It's been a couple of weeks of "down time" after my Food Photography & Styling Workshop to finally gather images together and write a recap of that awesome day.
In the interim I have been delivering many weddings to happy brides and grooms who got married in September and October. I photographed my last wedding of the year in the beautiful Catskills and then traveled to Kentucky for Thanksgiving with Chandler's relatives.
While I was away I received tons of praise and got sent images from my workshop attendees, thanking me for the fun time they had at my Food Photography workshop. I'm so flattered that Christina traveled from Wisconsin to attend! The other attendees came from NYC or Westchester and had varied backgrounds – some were wedding shooters, while others were bloggers or chefs-turned-photographers.
The Food Photography & Styling Workshop with special guest wedding planner and stylist Xochitl Gonzalez from A.a.B.Creates was at iCi restaurant. Ici is situated in Fort Greene, a beautiful historic neighborhood of Brooklyn, in an old house on Dekalb Avenue. The workshop took place on the parlor level which is infused with natural south-western light, ideal for photography.
I started off with a lesson on exposure using an all white still life styled by Xochitl:
I went on to explain the differences of using film and digital for still life photography. I showed a slideshow and then did a demo showing the precision of Polaroid + film shooting vs the ease and immediacy of digital.
(My awesome assistant that day, fellow photographer and friend Karen Cline shot these images of me :)
Blueberry pie I shot on film.
Xochitl's table-scape featured a unique tablecloth using the illustrations of Katie Fischer Design. Katie modelled her illustration of an elegant bowl of fruit from a still life painting her grandfather had done.
After the initial demos and slideshows, the rest of the day was devoted to hands on time, where the attendees could set up their own still lifes from the food and props provided by Xochitl and I, using some of the techniques they had just learned.
The attendees were busy shooting at the various tables on different surfaces and textured linens:
Some unique wooden surfaces I had purchased from Peg Leg Furniture made an appearance in many of the still lifes. So grateful to Tony Minnick for shipping them to me in time for my workshop!
The above image I shot on film using a cutting board from an antique store in Kentucky, and with ingredients Xochitl purchased from the Green Grape Market.
Then once Xochitl was ready, there was a big reveal of the stunning table scape she had created all morning!
"Ok, who wants to learn to do a food action shot?" Everyone gathered around one the of the tables for our last demo. There were many oohs and aahs from the crowd as the egg yolk was caught in mid air:
Some Polaroids of the blueberry pie before we devoured it ;)
Hope you will stay tuned for my next workshop which I will host in February. Please also feel free to send suggestions for future workshops! (Either email me or leave a comment here) I'm curious to know if you prefer group or private workshops, and if you have a preference for food/still life workshops, or portrait/wedding workshops.
To learn about my photography workshops and for periodic updates sign up HERE!