Part 04 · The craft · Lighting

Good light is the whole trick

Find a window, and turn your back to the kitchen lights.

Overhead kitchen light comes from directly above and slightly behind you. It does three unhelpful things at once: it drops your own shadow onto the thing you are photographing, it gives food a yellow or green cast, and it flattens everything into a single dull plane.

Window light comes sideways. It shows shape, it keeps colour honest, and it does not put you in the frame.

✓ Do this

Window to your side

Light rakes across the subject. Shape and texture show. Your shadow falls behind you, out of frame.

✗ Not this

Light behind you

Your own outline lands squarely on the subject. This is the single most common ruined food photo.

4.01.1

Four situations, four moves

Bright direct sun. Step back from the window, or hang a thin white curtain.
Overcast day. The best light you will get all year. Use it.
Evening, no daylight. Turn on every light in the room, get closer, hold very still. Still no flash.
Inside the fridge. You cannot bring the window to it. Take the shelf out.

⚠

Never use the flash on foodIt flattens the picture, throws a hard shadow behind everything, and turns anything wet or glossy into a white blob. There is no food subject a phone flash improves.