It took 6 hours to smoke it. About an hour to photograph it. Then about 10 minutes to eat it. So good. If you don’t already have one, get yourself a smoker.
Soft Shell Crabs from Anton’s at the Swan in Lambertville NJ. Get there and get some in your belly. This became the cover shot for our book, A Meal for All Seasons. Available now. Shot with Canon 5D Mk II using natural window light and a kiss of light from a Paul C Buff Einstein light.
Soft Shell Crab
White Chocolate Cheesecake
The proofs are done and it’s on the way to printer. The new cookbook ”Anton’s at the Swan - A Meal for All Seasons” will be available soon. Recipes from Chris Connors, chef and owner of Anton’s in Lambertville. Design by Jeffery Saddoris and photography from me. So excited to get this out in to the world.
Delicious Bread from Anton's at the Swan
This is a photograph of the delicious bread at Anton’s at the Swan in Lambertville, New Jersey. Chef Connors has made a study of baking bread and it really shows when you taste it. So good. Coming in October is the a cookbook where he shares his recipe and approach to bread as well as 12 other recipes that you’re going to love. I had the opportunity to create the Food Photography for this project and I couldn’t be happier with how it is coming along. I think you’re going to love it.
Have a Cookie
One of the best compliments a Food Photographer can get is to hear that a photograph invoked other senses for someone. I recently received that when someone said that when they looked at this they could smell the cookies. Our senses are very often intertwined. Sight invokes smell, which can invoke taste which can then invoke memories, which is really remembering how you experienced something with all your senses at some time in the past. So if you ever dig someone’s food photographs and your other senses kick in. Let them know, you’ll make their day and put a smile on their face. If you want your food or beverages to invoke that same experience, find yourself a food photographer or a beverage photographer who can create images for you to do just that. Cheers!
Make 'em Hungry
One of the best ways to entice people to visit your restaurant or purchase your product is to make them hungry or thirsty. Professional food photography can do that in a way that a quick photograph with your phone cannot do.
I had a restaurant owner tell me that customers told him they were instantly hungry for his food when they visited his website and saw his dishes featured in photographs. They had never visited before but they came right in that evening.
About 3 months before he had reached out to me and we worked together to create great looking food photography for his place. We got together and talked about what food he wanted to feature, the mood he likes to convey for his restaurant. We then planned a day to come in to his restaurant when we could shoot. We found the right spots to photograph each plate. We talked about how the food should be plated and how I would photograph the food. He made and plated the dishes one at a time. Using a mixture of natural light and artificial light, props from around his restaurant and my sense of composition, we created food photographs that made people hungry.
It doesn’t happen in an instance. It takes a little bit of planning and work but creating food photography that will make people hungry or thirsty and want to get those desires satisfied with your food or drinks can be done when you hire a professional food photographer.
Why am I a Food and Beverage Photographer?
Why I’m a Food Photographer? I spent time as a wedding photographer. I’ve photographed people, landscapes, cityscapes and street photography, so what was it about food and beverages that really took hold of me?
Looking back on my days so far, almost every great moment with family and friends involved either food or drink or both. Going back to when I was a kid, I remember the holidays when the family would come over and we’d gather around the dinning room table and spend the entire day there. The food would come out in waves, dishes would be cleared, another wave of food, coffee would follow with desert. We’d be laughing or arguing but no matter what the memories are good.
Later on in life, keg parties or getting together with friends for at a bar. Friends having a good Meeting someone new over coffee or a dinner.
See the thread here. Food and drink is always involved. When we gather as people we do so over a meal or in a place to sit with a drink and socialize. That’s where real connections are made. That’s where life really happens. The important parts of life for me anyway.
So it’s not surprising that Food Photography and Beverage Photography is my “chosen” type of photography. Sure I photograph other things and I find that fun and fulfilling as well. But photographing food and beverages is what I really love to do. I do it for clients and I do it for myself just for the fun and challenge of it. That is where my passion is.
I’ve been a food photographer for years now. I love it. Being a beverage photographer can be a lighting challenge some times, but you can usually enjoy a drink after you’ve gotten the shot. In short, I am a Food and Beverage Photographer simply because I love it.
Scotch...Rocks!
Smooth, earthy or smokey, a scotch on the rocks is a perfect way to end a day. Sit back and enjoy the light bouncing around inside the glass as you take your first smell. Hear the ice cubes dancing around the glass before you take your first sip. Tastes like heaven,
Corn on the Cob
Corn on the cob means summer to me. Sitting in the backyard after a day of swimming in the pool, cooking burgers and hot dogs on the grill and biting in to a fresh piece of corn on the cob. The taste of the butter and salt on the kernels. The butter dripping down on your hands and your chin as you take a bit. That is what I wanted to capture when I made this photograph.