Photos of Chocolate, Delicious Chocolate
A short while ago, I worked on some nice food photography and the theme was chocolate. We had the chance to go for some dark and moody shots and we took it. The trend in food photography these days leans towards very bright backgrounds so it was good fun to buck that trend and do something a bit different.
I may have had the ideal stylist to have on a shoot featuring chocolate: she didn’t like the stuff! Me, I was drooling through most of the shoot and probably put on a couple pounds after all was said and done.
The results of the shoot are below. I can narrow my favourites down to five or six of these shots. They have been added to my food photography portfolio, so you can see larger versions of the best ones there.
I’d love to hear your thoughts on these images in the comments.
Photo of the Day – Teacup Splash
Last week, I posted a shot of some water drops after I was inspired by this strobist post on how to photograph water drops. I liked my results, but I was pretty sure I could do a bit more with it.
So, in the interest of pushing myself, I thought, “No, I don’t have to just drop water…”
Here’s my favourite shot. Click to see it larger:
I stuck with a liquid theme, but rather than just dropping some liquid, how about a container for liquid? And rather than just have said container simply ricochet off its landing surface (a piece of black perspex, in this case), how about it lands on the saucer that would normally accompany it? Smashing.
On reflection, I could have dropped the cup and saucer together, but I had a couple reasons for dropping the cup onto the saucer. First, it made a good target – I could line the saucer up in camera and be sure that if I hit it with the cup, it would be in the frame. Second, I was working by myself and had to both trigger the camera (with a little remote button) and drop the cup. Adding a saucer into that equation might have made things a bit too cumbersome for me.
I like both the overall composition and the details of this shot: the off-centre cup, the sexy splash coming out the left side, the surreal splash rising upward that looks like it was being poured, the large shard on the left that is rising just off the surface, the pulverized mess beneath the cup, the random little fragment escaping in the top right…
I ended up doing about eight to 10 of these shots in one morning. Each smash lasted a fraction of a second. If only the cleanup lasted that amount of time.
Lighting info: One sb-800 on 1/16th power below the set and aimed at the background. Another at camera right and above on a very low power (I think it may have been right down to 1/128th). A bounce card at left of the teacup to fill.
Darby Sawchuk is a Canadian-born photographer who currently resides in Manchester, England. He has travelled to over 40 countries and is always adding more to the list. He creates stock for multiple agencies and is available for assignments.
+44 0790 992 8932
