1| The Industry | Alan Benson | Primary Research

Alan Benson - Food Photographer

General Team

1. Photographer
2. Food stylist
3. Chef
4. (Sometimes the Graphic designer, client)
   

Equipment, Props

1. Camera
   
2. Tripod
3. Lenses
4. Pocketwizard
   
5. Flash
6. Towels
7. Reflectors
8. Black cards
9. Translucent material
10. White table cloths
11. Cuttlery
12. Flowers
13. Corflett - used as diffuser
14. Camera tethered to laptop, everyone looks at images until perfect
    

General Process of Food Shots

1. Test shot of bowl - lighting & composition
   
2. Chef plates the same bowl up properly
3. Real shot
4. Add olives, oil, attention to detail
5. Check that it is sharp after each shot - zoom into 100% LR
6. Everyone checks photograph on screen until they all agree that it is usable. All make suggestions

6-8 shots per day norm for food photography. Used to be 6. Now it is 8.

Overall

Alan Benson was lovely and a delight to work with/for. He happily answered our questions. Teri and I ended up shooting a bunch of product shots both to be deep etched and against various backgrounds. Our shots were mainly for web output. We ended up observing for 20-30 minutes and shooting for 3.5 hours. It was great observing Alan, and we were confident shooting what we were briefed on so we learnt a few things but also realised how much we already know and that we were trusted to get the shots anyway. The graphic designer (who was the one in charge of approving the shots) checked pretty much everything we shot before we moved on to the next product and she was pleased with our work, so, great experience! I love shooting food and I would consider specialising in this a some stage in the future!