Welcome back to this series on using artificial light in food photography. In part one, we covered how to get that coveted natural light look using just one light and softbox. If you haven’t read part one yet, head over there now to catch up, and i’ll see you in a minute. In this part I’m going to focus on the food photography lighting setup I use, and how you can create two completely different lighting looks, using just one light source and softbox.
Once you’ve found a light setup you’re comfortable with, it can be really easy to stick to it and replicate it over and over again in all your photos. I mean, if it aint broke, don’t fix it, right? Well… not exactly in this case…
There are many reasons to get comfortable with more than one food photography lighting setup. For one, it will help you improve your skills as a photographer, but it will also add diversity to your photos. Being able to confidently light a set in different ways, will help you pick the best look for the type of food you’re shooting and the mood you’re going for.
In some cases, a dish might call for a light, bright side lit look, and in others, the perfect backlight will highlight the food’s best quality. In any case, whether you’re shooting for your own blog, or doing a client shoot, the ability to be versatile will help you no end!
In the photo below, nothing has changed except the lighting setup, and you can see what a dramatic difference it makes to the final shot. Later on in this post, I’m going to show you the exact setup I used to create both of these shots:
The key thing to remember with artificial light is that you’re probably not going to get perfect results the first time you try a new angle. The same way it takes time to learn how to work with natural light, it also takes time to learn how to work with artificial light, so don’t give up.
In last week’s post, I mentioned the equipment that I use. I use a PixaPro LED200D mk II continuous light, and a 150cm octagonal soft box with double diffusion. This light and soft box help me recreate the effect of shooting right next to a window flooding with beautiful natural light, with the added benefit that I can control the brightness, colour and direction, to create my perfect look.
In today’s post, I’m going to show you how easy it is to create a side lit and a back lit look, using just one light and soft box. If you want to see how I did this in video, you can watch below!
Back Lighting
Backlighting in food photography is a great way to emphasize the specular highlight on the top of shiny food. In my example above, the olives with their coating of oil look even more appetizing when they have a nice glow around the top.
To backlight, place the soft box behind the food, higher up above your set angling downwards slightly so you don’t just end up with a silhouette of your food. You’re not aiming to have the light visible in the shot, so getting the angles right is important.
Make sure you’ve set up your scene with the focal length lens you want, then with your camera on a tripod, start moving your light around to find the optimum position for your shot.
Related: Why using a tripod is essential in food photography
When backlighting, the use of a white or silver reflector is pretty important as the front of your subject is facing completely away from the light source. This means that without a reflector, the back of your scene will be overexposed if you use the camera settings to expose the front of your food, giving that not great “blown out” look to your back lit shots.
To avoid that, place the reflector at the front of the set and angle it towards the front of your food scene, so the light can bounce directly onto the front of the food. If you have a spare light stand with a reflector arm attached, this will help hold your reflector in the perfect position while you take the photo.
Here’s a view of the backlighting setup I used when shooting those olives:
Side Lighting
Side lighting is a great all rounder. It works for nearly every situation, so it’s a solid skill to have up your sleeve.
To light this shot, I’m positioning the light on a slight diagonal to the food, to give the shadows a bit of direction, and again I’m also raising the light higher above the set, and angling it downwards onto the set slightly.
When setting up your scene, play around with the direction of the light. The direction of the shadows in a slide lit shot has a huge impact on the look of the final photo. Depending on the angle you’re shooting your scene, a different direction may look better, so for a top down shot you may want the light higher up and pointing down on your scene more, and for a straight on shot you might want the light a bit lower to give you the opportunity to give your shadows more direction.
For this shot, I’m going to place a reflector directly opposite the light, to fill the shadows slightly, creating a light, bright look. If you’re going for a darker, moodier look where you want the shadows to create a lot of contrast on your food, you can either leave the reflector out of the setup, or even use a black fill card to absorb more of the light to accentuate the shadows.
Here’s a shot of the setup for my side lit photograph:
So there’s two, really different but really simple lighting setups you can recreate using just one light source and soft box. Nailing these setups will give you versatility in your work and confidence to try new things and start experimenting!
Your Turn
Do you use artificial light in your food photography? What kind of lighting setup would you like to recreate that you’re struggling with?
This post is not sponsored. Pixapro kindly sent me the light and softbox free of charge. All opinions are my own and I truly believe in this equipment and use it myself in nearly all my food shoots!
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Hey Lauren. Wow, that’s a great video. I’ve been shooting food for a couple of years and of course have had the chance to see a bunch of people sharing their experiences. The quality of your video just stand out. Really like the quality, the sound track and the easy, simple but very effective way you explain stuff. Keep up the awesome work for it’s of big help.
Hey Daniel, wow thanks so much for the compliments! So great to hear you’re a fellow food shooter 🙂 Would love to see some of your stuff, do you have a website?
Superb superb superb. ……..
Did you use a light meter? If yes, what was your reading.
Lauren can you explain how honey combs and snoot are used.
Hi Jairaj, thanks so much for the comment, I’m so glad you liked the video! I didn’t use a light meter, I actually just look at the histogram preview either on my camera screen or via my tethered screen to get the exposure I want. As this is a continuous light it doesn’t have a fire power setting.
So, the honeycomb is a layer that goes on top of the diffusion panel to make the light more directional and a bit “harder”. It creates images with a bit more contrast. In my latest post “The Rule of odds”, you can see this effect as all these photos were shot with the honeycomb grid!
I ❤️ your article especially your video! It’s inspiring me to give food photography a try one day. I’m only a month into photography and documenting my journey on my site which is also just as new! Thanks for this. Cheers!
That’s amazing Richelle, I’m so happy to read that this has inspired you! I can’t wait to see what you create!
Good post. I think a lot of people are afraid of using artificial lighting but when done well it can work out. I like to incorporate both of your set ups for one set up. Using a strobe with soft box side lighting the food and having a reflector to bounce. Then having a second strobe with a grid reflector as a back light and using some white board to bounce some of that light. Works nicely when not able to utilize window light.
Thanks for the comment Scott! Yes artificial light is a great tool if you learn how to work with it!
H Lauren,
Good informative video, question what would the difference be between the 100 and 200 model please of the continuous light.
Tried strobes and find too difficult to grasp therefore looking at one of these lights.
thank you
Hi Karen, I haven’t personally used the 100D, but it looks like there’s a mkii version now! I definitely think continuous lighting is a GREAT alternative to strobes. I would say the 100D mkii would be just as effective for food photography as the 200D mkii
https://www.essentialphoto.co.uk/product/pixapro-led100d-mkii-daylight-balanced-led-studio-light/
What an amazing, helpful post! When I started my baking blog I was using cheap artificial lights that weren’t doing my food any favors at all. I recently moved into a new house that gets TONS of natural light so I was so excited!…for a month until winter started creeping up. And fall/winter in michigan means darkness, darkness, and more darkness so it looks like it’s back to artificial light for me. But after reading this post and seeing your beautiful pictures, I’m finding that I’m not so anti-artificial anymore! Thank you!
Woo I’m sooo happy to read that Jacy!! Natural light is amazing, but being confident in artificial light too is going to help you sky rocket your food photography!
Hi Lauren, thanks for sharing this one!
I am about to buy a light from PIXAPRO but would like to ask you about which one do you think is a better option in your opinion. I will be shooting still life photography.
The one you are using is the PIXAPRO LED200D MKII which has a CRI of 95 and colour temperature of 5500: https://www.essentialphoto.co.uk/product/pixapro-led200d-daylight-balanced-led-studio-light/
PIXAPRO released a couple months back their new light which is the PIXAPRO LED100D MKIII with some improvements such as CRO of 97, colour temperature of 5600: https://www.essentialphoto.co.uk/product/pixapro-led100d-mkiii-daylight-balanced-led-studio-light/
I am wondering if you could look at the specs and let me know what you think. I am considering the newer light also as it has an improved colour accuracy and daylight balance but it’s not as powerful as the LED200D.
I am curious to hear if you had troubles with the LED200D being too warm?
Thanks in advance and keep up the good work!
Hi Adrian, I only have experience with the 200D mkii, but the 100D mkiii looks great too, I am sure it would work very well for food photography. I have never had a problem with the light getting too warm, it does get warm but nothing unusual.
May I ask where you got the holder for your reflector? I did not want to bother so I have been looking for ages but still can’t find one which I like as much as I like yours on the photo. Thanks!!
I got mine from Essential Photo