Food photography lighting tips

Food photographers do a great job with their photographs, they achieve a photo that makes the food look even tastier than in person, and to do these photos, an important aspect is the use of the light.

To achieve a clean and colourful image, they have to plan the photography with different aspects.

Depending on what type of meal it is.

To take photos of breakfast use a light with at least 1.000 lumens, for other meals of the evening use a lower light with lees lumens, changing the ambience of the photo based on the type of meal. For Dinner meals, a relaxed and comfortable light is needed, like warm white with 600 lumens.

You can see in this photo, the photographer used a bright light, this light is used for breakfast or morning meals.

Angle

The angle of the light is another important fact to have in mind at the time to take photos of meals. Playing with the light and the shadows you can accent different parts or aspects of the food and camouflage other things. With the correct angle you also get an improvement of the texture of the meal in the photograph.

In this image you can see different types of angles, like front, side, above...

Keep it natural

It’s very important to make the product look as natural as you can. 

Sunlight is the best choice for food photography, but is not always as sunny as we want.

In these cases you can use LED lights, choosing the perfect colour for the photo and without producing the heating of a halogen lamp. 

Colour Temperature

The colour temperature is also an important factor for this type of photography. Cool temperatures are bad for this, it can make the food really disgusting visually talking. 

It is better to have a warm colour temperature, achieving a better view of the food, and making it more appetizing for the people. Between 2,700 and 4,000K and with a CRI higher than 82 to have a good saturated image.