How to Work with a Food Photographer

You are a restaurant owner, a magazine editor, a cookbook author, a product marketer, or a food service company. You take great care in creating signature dishes, visual spreads, and food products, and signature dishes. Your story and your product set you apart.

But nowadays, It takes more than a delicious product to be successful. You have to get it in front of the right people, and that’s where I come in.

In today’s world of social media, digital marketing, blogging, foodservice apps, and self-publishing, beautiful images that are professional, visually appealing, and on brand, are more important than they’ve ever been. Great images communicate company expertise, confidence, and commitment to quality. They are a first impression, and a lasting impression of your business, and an eat-with-your-eyes experience that helps attract your ideal client - the kind of people that will always come back for second helpings.

What Do Food Photographers Do?

In a breath: Food photographers create crave-able content. We are artists whose primary goal is to make your food appear so lifelike and delicious that you’re tempted to reach into the picture and take a bite. Food photographers want to tell your story, and we do so by artfully designing each frame using these elements: Food styling, lighting, brand voice, framing, props, editing, and motion*

*(Some food photographers (like me) are also food videographers!)

An experienced food photographer knows how to show off the textures, colors, and ingredients of your dishes and communicate who you are as a brand by perfectly orchestrating these variables.

Why Should You Hire a Food Photographer?

1. Supplement Your Marketing

Whether you have an internal marketing team or not, quality food photography is worth investing in. Pictures are often the first impression people have of your business; whether they land on your website or scroll through your social media. Do your images demand attention? Do your images do your product justice (i.e. does your food look as good as it tastes?) High-end food photography is a way for potential customers to ‘taste test’ from their home. To see their meal before they order it. Great food photographers create images that enhance your marketing efforts, elicit an emotional response, and (frankly) make your target audience drool.

2. Showcase Your Brand

• What are you selling??
• Who are you??
• Why does your product matter??

Consumers today want to feel connected to the brands they support. For some, it’s as much about what as it is about the who and the why. With so many products on the market, each of them clamoring for attention, high-end food photography sets you apart. It commands attention and helps you tell your story without saying a single word.

3. Attract Your Target Audience

An establishment that describes themselves as “a quirky dive bar chain with curiosity-shop decor” and another that claims to be “a high-end whiskey bar for the urban gentleman” both offer alcohol and yet appeal to very different demographics.?

Food photography uses photography elements like lighting, food styling, angles, framing, colors, and props, etc. to tell people who you are. This attracts like-minded people to your business or product and increases the odds of earning life-long customers that will come back.

4. Elevate Your Product Value

Professional, high-quality photos tell your customers that you have invested in your product and you believe that it’s worthy of beautiful photos. They prove that you value quality and elevate your product and brand as a whole.?

How to Find The Right Food Photographer

1. Decide What You Want

Take inventory of your photography needs. Comb through your online and print media and make a list of the parts that are in need of high-quality food photography (and videography)?

• Instagram: Feed, story, reel, and IGTV
• Website images: Pay special attention to your homepage
• Marketing collateral: Brochures, product sheets, menus
• Prints:?For your shop?

Then, take note of your future needs

• Pictures for your cookbook
• New products or menu items

Finally, arrange them in order of priority - based on the needs that will make the biggest impact on your business - and set a budget.?

2. Do Your Research

Look for photography on Instagram, LinkedIn, websites, cookbooks, print media, etc., and start collecting images that really resonate with you and have a similar aesthetic to your brand. Pinterest is a great place to find and collect examples of work, or a simple Google Doc will also do just fine.?

Based on these, create a list of food photographers and reach out for availability and quotes.?

3. Hire a Food Photographer for Their Style & Capabilities

It is so very important to hire your food photographer for who they are as an artist. You want the work to feel natural and exciting to your food photographer. Although many of us are able to shoot in different styles, I can guarantee that some are already naturally shooting in your brand style. Those food photographers may be able to offer additional expertise, creative ideas, and a collection of additional props and equipment to help your vision come to life. Plus, they’ll approach the project with the magic that comes from working in their natural creative flow.?

On this topic, make sure to vet your food photographer for their professional skill level and access to the equipment your project requires. For example, if you need product shots for your website, you may need access to someone with a studio and studio lights. If you want a food photographer that also does videography (like me!) that is a special skill set that will narrow down your search.

4. Ask About Rates Up Front

If you have budgetary concerns or limitations, be upfront about what you can pay for a certain project and ask what they can provide for you within that budget (this is the main reason I recommended listing your food photography needs in order of priority). Your food photographer should be able to provide you with an estimate after learning more about your photography needs and priorities.?

5. Meet Your Photographer

It’s important to jive with your food photographer! You want to feel comfortable giving feedback and asking for what you want, and they want to feel comfortable working potentially long hours with you and your team. There should be a general sense of trust and respect.?

Here are a few key factors to pay attention to when you meet them. Your food photographer should:

• Be a good listener and communicator.
• Be excited about the project. Not just about ‘closing the deal’.?
• Have experience with food photography. Lifestyle, wedding, or landscape photography is very different.?
• Have examples of work that is similar to your vision.
• Come prepared with some ideas. It should be clear they’ve done their homework.
• Appear confident and humble enough to take feedback.

6. Request an Estimate and Sign a Contract

This is a great time to confirm your vision with your food photographer and agree on clear deliverables. It’s also important to ask important questions, such as:

• How often will you meet?
• When is the shoot?
• Who will be involved?
• What are the start date and the project timeline??
• How many images will you deliver??
• What is the final budget?

Once you’ve worked out the details and signed the contract, it’s time to get to work!?

How to Work with a Food Photographer

You’ve found a photographer you like that has a style you resonate with and provides the services you need. Now, it’s time to build a positive, long-lasting relationship with them. All of the advice I give you below will make you an easy person to work with, which will make your food photographer more likely to have a positive experience and want to work with you in the future.?

I can say from experience that working creatives is one of the things I love most about my job, so there is so much potential for a long and lovely working relationship!?

1. Make Introductions and Assign a Point Person

Introduce your food photographer to the creative team and anyone they’ll be directly working with. Assign a point person for the job (and stick to it). Make sure you are communicating internally so that the photographer only has to communicate with one person via email.?

You know what they say about ‘too many cooks in the kitchen…

2. Have a Pre-Production Meeting

While every food photographer is different, I always call a pre-production meeting to go over the project in detail. In this meeting, I collect all the information I need to get started designing the shoot. We talk in detail about the product and decide what colors, lights, props, hand models (oo-la-la), and ingredients we need.?

This is a great time to share brand guidelines or a mood board if you have one. If you are letting your food photographer decide on the creative direction of the photoshoot, make sure their mood board gets approved before the shoot day.?

Think about the pre-production meeting as the best time to get all the final questions answered on both sides so that everyone can show up prepared and get right to work on shoot day.?

3. Make Yourself Available

Communication is so key. You have to remember that your food photographer is a contract employee who doesn’t have years of insight into your specific business. So, on shoot day, there may be last-minute questions that come up - it’s so important that the point person is available to answer any questions promptly to keep everything running smoothly and avoid delays. If you or the pre-established point person can’t manage the project in a timely fashion, consider giving decision-making privileges to someone else in your company.

I’ll wrap this up with two final requests:

1. Treat them like a partner: They’re your partner, not an employee, so communicate with them, cheers them, laugh with them, and engage in radical honesty. Mutual respect and honesty are key if you want to get their very best work and grow as a team!
2. Pay it Forward: This is not at all a must, but I am a firm believer in paying it forward. Nothing makes me feel better than dumping love and appreciation on a deserving recipient! It’s an instant dopamine rush not unlike the feeling of biting into a warm, Bismarck donut. If you love their work, leave them a review, write a post on Instagram about your experience with them, recommend them to your friends, etc.

If you are on the market for a food photographer, we may be a match made in culinary heaven! I get excited about working with food companies that are passionate about their product and that have a story, big or small. I love shooting stills, and love bringing food to life through videography and food motion. My style is approachable, friendly, and simple. I love editorial food photography and would love to shoot for a magazine one day or a cookbook. In fact, I’ve flirted with the idea for years of writing one myself - perhaps just to check that off my wish list :)

I believe food photography is one of the single most important things you can do for your business. And I also know that the ‘unknowns’ of working with a food photographer can be a big barrier for companies who could benefit so much from beautiful pictures. So I hope that this blog answered your questions and gave you the final nudge you needed.?

High quality, show-stopping photos are yours for the taking, so get the visual content you need to finally bring your beautiful products into the spotlight by hiring a food photographer.?

Am I the food photographer of your dreams? Contact me to find out!