Through Stephanie, I found this amazing giveaway from Jen at Light Enough to Travel. If you win her food photography competition, you get a for-real handmade (handpainted?) painting of your photo! Too cool. Now I’m no photographer, but I love art and I love food–so this sounded like it was worth the effort. And Jen has some great and easy tips for taking better food pictures. I sometimes get overwhelmed by tutorials, but her advice is so simple.
My go-to photography angle needs to be shaken up, as it tends to involve a lot of overhead shots like so:
So I definitely needed to heed Jen’s advice to use creative angles. And I know the most important one is to find good lighting, but as winter approaches and days get shorter (and more depressing), that gets harder and harder to do. But guess what? I’m working from home (since my company is moving offices and right now we have no desks…I think there was a lack of planning somewhere along the line there), and that means I get to perch my meals (and my face) in some indirect daylight! I could have used some garnish, but hey, baby steps here.
My submission photo:
So what did I make? Stir fry! I made a trip to the international market I live near (and am obsessed with) and picked up a few new fun ingredients like brown rice vermicelli and tamarind concentrate. So with basically five ingredients and five minutes, I give you dinner (Or lunch. Or maybe breakfast if you’re feeling particularly out-of-the-box.):
Easy Not-Any-Sort-of-Authentic Stir Fry
- Oil of choice (I used sesame)
- Brown rice vermicelli noodles
- Veggies of choice (zucchini and summer squash are pictured)
- 1T Good soy sauce
- 3T Tamarind concentrate
Heat your oil. Soak your noodles in tap-temperature water for five minutes, or until they soften. Saute your veggies lightly, add in the noodles, dump in your sauce. Stir everything around over high heat until it looks done. Enjoy!
I also used some of the above ingredients to make some clean-out-the-freezer Pea’d Thai (ohh, there’s no stopping me when it comes to naming food) based on this mock pad-thai recipe, but it wasn’t nearly as photogenic. Yes, I’ll blame the food, not the assembler.
What are your favorite photography tips? Do you like taking pictures of food/spend much time assembling your food photo shoots?
I love your submission photo! Looks much better than any I have ever taken
I am so bad at taking pictures, I never care about light and angles, I just turn my camera on, take a photo, turn my camera off, and eat 
I would really need a lot of advices and practise 
Your submission photo looks great! I try to take good pics as best as I can, though I don’t have that great of a camera and have never taken a photography class. I think lighting makes the biggest difference.
I love using tamarind in stir fries. Good stuff!
I love photographing food but my styling needs work. I don’t mind spending time on it as long as I have daylight. Once it’s gone, I get pretty frustrated.
It looks beautiful, and so does the food! Yum!
Have a wonderful weekend!!
Great photo! My picture taking skills are less than stellar for sure haha.
A stir fry sounds really good right now
I love your blue and white bowl! So pretty and cheerful! Easy stir-fries with rice noodles are the best kind. Try it with a bit of sesame oil next time…so good.
Soba noodles are also amazing! Agreed re: sesame oil. It’s fantastic!
Looks like you have a bit of competition!
Your submission photo turned out lovely! I tend to fall into the bird’s eye view habit too!
I like taking pictures of my food, but I definitely don’t really style my food.
Lookin’ good with the stir fry shot! I’m an amateur…but natural light and photoshop help loads
Your photo is beautiful! Taking food-photos is hard work, I certainly have a lot to learn!
The recipe sounds good to by the way! I like that you use sesame oil- it gives a lovely flavor!
Happy weekend
I need to use sesame oil more often, this had been sitting in my cabinet for ages, I’d forgotten how good it is!
I like the submitted one, and the one with the peas is great too… I heard that putting the food on plain white crockery is supposed to be good but I prefer your coloured bowls!
I try to make my pictures look good but it’s definitely not a talent of mine
I think they’re equally good in different ways. Plain white shows off the food more, but colours tend to accent or complement the food. I like the way the straight lines on the bowl are in contrast to the wiggly lines of the noodles.
Ohh, I hadn’t even been paying attention to the lines on my bowl–thanks for pointing that out! I love that set of bowls, and now I have more reason to sit and stare at them, deciding which one to use
lovely photo, really lovely! Jenn is right about varying your angle. I’m working on my photography as well, and I’m having fun little photoshoots with my meals
Still lots of time to enter the contest! It doesn’t close until Thursday night. At minimum I will send new readers your way, at best you can win a hand-painted creation!
Looks awesome! I should probably spend a little more time on my photography but I don’t. Not sure why?!?!
My issue is usually that food is too tasty, I don’t want to take the time to make it look good, I just want it to taste good
Thank you so much for entering my contest! Your submission looks great!
I’m sorry I didn’t see it right away; I was taking a break from the Internet this weekend and posts over a week old get comments moderated. I should really check in more often!
Haha, not a problem, I usually disappear on weekends as well
Glad it didn’t get completely lost though!
great looking meal!
I am so going to do a photography course soon as I need all the help I can get! So nice to be working from home – enjoy every moment of it
I would love to take a photography course! But most around here want you to own a fancy camera first–I want to take the class and see if I’m any good before i get the camera