Food Porn

Food photography is a still life specialization of commercial photography, aimed at producing attractive photographs of food for use in advertisements, packaging, menus or cookbooks. But here I am not advertising any food product I am exploring the world of photography in different sections.

Nowadays we can see a change in the trend of food photography. For a long time, food photographs tended to be shot and composed the way people were used to encountering their food: laid out on a table setting and shot from an overhead perspective, i.e., from the point of view of the eater. Stylists accordingly arranged the food to appear good from above, with the items arranged flat on the plate and clearly separated from each other.

Later, romantic lighting, shallower angles and more props came up with extreme cases leading to the term "FOOD PORN". Most recently, the prevailing trend in Western commercial food photography is to present the food as simple, clean and naturally as possible and with little props, often using effects such as selective focus, tilted plates, and extreme close ups. This complements trends in professional cooking to make the food more visually interesting. For instance, the height of dishes tends to increase and their elements are often layered, which lends itself well to narrow-angled shots.

The role of the food stylist is to make the food look attractive in the finished photograph. The main difference between how a home cook or chef may present food and what a stylist does is the time and effort a stylist takes to carefully and artfully arrange the food. Also required is the visual know how, and ability to translate the perception of taste, aroma and appeal that one gets from an actual dish, to a two-dimensional photograph.

Colorful stacks of vegetables drizzled with rich sauces on a clean white plate with glistening table settings- you know the shots. Sometimes the photography is almost the true focus of the book with the recipes taking a secondary role.

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