Food photography is a specialization of still life photography and produces attractive and mouth watering images of food which can be used for advertisements, restaurants, food packaging companies, menus, cookbooks and posters. Restaurant photography is a further specialization where the pictures shot are only used for display in restaurants and cafes.

This type of photography is a highly collaborative effort and requires an entire team like a food stylist, art director, assistants as well as the photographer himself. There are many Miami food photographers who can be hired to get food images clicked if you are planning to publish a cookbook or start a food blog.

In the earlier days, food photography was quite conservative depicting food or dishes laid out on the table in an attractive manner. But today, photographers and stylists love to play around with the settings and lighting techniques showcasing each ingredient or the entire dish in a highly provocating and romantic way giving rise to the term, ‘food porn.’ This is the age of gourmet food and hence most celebrity chefs and hatted restaurants are looking for innovative ways to present their menu to the public using restaurant photography.

Most Miami food photographers work in close association with food stylists as these are the people who are responsible for styling and arranging the food in an attractive and eye-catching manner. Some food writers and celebrity chefs don the role of food stylists too so that they can potray food as they visualize it on their blog or in their cookbook or restaurant. The popularity of food photography has also soared up with many new reality cooking shows like Master Chef and Top Chef on television.

A variety of techniques are used to create specialized effects while clicking images of food. The appearance of steam is created by using cool air nebulizers or chemicals; food, especially fruits and vegetables, are made to look fresh and bright by spraying water or other heavy liquids like corn syrup. While shooting photographs of dishes, food colors and browning agents are added to make the gravy look browner or the dish to take on a particular color to make it more pleasing to the eye. Sometimes, vegetables are only blanched and not cooked completely so that the color appears green and bright especially for asparagus stems, French beans, salad leaves, lettuce or other green veggies.

Food photography is quite challenging because the photographer has to be quick in shooting the images as the food may not stay fresh or in a particular position for long. This is especially true while clicking images of desserts or burgers which can melt or turn soggy-looking after a few minutes. In spite of the many challenges, Miami food photographers are highly sought after to entice a person’s imagination even with the most basic ingredient.