One of the first photography techniques we learned is how to use aperture settings to take more creative photographs.  You probably noticed that many of our food photographs are close-ups of with a blurry background (photograph above on the left).  That technique uses a wide aperture setting to create a narrow depth of field.  We also tend not to pay too much attention to lighting techniques, partly because we didn’t know much about it and partly due to the fact that the food we were photographing was our meal that was getting cold.

I ran across this amazing blog from Taylor, a food photographer living in Charlotte, NC, who shares food photography tips and tricks.  His tutorial on Light Quality and Shadow Contrast helped us to clearly understand those two basic factors regarding the impact of lighting on photography.

We set out to create a mini-studio in our dinning room using materials we had on hand to try to replicate the techniques described in Taylor’s tutorial.  We taped parchment paper to the glass in our french door to diffuse the natural sunlight coming in (affecting the light quality) and used a white foam board to reflect light from the opposite direction (to control shadow contrast).  The result is the photograph above on the right.  We were pleased with the outcome and with our new found photo techniques.  We hope you like it too.