quality. Here are some steps I'd recommend to optimize your images for Facebook display. I recommend using Photoshop but you could certainly…
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