Food Photography Basics Class

Last night, I went to a food photography basics class taught by Joe Laedtke and offered through Dabble. Class was at Ryan Braun's Graffito in the Third Ward and we had the whole restaurant to ourselves, as the restaurant was technically closed to all other patrons. The chef made us salad, our main entree and dessert and our meal was included in the class price.

This is the best shot I got of my salad. I learned how to focus in on certain aspects of the food and not be afraid to move it around if I don't like the way it looks, which is what I do at home, but I normally don't do that at restaurants.

And here is my pasta entree.

When dessert came, we turned off all of the lights and experimented with lighting using two phones and a flashlight covered in parchment paper.

Below is a photograph of my dessert lit up by two phones and no flash. Pretty good, huh?

Karis trying out the phone experiment with her dessert.

Joe was kind enough to let us use his camera to test out his softbox and bounce flash.

This is the result of that experiment. I was shocked when I saw the photo I took.

And these the photographs I took in natural light and using my DSLR with my flash. Quite a difference, huh?

It was so much fun to learn how to take better pictures of my food! I would recommend taking Joe's class if you live in the Milwaukee area. I would also encourage others to check out Dabble's classes to see what is offered in your area.