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My Lighting Setup
Like every food blogger out there, I too struggle with a serious loss of light during those long autumn and winter months. Never made a secret of the fact I prefer shooting with natural light, but alas, not a whole lot I can do about it.
So, I’ve toyed with my studio lights a bit more and after a lot of trying (and some minor cussing), I think found the setup that works best for me in most cases.
I work with two studio lights and soft boxes:
1) The one in the upper right corner is my larger soft-box and it functions as my key light. The main light source.
2) The smaller soft box on the left functions as my fill-in light. Sometimes even used directly overhead. This one is set to its lowest setting.
3) In the right lower corner is I my medium-sized white light reflector to lift some of the shadows in the front.
And here’s what happens when you combine them all. World, meet my Porchetta!
Of course I’ve tried different setups and angles as well, but if I want to take a few quick shots and need to know for sure they will come out evenly lit, this is my go-to setup.
What’s your favorite lighting setup for food photography?
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I have lately been using my 580 on a lightstand about 6 feet up, pointed at the ceiling, triggered by a cybersync. seems to work well enough., that’s a huge setup you have!
You should see what my living room looks like when I’m shooting a posting :)
Open shade on my back porch! ;) I’d love to have lights for when it’s icky outside, but I just don’t know where I’d keep them!
My favorite lighting is when mother nature cooperates since I don’t have lights, soft boxes and reflectors. I do have a “mini” studio which consists of a small white box and two table top lights…I don’t like using it because it’s so limited. When it gets dark so early sometimes I don’t have a choice ;) My son is off to college next year…guess what’s going to happen to his bedroom ;)
Wowo how i wish i had your light set up. But then i have small place i woudn’t know were to keep all the things.
My house is pretty small, too! I store the studio lights in the attic.
Forgot to write the light set up :-) mine is just pushing my table to the huge window i have and the using a white board as reflector and then i go on clicking. And i moaned so much about how dark the weather is here always that hubby made me a light box; which works good for me.
Hi Kay, what kind of lighting do you use? Tungsten or Strobes? I want to buy some lighting and I’m just curious as to what others work with.
Thanks!
Yvette
Strobes, Yvette.
I don’t know why I didn’t think you used extra lights I just assumed you knew waaay more than most of us about photography and they always turned out great.. (which they do) So I guess using the lights means you do know more .. Doh!
I am looking for way to smoke chicken and stumbled upon your blog. It’s nice that you incorporated recipes and share your photography skills with us here. I have never been able to take good photos of food. I love to cook but taking photos of the food looking yummy takes a lot of effort and so far the food don’t seem to look better than they taste. So, I just gave up! But seeing you sharing this tips here, inspire me to try out shooting food photos again. I may try out the next time I cooked. Thanks, a lot!