Food Photography

[shutterbug182]

I want to specialize in food photography. The problem im having at the moment is lack of equipment to expand my folio . At the moment i have a Canon eos 3000N and a 38-80mm lens 4.8, which i have to make do with for now. I have been using window light and it tends to be abit flat. Does anyone have any suggestions for lighting equipment that is cheap but effective?. I was thinking of getting a tungsten light on a adjustable stand, and some diffusing material, and maybe a macro light to add texture.

Any thoughts and suggestions would be great!

Sarah.

[another view]

I'm not an expert in this but good results can be done pretty inexpensively. Make reflectors out of white mat board, maybe covered with aluminum foil. Use mirrors as reflectors (like adjustable make-up mirrors). Tungsten halogen worklights from the home center will be a good start, but do a custom white balance. Backgrounds, etc can be anything you want.

There's no reason to spend a fortune on this stuff at this point, and I'm sure you could build an impressive portfolio with equipment from a craft store and the home center. Most of my small product photography (like for ebay) is done with window light and pieces of white paper for reflectors - set on a big piece of white paper as a backdrop. The expensive piece is the light stand that I tape the background paper to - but again, anything will work, whatever's handy.
Check out cooking magazines for ideas for shots. Most of what I see is really shallow DOF shots - you can get that with your lens if you use an extension tube for macro (from Canon, should be under $100). I've seen some photographer's websites that talk about their techniques for food - can't remember names though...