5 Food Photography Tips You Can Use Right Now

With a new year comes the optimism of a fresh start, and maybe for you, a new food blog! Whether you’re into any aspect of food photography, including food blogging, owning a food business, or just having fun on Instagram, we’ve rounded up five of our best (and actionable!) food photography tips from five of our current Baked members – Heidi Richter, Kris Osborne, Kelly Neil, Alexandra Daum, and Kelly Brisson.

1. Negative Space Is Your Friend – Heidi Richter

Negative space in food photography helps draw the viewer’s attention towards your main subject, and helps define its boundaries, and keeping your props to a minimum also saves a lot of time! GIve it a try and you’ll see that minimal food styling combined with negative space will work effortlessly together in your food photography.

Gluten-free Maple Almond Cookies by Heidi Richter from The Simple Green

2. Choose Your Ingredients Wisely – Kris Osborne

Choose the freshest-looking, best ingredients you can afford and find; don’t be afraid to carefully examine multiple pieces of produce before choosing the heroes that will make it into your food photography! Be sure to look at colour, shape, and blemishes, and also consider buying extra ingredients for back up. Herbs and greens wilt quickly, berries soften when touched too much, and do you ever truly know what’s going inside an avocado? It can be like a game of Russian roulette! If you choose your food photography ingredients wisely, you’re already halfway there.

Easy Make-Ahead Salad Jars by Kris Osborne from 80Twenty

3. How To Choose The Best Angle For Your Food Photography  – Kelly Neil

Here’s a simple and effective food photography tip for you – photograph tall food straight on, or at a 45º angle, and shoot flat food overhead! Tall food needs to look tall – think cupcakes with frosting, or a layer cake on a cake stand. If you shoot those items from an overhead, flat lay position, your viewer can’t see their height. On the other hand, if you shoot a quiche or raw ingredients lying on a cutting board at a 45º angle, it won’t have the same graphic effect as when photographed from overhead. 

Tomato Sage Yogurt Quiche With Buckwheat Cheddar Crust by Kelly Neil from kellyneil.com

4. Go Neutral – Alexandra Daum

If you’re just starting out with food photography it can be helpful to stick to a neutral palette of matte whites, greys, beige, neutral woods, and blacks for props and backgrounds. Though I often use the same handful of plates, backgrounds, and serving dishes, using neutral tones keeps the focus on the food. It also allows flexibility with the amount of props you need to buy! Using fresh ingredients, and adding natural elements like greenery or flowers, to your food styling means people won’t notice you’re using the same handful of props all the time.

Vegan Chocolate Hazelnut Cake with Chocolate Ganache by Alexandra Daum from Occasionally Eggs

5. Look For Natural Texture – Kelly Brisson

Whether it’s a droplet of water on a leafy green, swirls and ridges of uncooked pasta, or the stringy, fuzzy flesh inside a pumpkin, honing in on your food’s natural lines and textures always makes for eye-catching food photography.

Roasted Pumpkin Purée + Smoky Roasted Pumpkin Seeds by Kelly Brisson from The Gouda Life

We hope you enjoyed 5 Food Photography Tips You Can Use Right Now!! If you’d like to see more posts like this, please let us know in the comments below! In the meantime, be sure to check us out over on Instagram – we’re @baked_theblog.