Ebohlman!

Since you have a sense of what our cameras are thinking ... my old camera goes orangey on me. This happened a lot when I was taking pictures of pies. I was usually under my hood, which had the best light in my kitchen with a grass mat underneath to hide my cooktop.

Thanks.

Is your range light tungsten? That would explain any orangeyness.

Hello all you accomplished food photographers,

Antonius and I decided to join the modern world, finally, and yesterday purchased a Canon Digital Elph. (Thanks, by the way, to all those posting earlier in this thread about models and sites for reviews.)

Now what? I see Erik M. just posted a picture in the eggplant thread for which he notes "no flash". We've overheard discussions of "macros" and flash settings and we're not sure what the best approach is. The manual has endless discussion of all the camera's features, but -- strangely enough -- not specifically aimed at people who want to take pictures of their food.

Can you guys give us some guidelines on what settings we should use to get some pretty good pictures, pretty soon?

thanks a lot,
Amata

Well, the main thing of course is to take lots of pictures lots of ways and get to know what you like. What's nice is that digital makes your learning curve so much faster and easier (and less expensive).

The big issues are natural light versus flash and regular versus macro. There are some cases where flash is, as noted before, the only choice, and some where you can knowingly take a dark picture and brighten it up later. For really pretty natural (no flash) light, though, what you can do with the camera is not as important as 1) taking pictures at lunch rather than dinner so you have nice natural light, 2) arranging yourself where the natural light is good. Even a dark restaurant may have a couple of tables by the front window where you can get pretty natural light. So seat yourself where the light is good, or you can do what I did at Larsi's the other day, which was grab the plates off our table and carry them over by the window to take their pictures. (Fortunately, no one was sitting at that table....)

As far as regular versus macro-- the closer you get to a dish, the more likely it is that your camera won't focus properly without going to a macro setting. (As you'll quickly learn, you can't tell for sure if a shot was in focus from the little LED display on the back of your camera; the resolution isn't high enough.) I find that exactly where this happens is very specific to the camera, and probably varies by how much light there is and so on, so I routinely snap a couple of shots at a couple of slightly different angles/distances on the regular setting, then switch on the macro and take a couple more. Out of four or six close-up shots, all at slightly different angles/settings, at least one (hopefully more) will be in focus, and some will probably have an interesting effect where part of the shot is in sharp focus and other parts are not. I am sure there are people who can snap and get exactly what they want, but I'm not there yet-- and frankly with digital there's no downside to snapping a lot of shots and seeing which ones came out later.

Mike G wrote:frankly with digital there's no downside to snapping a lot of shots and seeing which ones came out later.

Other than pissing off your table mates who are hungrily waiting for the wierd photographer to release their food from the photo shoot.

Now don't get upset just because it got cold, and I sprayed it with glycerine to have more sheen, and replaced the ice cream with stiff mashed potatoes....

Hi,

On Sunday, I discovered one of my favorite frozen custard stands had opened for the season. I was so happy when they handed me my mini Turtle Sundae with extra whipping cream; I just dove in. When my friend got her selection I had the nerve to ask her to pause while I took a picture.

The best place was on top of the garbage can. While I am all absorbed taking my pictures, I didn't notice my growing audience: kitchen crew stopped and stared, other clients were watching and the owner was making exaggerated gestures. I'm oblivious, then someone says, "You can come again, you don't need to take pictures!" I looked up to find quite a few eyes on me. My friend begins explaining I participate in an internet food forum, which seemed to give them more reasons to think I was crazy.

I was out of LTHforum cards, which is just as well. I suspect somethings are better left unexplained.

Regards,

I'm pretty proud of this photogaph I took yesterday at Yes Thai. Probably the best photo yet in my brief food photography career. I didn't post on the Eating Out board because I didn't want to start a whole Ameri-Thai vs. authentic Thai discussion.

This is the prik king catfish:

I was at Alinea, aching to take a photograph, but couldn't do it. Maybe I'll start somewhere, someday...
I would highly recommend my very tiny Canon SD20 which is super small and takes beautiful pictures at 5 megs. I gave the same thing to my dad at Christmas and he loves that he always has his camera on him, so he is able to get some great pictures.
My favorite geek website is cnet.com -- it has great reviews of the latest stuff, as well as comparison tools. http://reviews.cnet.com/Canon_PowerShot ... 33340.html

And you thought some of us were bad:

This guy took a picture of everything he ate for a year. And got it published.

Everything I Ate is Tucker's personal homage to food, and in a culture where food is so often the enemy, where so many of us seek to suppress our appetites and conceal our guilty pleasures, this curiously intimate food diary is an out-and-out celebration of the joys of eating. Arranged in chronological order and featuring short captions including date, time, food, place, and any company enjoyed, the photographs reveal one man's rituals and patterns (he has a brief love affair with a morning brioche, but it is his midnight bowl of cereal that really stands by him in the end).

I got a kick today watching Rick Bayless (on IN PBS) tour Mexico city fondly photographing each food find. He even took picture of signage. C'mon Rick you can share your pics here too !

Hi,

This evening I went to a fundraiser at someone's home. I had volunteered to bring punch (also know as Rich4's Lemon Soda, then I expanded it to a smoked salmon. On impulse the other day, I bought 5 pounds of raw hot links from Peoria Packing House to smoke and cut into 1-inch portions as an appetizer. I knew the first two items would be welcome, I was really curious if the hot links would go over well with my friends.

I don't know why I worry, everyone loved my contributions to the party. Several people quized me on how I made the fish and links. One person had had a smoker, probably not a Weber Smokey Mountain (WSM), but never quite got the hang of it and sold it recently at a garage sale. I told them I have had my WSM as a glorious doorstop on my patio for over 20 years and finally learned to use it in the last year.

Another gentleman had a WSM, but had never used it. He asked if I had marinated the salmon, which I had in Mojo Criolla with some olive oil for several hours, then smoked it for 90 minutes using apple wood chunks. My salmon seemed to convince him he wanted to get his WSM into action. I told him about my friend who taught me how to effectively use it last year, which is now an online 5-Step tutorial. I advised there is no point reading the Weber instructions beyond assembly because they differ substantially from the 5-step intuitive cook philosophy. He indicated he wanted to achieve the same results I had and carefully took down the information and my phone number.

He began to indicate his son owned a restaurant and might be interested in learning the 5-step. I naturally asked the polite question: what was the name of the restaurant and proceed to have my teeth hit the floor. His son is Hot Doug. I then offered my praises for his son and his establishment. He smiled, "Doug was always known as my son. Now I am known as Doug's Father!" I told him about the wonderful day we spent listening to Doug talk and cook food at Bloomingdales. I told him how much I learned that day, then his father warned me not to tell too many his secrets. I essentially quoted to Doug's Dad the comment Mike G made when Hot Doug's re-opened:

MikeG wrote:It amazes me sometimes, the lack of imagination people in business have. Six, seven months that Hot Doug's, the one hot dog stand that had lines out the door in a city of hot dog stands, was closed. Did a single hot dog stand anywhere in the city think of touting Thuringer or knackwurst, let alone lamb dogs and elk dogs and buffalo dogs with blue cheese? Not that I ever saw. A great opportunity to gain customers and separate from the herd, and nobody took it.

I offered nobody seems willing to put the creative effort into their stand as your son, so you have little to worry about. I then called over my friend Helen, when I introduced him as Hot Doug's Father, Helen's eyes lit up and she gushed how much she likes Doug and his food.

Doug's Father asked if he could take our picture because he wanted his son to know he met some fans. I said better yet, can I take your picture so I can prove that I met you! In our little corner of this event, the exchange of pleasantries and photos was drawing some attention. We also found the recent Chicago magazine which briefly mentions Hot Doug's and posed for photos with it. We were having such a good time in our little corner, it became a bit of a magnet for others.

After Doug's Dad left, those who were on the fringe of our conversation asked to be filled in on the reasons for our keen interest in his son. Nobody at this party was aware of Hot Doug's, so it took a bit of explaining.

As the party was concluding, one of the hostesses noting we'd been taking pictures asked for copies for their newsletter. I suggested they may not be interested in my pictures because none featured the Congressman, who was our reason to be there. "You took all those pictures? And none were of the Congressman? What did you take pictures of?" So I whipped out my camera, threw it into slide show mode and showed her my pictures: "This is Doug's Dad, this is my friend with Doug's Dad, this is my friend and I with Doug's Dad and, oops!, that was my dinner from last night and my lunch from the day before!"

The looks you get sometimes are precious.

Regards,

HI,

ReneG and I did a divide and conquer during a stop in our exploration of NW Indiana. We had already eaten at this establishment on an earlier trip, though we had a few loose ends to settle. No need to eat there again, we divided the chores: Peter taking exterior pictures and I went inside to collect menus.

Inside the counter girl inquired if I planned to eat-in or take-out. I advised I didn't plan to eat there, though I was interested in a take-out menu. She gave me one, then I stated I really needed two copies. She frowned, gave me the second copy, then challenged me, "Why is that guy taking pictures?" "We're food hobbyists." "What do you need them for?" "I said it was to complete our files because we had already eaten here." "Is this for a newspaper?" "No." "What are you doing this for?" "It's a hobby! We write about food for the internet" Meanwhile a rather muscular young man comes from behind a swinging door, obviously heard everything, while drying a dish. "What are you going to say about us?" "Nothing bad, really. We just love to talk about food on the internet. Really!" All said while walking out the door.

I'm sure we were the weird observance of the day for this establishment.

Regards,

Hi,

If you want to go paperless, then consider Rene G's strategy for maps. He photographs the map he will need, then later using the positioning and zoom function on his camera to search and read the map on the camera's screen.

Regards,