Currently in the shops are some surprisingly good items of summer clothing by Aldi with packaging shot by me! I photographed these earlier in the year at my studio in Newcastle city centre for Bebe clothing, who create the clothing and packaging for Aldi women’s fashion. The colours were really pleasing and the model was fab! A great shoot indeed and who’d have thought the goodies in the central aisles could look this good?
This December I am promoting my head-shot portraiture deal to small businesses and sole traders in Newcastle who would like to update their profile photo for social networking and company websites. It’s often a job we put to the bottom of the pile, particularly as VERY few of us enjoy having our picture taken!
If you bite the bullet and book in to my studio for a January 2016 appointment the first ten enquiries will be rewarded with a 50% discount on the Studio Profile package. Just please quote the code CLAVJAN and you will receive the package for just £50.
The Studio Profile package gives you a relaxed and enjoyable half hour studio session with the option of various backdrops at the studio. Or you can choose to be captured in your office or outdoors at a location relevant to your business if you prefer. Around one week later you then choose 10 images from around 30 finished and retouched portraits. These are then supplied as digital files ready to upload to social networking sites LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter etc or website team/about pages and high quality versions for printing too.
It might be helpful to see what my past clients wore, the variety of backdrops we used and various lighting styles for corporate and social media portraits so please visit this page on my website http://www.sarahdeanephotography.co.uk/corporate-studio-photographs/
Please call 07960 338357 or email me at sarah@sarahdeanephotography.co.uk and I can give you more information on the studio’s offer and discuss availability for January.
Jason Squires social media marketing expert came to me recently for profile photos in my photography studio in Newcastle city centre and around local nearby landmarks at the quayside. Being a social media expert he knew the importance of good quality portrait photos online and needed a broad range of profiles for his new website. His business advises other businesses on the strengths of social media and how to grow your client base and increase growth using social media effectively.
The brief was to create portrait imagery that allowed his clients to have a visual introduction to Jason on line in professional yet friendly and relaxed photography. The weather was dry and we worked our way around the quayside to various landmarks with spectacular backdrops across Dean St and across the bridges to the Baltic. Jason works nationally however this Newcastle city scape was a great one to use particularly as it was a stones throw from my portrait studio. We finished up with a few studio shots with plain backdrops of white, grey and black coloramas each offering a different atmosphere and offering flexible use for Jason across various print and web media designs. If you’d like to see the results of the pictures now within Jason’s site or want to know more about Jason’s work please visit this link; http://www.jasonsquiresonline.com/
If you would like a new online profile shot maybe for your company website, LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter or other social media please see the flyer below for details of my current offer and give me call to discuss availability. I can help you loosen up (as very few people like having their portrait taken) and make the experience an enjoyable one! Please don’t be shy and pick up that phone to call me on 07960 338357
The Big Cheese Making Kit has had such success with it’s easy to follow kits for making a variety of cheeses at home that soon it is to launch the Ultimate Cheese Making Kit! This kit will be the king of cheese making kits and comes with an accompanied recipe book for delicious suggestions as to how to use the home made cheese in savoury and sweet dishes.
I was up in Edinburgh on location last week shooting food photography images for the home made cheese recipe illustrations in owner Ailsa Proverb’s now famous kitchen and these are samples you see below. The kits are sent worldwide and Ailsa recently received an MBE from the Queen for services to the Food Industry after only a short time in business. Bravo! Say cheese Queenie!
Here are a selection of images from the two days we spent in Ailsa’s fabulous kitchen. Photography tips are below for anyone wanting help and hints on food photography on location.
Macro Lens & Food Photography on Location Photography Tips – The Basics
So my blogs are taking a new angle now as we all know the internet is rather old fashionably known as the ‘information super highway’ so I thought it important to start offering more informative photographic help and tips.
So to set the scene for well lit light and attractive food photography on location I needed elements of studio photography to be taken to the location. I used one flash 400 head with a 1m x .5m soft box bounced onto the ceiling to avoid harsh light bleaching out the white texture of the homemade cheese as much as possible. In terms of kit, I shot with my Nikon D700 (full frame) and I used my 24-85mm Nikon lens with built in macro to get detailed mouthwatering close ups of the ingredients. I shot on macro setting throughout and used the zoom on full 85 for some close up compositions.
Food photography really benefits from a shallow depth of field, so an f-stop of around 2.8 to 3.5 will give you the sharp focus and extreme blur in one shot. My shutter speed was 125 and ISO was 250 fairly statically as the flash head kept light constant despite the nearby window. Try not to rely on natural light as you will be struggling with setting changes if the sun goes behind a cloud. But do try to mimic the way that natural light can cast gentle shadows from a natural source like a window. NB when using shallow depth of field, you must be careful to highlight the correct part of the food in the photo and for this we had the mantra that ‘cheese is king’!
Ailsa’s colleague Alison had prepped most of the food the day before as most would be typically served cold or cool. This takes the pressure off as hot food wilts and hardens as it cools and becomes unattractive so the window to shoot is much smaller. We also had carefully chosen props with subtle shades with small splashes of colour on the crockery for the styling. So the prep had been paramount to the success of this shoot.
If you are doing lots of close ups then it’s a lot easier to work in a location environment as little of the backdrop will be included, so a little mess can be allowed! If you want some backdrop blur of the natural environment then remove any strong coloured items that may distract from the food, particularly red. You can also have relevant props blurred as I did with the Gnocchi shot leaving the parmesan grater in the backdrop. The macro lens was used throughout this two day shoot as it will enhance the recipe book by helping the reader identify the ingredients easily and imagine how it might feel and taste in the mouth as they eat it. You can get in really close and select the most attractive part of the dish. There is a lot of experimentation with this type of photography so it is a lot more time consuming that most. Although as you image extremely rewarding too!
I recently created a new personal record with my North East based pub & bar PR photography for Heineken recently when revisiting the cosy Staith House in North Shields, Newcastle. This was the 4th time I have captured Kimberly, James and John as they have really put this pub on the map with their excellent menu, real ales and live music. The pub had excelled in social networking above others in the Star Pubs portfolio and so I was asked to capture social networking themed shots for the Heineken awards and Staith House PR.
Below are a few of the PR photos and bar interior photography along with the shots Kimberly took of me whilst I captured James updating Facebook. In fact technology is so amazing that Kimberly’s phone pics of me popped on James’ laptop screen whilst I was shooting the Staith House Facebook page!
