29 September 2010

homework pics

I bought my DSLR a month or two ago because I wanted to improve the quality of my food (and I guess all other) pictures. I was on full auto for a long time, but what's the point of a SLR if I'm not going to learn how to use it properly? So I signed up for an intro to photography workshop at the Washington School of Photography thanks to a groupon or living social deal. I'm glad I did because I finally get what ISO means *not* regarding to internal auditing for work, and I now know what the f-stop does. Am I a pro now? LMFAO hellz to the nizzo. But am I starting to understand basic stuff like composition better? Indeed.

So during our first class we went over that technical stuff and then 6 basic composition guidelines -- rule of thirds, filling the frame, leading lines, change of perspective/point of view, repetition, and frame within a frame. (All are easily googled for examples if you're curious.) We were supposed to bring in some examples for critique in class. I had all these grand ideas of food pics I wanted to take... closeups of pillowy cupcake frosting kissed with sprikles, filling the frame with some nifty kitchen gadgets, cookies that look so scrumptious you can't help but drool... Unfortunately, I didn't do a whole lot of baking/cooking, and also sometimes what's conceptually awesome in my head doesn't translate well in real life (or at least I haven't figured out quite how to make it translate yet). I did manage to get 2 food-related pics that I liked, and both were well-received from the instructor and the class with "This is an interesting picture" comments, lol. Actually for one of them, he asked the class what they thought, and I think they were scared. Something about being a serial killer...

Here are the 2 food pics I brought in for my homework assignment. Which composition techniques did I use for each? What do you think of them?

~~ 1 ~~

~~ 2 ~~

I've also learned a few things about my photographing skillz: 1) I need a tripod. My hands are so not steady! And 2) I take a bazillion pictures to get one good one. I'm hoping that with this class and more practice, I'll start getting better than 1 in a bazillion. I'll definitely save a lot of time if I can get it right sooner rather than later. I just gotta keep practicing. So with any luck, over time, you'll see this blog get prettier!

What's your favorite way to compose your food pictures?

5 comments:

  1. I like the knife picture, the lighting on it is really interesting. The wear patterns on the blade are also neat. Pretty sure you can send that to Henckels and get it sharpened to remove the little nicks in the blade.

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  2. me likey! :) i like the 1st pic... when brandt said the 2nd one was a knife i was like whoa. very nize.

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  3. Gorgeous shots! I can't wait to see more!

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  4. Love them!!! btw, who taught your workshop?

    -Kristine

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  5. Danke peeps. Kris -- Sami something is my teacher, though for today's field trip it was Michael Kingsley. Good times. I'm learning, slowly but surely!

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