Food Photography Help Needed

[Coachs Wife]

For those who haven't met me, I have a wild game recipe blog, www.mywildkitchen.com, that I post wild game recipes to twice a week. We recently moved and my new kitchen has terrible lighting.

I don't have fancy equipment. I have a Canon Rebel T2i. I don't have any external flash. I don't use any flash at all when I shoot my food. At my old house I was able to get away with the overhead florescent light and a rice paper lamp with a soft glow bulb. This new kitchen has a large window, but this creates lots of shadows. The ceilings are vaulted with dim lights. The cabinets are low, blocking even more light.

I have about $100 to try to fix my lighting, plus install a new "backdrop" in the kitchen (the backsplash here is terrible.) Can anyone recommend a cheap fix? I don't really want a lot of flash lamps (if that's what they're called) standing around the kitchen waiting to be knocked over by one of the kids. What I'd really like is to be able to take advantage of the natural light coming in through the windows, but have another lighting source to offset the shadows. Plus, come winter, that natural light will be gone and I'll be cooking with the kitchen lights only. Is there something I can undermount to the cabinets, without creating harsh direct light and shadows?

Here are some samples of my pictures:

Old House with Florescent lighting and rice paper lamp:







New House with Vaulted Ceilings, Big Window, Florescent Sink Light





I'll take any advice y'all have to offer. I am by NO means a professional photographer, but I've learned a lot in the last year and want to make sure my pictures reflect how good the food tastes. If the pictures are bad no one will want to read the recipe...

Thanks in advance!

[Casey]

Go to The Home Depot and grab a few of these for $10 or so. Throw in some 6500k bulbs and you should be able to get the lighting you need. You might be able to build a frame out of PVC for the lights. I used the tent below with them as well.




I also have one of these that is handy...and cheap.

[Shane]

^yep.

I also like natural light and shadows sometimes. Don't be afraid of that. Put the camera on a tripod. Use ISO 100 and f/16 or so for broad depth of field. You'll probably need a fairly slow shutter speed (hence the tripod).

[Coachs Wife]

The tripod may be tricky because I'm constantly moving from one area of the kitchen to another.

We have a few of those lamps in the shed. I'll have to give that a try. I like a few shadows, too, but this kitchen is bad. Have to set my ISO to 800 just to get a steady shot. But like I said, I'm still learning this camera. I may not know how to use it exactly right.

Thanks for the pointers. I'll see about getting a small tripod and try out the lamp.

[El Viejo]

Shane's advice is spot-on. You want more depth of field in your shots (more of your pictures in focus). The best way to do that is with a tripod. That way you can shoot at a f-stop of 16 without worrying about your shutter speed. I like the lighting you have on your images. I would just work on the depth of field. Those lights would help with that as well.

[Robby Brown]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BEo2c6mCupw

This may help.