Food product photography to make consumers’ tummies rumble: The five things you need to know!

We all “eat with our eyes”. It’s a fact. As a food/beverage manufacturer or producer, you know this better than most, because attraction to the images of your product is an integral and essential part of your marketing strategy (and a healthy bottom line).

An effective food photograph works as a beacon for your audience to find your product. It’s part of your branding and products’ visual identity, along with your logo, and graphic design. Anything that references your product is your brand. These elements should work together and resonate with your customers in a way that encourages them to develop an affinity with your brand.

The ultimate goal of the photographic process is to have images so evocative that when someone from your target audience sees your product packaging, their tummy starts to growl. Imagine your packaging creating an involuntary hunger response - now that's really going to help you sell product!

I want some of that!

Part of the mission of your visual identity is to create an aspirational narrative for your brand. Developing your narrative starts with identifying in detail who your target audience is and trying to understand what stimulates them. Then, through engaging relevant photographs, you can speak directly to them to create that essential feeling of desire: “I want some of that!”

Regardless of your chosen style, product photographs should, of course, always look fresh, vital and vibrant. Ideally, the packaging photography should outshine your competitors on the supermarket shelf.

But what really goes into that food photograph that sets tummies rumbling? Here’s my recipe for successful food photography:

Colour

Smell is the most powerful trigger with food, followed closely by colour. Strong colour and harmonious use of colour help to trigger a hunger response. A pasta dish can look good but with a few strategically placed basil leaves on the dish, the complementary nature of the combination of green and red elevates the image to new heights. 

Light

A photographer's key ingredient is light. An experienced professional food photographer will have spent years developing the most effective ways to use light when photographing food, both fresh and packaged. Having magnificent subject matter does not automatically translate into a magnificent photograph. You need beautiful light – it’s the ultimate flavour enhancer.

Though you may not be consciously aware of it, just like everyone else, you’ve been responding to effective lighting in food photography all your life. To wield light well takes years of experience. Most importantly, well-placed light will pick up highlights of moisture on ingredients. The quality of the light should work to accentuate the hero elements while carrying the right level of contrast to maintain crisp detail where it’s required. Cool light or bluer light, makes food look less appetising than warmer light, but go too warm and you lose the impact of the cooler colours in the dish.

The right equipment for the job 

Even with years of experience in lighting and composition, you still need the right photographic equipment. Granted, everyone’s smartphone is capable of a reasonable shot for Instagram but that’s as far as it goes. To deliver on the brief for your business’s visual identity – photos need to be fit for any application and emphasise and build on the look and feel of your brand – the right equipment is essential.

That includes super sharp lenses and a professional camera body. The capability of a professional camera is immense, capturing accurate colour and detail in deep shadows and highlights with resolution that allows billboard-size enlargements. Specialist strobe lighting equipment and colour-neutral reflectors offer maximum control and repeatability of the lighting event. Then for all this equipment to yield a professional result, requires a computer with a calibrated screen and specialist software to maximise the potential of the file through the editing process.

Every single component in an effective food and beverage photo is in service to the final hero photograph. Professional food stylists are worth their weight in truffles. Their input will make or break a big food shoot. A seasoned food stylist will bring a vast knowledge of foods, and food handling, often have massive personal collections of props and backgrounds, they research and develop recipes, source ingredients, and then cook and meticulously plate up the meal to be photographed. They compose the meal on the plate in a beautiful way and, in conjunction with the photographer, make the appropriate adjustments to create a balanced and harmonious scene. It takes time, huge focus and energy to build a simple-looking image that speaks directly to your stomach.

Post-production 

And the work isn’t over yet. A decent-sized photoshoot will produce hundreds of images, each subtly different. Here again, your photographer’s experience comes into play. Editing to find the gold in dozens and dozens of images is a skill in and of itself, but an experienced eye can select the images that deliver.

Once the final images are selected, the fun really begins. Any blemishes are removed, colour ranges are tweaked, highlights details are balanced and any overly dark areas are lightened to suit. Through all of this, the image gradually evolves into that all-important representation of your product. An image that will stir up the sense of hunger you are looking for.

Your photography is a business asset

Successful marketing takes a lot of effort. It requires planning and will cost money. Given the vital role that professional food photography, food styling and graphic design play in selling your product, these need to be factored in, and adequately resourced from the beginning. 

Photography should actually make you money rather than costing you money. Strong food photography holds a great deal of latent energy and can be re-used over several platforms and in a number of ways. I have a cheese maker client who consistently finds inventive ways to re-use photographs that we shot 10 years ago.

It’s smart to consider the visual identity of your business as an asset of equal importance to your plant and equipment. High-quality photography is an important tool to give your brand the greatest leverage to garner maximum attention in the marketplace.