Styling a Burger and setup up a photoshoot for a burger requires skills on styling and lighting tecnhiques to make it look tasty and appealing. Below, you'll see the behind the scenes, details of the process, the editing and final image.
I've choose to put the burger on a woody surface that fades into the black background to focus on the subject. The idea is to highlight the burger with bright light to show the textures and colors as best as possible, and contrasting with a dark low light background. The light setup is simple, with two diffused lights, which makes it easy to transport and reproduce on a restaurant or any indoor location.
Behind the scenes :
The key light gives a nice reflection on the sauce, tomatoes and onions. The light is diffused to bring texture on the top bread, by creating diffused shadows on the brad, lettuce and the burger to creates depth.
The backlight is the same sofbox than the key light, but used in a different angle to give a shorter light gradient and less diffused shaddows. It creates a great color on the lettuce, shows the humidity of the melted cheese and highlight the texture of the button bread.
Retouch and Editing :
The editing process is crucial as the Raw files are flat, perfect to work with. I start to correct the brightness, contrast, detail and showcase every color individually with a colorimetry correction. Then I start making local corrections to clean the burger and surface. As the buttom bread and burger didn't fit perfectly, I've correct the burger and toppings, rebalancing the size of the ingredients to be more lisible. At the end, a perspective correciton is done to ensure that the burger doesn't look inclined.
Preview :
It is the perfect style of image to promote your food as a restaurant, hotel, catering service or chef.
There is a lot of communication channels where photographs is used to promote food, here is some examples ;
Digital : Online shop, Website, Instagram, Google, Tripadvisor...
Print : Menus, Brochures, Flyers, Business Cards, Posters ....
Credits :
Photography, Editing, Styling, Design : Joana Santos, Commercial Photographer
Location : Joana Santos, Commercial Photographer Private Studio in Algarve, Portugal, Europe
Mockups :
Flyer on a table mockup : www.mockups-design.com
Poster on a wall mockup : www.PosterMockup.com
Phone fLoatting mockup : www.ls.graphics
Instagram feed mockup : http://www.anagramdesign.graphics