Inventionland Designer and food stylist, Kyp, gives us the skinny on food styling – a good excuse to play with your food.
Inventionland Designer Kyp prepares food to look its best in real life and captured in a photo to tell the story when it comes to food photoshoots for product packaging.
Foodies know Instagram filters only go so far; so, here are a few real tips for at-home chefs to spice up food photography.
Think about the story.
When it comes to food styling for product packaging, the story you tell with imagery is as important as the product itself. Not only are you showcasing a bite to eat, you’re also displaying the ease of the use of the cooking/baking product.
According to Kyp, food styling is all about what you want to show while keeping the food on-brand.
“One thing worth noting is that we have to keep all food and props on-brand, like using the same color napkin or hand towel to keep consistency between shots, or shooting food that looks more festive/homemade versus food that looks professional/elegant based on the product line,” said Kyp.
Prep your plate.
When you’re not preparing food just to eat it, the appearance of your plate becomes a lot more important. Vibrantly colored food in varying hues can really enhance any food photo. Sides and garnish can also make a meal look complete.
Kyp said creativity is a key ingredient for gathering great product shots. Here, she created a stencil to give her brownies a powdered-sugar all-star appeal.
“It’s all about the detail in creating these beauty shots,” said Kyp.
Fake it to make it.
In order to get the perfect shot for product photography, sometimes you have to bust out the blowtorch. Here, Kyp uses a small blowtorch to braise meat, giving it that fresh-off-the-grill look.
“It may look good, but you wouldn’t want to eat it with all the pins in it to hold the lettuce and tomato in place!” said Kyp, again making sure everything was perfect down to the last detail.
Appease your appetite.
But, don’t let Kyp fool you. Her food photoshoots don’t always involve so much tooling. Sometimes, she likes to pause to enjoy the fruits of her labor!
“It is nice to eat the final products,” said Kyp.
She even recalls the time she had the opportunity to photograph celebrity chef Paula Deen at her Georgia home. During this assignment, Kyp had the chance to take this vibrant photo of Deen holding kumquats.
“…I love kumquats, and I probably ate about 40 of them off these bushes while I was there, but luckily I had the foresight to wait until after I took all the shots,” she laughed.
Food styling is an important part of a consumer grabbing a product off of store shelves. The perfect shot has to showcase the creations that a person can make, thanks to that product.
Let’s just say that a picture-perfect shot is the icing on the cake!
Copyright Inventionland, 2016
