household items to improve your food photography~thursday things

Hiya food blogger peeps. Household items to improve your food photography is my fun little Thursday Things post for you guys today! It is another edition of my photography tips. This one is all about using inexpensive household items (you probably already have at home right now) that can help you to improve your food photography. These are so simple you’ll be amazed!

If you haven’t read my 8-tips for better food photography yet, make sure you cruise through that too. And I also have a list of food styling tools that can really help improve your food styling. Please make sure you leave a comment below letting me know what I left out. What simple household items do you use to make your food photography great? And as always I would love it if you shared this post.

~Katie

8 Household Items to Improve Your Food Photography

1. Salt: It’s not just for making your food taste good. It can also make beer foam. If you have a beer poured into a glass and it has been on set for a while, it probably looks pretty flat by the time you’ve got the composition and light how you want for the final photograph. To foam it up, you don’t have to add more beer. Just sprinkle a pinch of salt into the beer and it will start to bubble, creating a little head and bubbles to catch the light.

2. Aluminum Foil: Speaking of light in glasses. This is especially true of dark and moody shots, the light just won’t reflect though the glass. A smooth piece of foil propped behind the glass will reflect though the liquid and brighten it up.

3. Blue Fun Tak: A tiny ball of fun tak will hold a handle of a fork to the plate when it just won’t stay where you want it to stay. Just make sure the handle of the fork covers it completely from the camera’s view.

4. Thin white fabric: If you have ever sewed curtains, you probably have a bunch of this hanging around. It’s also known as muslin. Use it to soften harsh sunlight. I hang my sheet of muslin with push-pins from the window trim. I have a really thin one that I use when there is really low light. If you don’t have this on hand at home, you can find it at a fabric store and it is really inexpensive. You’ll just need a yard or two.

5. Black and white foam core boards: I use black foam core a lot now. Especially if I want a dark background. I use it to block the light from hitting my background. See all those yucky wrinkles in the fabric above left? Buh bye when I blocked the light with the foam core. It will help draw your eye forward to the subject. Also, black foam core really helps control the light for moody directional lighting in general. It is really great to play around with it. White foam core on the other hand is good for reflecting light back on the subject. This is called “bounce” and is great if you want a soft overall lighting feel. If you don’t have it at home, it is only a few dollars at a craft store. I have a few sheets of each.

6. A piece of white paper: You can use this to set your white balance in your camera. In the winter, have you noticed that the light is much more blue than in the summer? All of the photos I took in the winter came out blue before I learned about white balance. This is a setting in your camera. (You can also fix it in post processing too.) If the auto white balance is not working out, and usually it does a great job, you can override it by taking a picture of a white piece of paper. It has to fill the whole view finder, and has to be in the light you’re using. Then go into your settings in your camera, and tell it that you want it to be on “custom white balance” and that that image of the white paper is the one to use for it to figure out what “true white” is. If you’re ready to start using inexpensive studio lights, this will come in really handy.

7. Clips and clamps: I have worked with a lot of professional photographers, and every single one of them have a TON of clips and clamps on hand at all times. {My husband has a bunch of those orange ones in his wood shop.} They are great for rigging up backgrounds or attaching things to light stands. Or I also use a simple bull-dog clip to stand my white card for a tiny little bounce card. There is no end to the many uses of clips and clamps in photography.

8. A step ladder: I think it is so funny how much better my compositions became once I started keeping my step ladder in my photography space. All of a sudden, it was so much easier, and I had no excuse not to get my camera higher up to have an better vantage point. All of the shots stopped at three quarter range because my shrimpy little body was dictating where the camera could be anymore. Now I can set up my camera overhead on my tripod. The whole tripod goes on the table! And then I set up the step ladder right next to it. Or if I have my tripod set up at a high but not overhead angle, so that it is too tall for me to look though the viewfinder this is super helpful.

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