How to Fix Flat Looking Food Photos: Lighting Series PART 3 

I have no words to describe how much you influenced and taught me. Bless your soul!

absolutely love your videos

She is the best♥️

I'm watching your videos for the first time and OMG I'm just in love. I just started with food photography and this explanation was extremely clear and simple!! I think I've just found a new favourite photographer who makes youtube videos! YAY!

You are AWESOME!!! not only are you a great photographer but a great teacher as well!!!

From Kuwait with love and respect, thank you for helping me improve my food photography skills 🫂🙏🏾

A gifted teacher!

I'm so thankful that you happened to me. Came across your channel when I was searching to grow my food photography skills. And no one explains the details like you. My food shots are improving and I m soooooo very happy that i got you as my RU-vid teacher. Thank you so much. I have a RU-vid food channel , do check out ur student's progress. I am trying with whatever accessories I've got. Love Sreekala Abhishek Nair

A pro tip tutorial on high gloss ceramics would be great. I, fortunately have access to hundreds of hand made plates. Some are ceramic, terracotta, porcelain..however it is the high gloss ones that cause the biggest issue. Getting the lighting to illuminate the food, without creating a bright reflection off the plate rim can be a nuisance.

You are the best!! Don´t stop sharing your videos pls

Once i'm a great photographer i'm going to send you a gift of my gratitude for all the lessons, right now is invaluable

I love the way you explain how to work with light. It's helped my food videos in the short time I've been taking food photos.

I noticed that every time I hear your opening I start to smile )

Just that little candle behind you adds so much to the shot.

Light, Sciences, & Magic is the BEST photography book EVER. Every single photographer should own and read this book.

Joanie is a pro. Why doesn’t she have more views. Joanie thank you for helping all of us

She's very camera friendly. :) As a videographer, I noticed she practices what she preaches for video. The one key light she has is producing shadows on the left side (our right) of her face, and making that well-known look with the triangle of light on her cheek (I think that's called the "Rembrandt"?). The left side of her face is slightly darker than the right, creating depth. She's also using the same concept on the background, where the right is brighter than the left. To bring in a point of interest, she uses a common technique of lighting a candle, which makes a potentially dark, underexposed section of the video more interesting. The candle also adds some orange to the overall black and white theme. That B&W theme is emphasized with her black top, black hair (w/ bluish highlights), which sets a sharp contrast with the white bkgd. So as to add a bit of color, she adds a pot of green grass, books with colored bindings, and even a multi-color cup in front of her. When color grading the video, she increased the contrast to accentuate a sharp look, possibly adding slight saturation in the red/orange spectrum, giving her skin a more natural look and bringing out the cup in front of her and the small painting in the bkgd. Finally, she uses the common technique of a lens w/ a fast shutter (I'm guessing in the 1.x range) that adds slight bokeh, making the bkgd out of focus and emphasizing the foreground (her) even more. She may be a good photographer, but she's an excellent videographer as well!

Your smile makes it easy to digest the lesson... thank you

Wow, this took me back to my colour theory class I took in college my freshman year in 91. Good stuff Jonnie, good stuff. We were also taught to squint at the image, & if any colour(s) stood out too much, we were told to evaluate and assess to see if we needed to “tone” them down a bit, or if all the colours were too flat while squinting, then again we needed to asses the situation and see if we needed to add more “saturation” to the colours to balance out the painting. I still do that to this day with my photography, as I found that the same principle applies. Thanks again for the time and effort you put into making your videos!

Thank you so much for doing this and sharing your knowledge on light in food photography! I've been looking for how to create dark moody photographs but couldn't find any good ones on the internet! Hope you have a video of that! 😊

Wow you make complicated things so easy to understand. I can't wait to try this.

This is probably the most helpful product / food tutorial in all of RU-vid

Nicely articulated

So helpful! I cant get enough of your videos🤗☺💙

OMG OMG this is what is wrong with my photos!!!! This right here. How did I never see it?! Thank you! I have just been staring at my photos shaking a fist, wondering what I'm doing that's dragging down my photos so much lol! So helpful. I just took notes like in class hahah

Joanie this is the best video explaining how to work with light!!! Thank you so much

Realmente me ayudan mucho tus vídeos, it's a really helpfull..!!!

I remember using this textbook for my photography diploma in college. It was the first time I ever used a textbook to its full extent, unlike other mainstream courses. It's also one of the only textbooks I didn't try to sell back for money. xD

Great content and video. The possibilities are endless, aren't they? Lots of experimentation and shots required to nail desired and unexpected great photos.

Always awesome

Great lesson! Bite-sized learning! Nutrition for the brain.

Extremely useful video for beginners👍👍👍 in such a short amount of time, I learnt so much. Thank you!

You are my mentor, Joannie!! Great video. Simple but meaningful explanation!

I heard you say before that diffusion breaks light into smaller particles and I thought that's some scientist talk. now I understand why. Thanks for your awesome videos. I've been binge watching your videos and I started taking photos of my dinners for practice.

Wow! Just love your way of teaching! Thank you! for making it so easy to understand

Hi, first time watching your videos, am not a professional but I have been looking up food photography for my bakery. I really loved your explanations, you are a really good teach. Thanks for this

This was very helpful. It was explained clearly with simple to understand concepts and examples.

Well, very nice explanation! I can understand this easily without having to think about lighting very hard. This is what other photographers wouldn’t share online, but you share it for free. Thank you! It helps me a lot.

amazing video Joanie I love it how you make it easy, you are the best , keep up the good work .

You nailed it. The most important and difficult subject in my opinion. Thanks !

Been so busy lately and miss following your playlist of tips and tricks. I realize that you have to juggle to keep up with this pace and I do salute you for this. Thank you for always putting valuable and relevant info out there. This book is one of my wishlist books going to my stash of fundamentals of design. Kind regards A

Would love to watch you review some followers food photos 🙌🏻 Learning from others mistakes, so we don't make the same ones 🙏🏻

Joanie, your videos are just so awesome. You are so gifted at teaching and presenting on camera. Thank you for all that you do! :D

Very helpful thanks! Going to try converting some of my photos to b&w to see how they hold up :)

You are awesome Joanie, thanks for your videos! Love your style and your spirit

Joanie, your tutorials are awesome.

i love your content, its very useful. i am working on improving food photography skills, wish me luck

Another great video, i'm grabbing a copy of that book right away ! Thanks for the brilliant work 😉

I was totally paying attention to you and then suddenly I thought a fire was starting in your kitchen behind you! I wanted to jump in a save the cookbooks back there! LOL!!

I loooove your videos. I was not even interested in food photography. But then, I have watched couple of your tips and I am now all into food photography. 😂

Using B&W to evaluate contrast - good tip!

I watched so many of your vids and they are awesome. I am not photographer or anything near that field. I am a chef who often had to take food photos for menus and events. The knowledge I learned from The Bite Shot really helped me in meny cases. I paid a lot of attention to the vids you talks about lighting. I am planing to do a cooking video but the light setting is maybe different from photo taking. If you can suggest on this is would be greate. Thank you in advance, and wish you a great day. I love your work

Amazing, thank you. It is all logical about light direction, but you explain it so well. thank you

Awsome. Makes so much sense when you explain it.

Wow. Great tips. I'll practice some today. Thanks!

Thanks for the tips! Will try to incorporate some in our Food Videography as well!

Great tip 📷 😎❤️ Subscribed’ God bless

I love so much every thing about you and your photography ! Excellent work always ! Congradlations...

Im in awe that I discovered you joanie! You are super talented im so impressed with your work 😍😍😍

Loved this video Joanie!

Thank you ♥️

You are amazing ❤. from middle east

Very useful

I am in love with this series! Thank you so much for the great info!

Jonnie!!! You are like a food photography institution 😁 loved loved both the video and You as always 😍

Book, sold! I was just searching for a book on light, thank you.

Really well done video! Congratulations!

Great video! Can't wait for the next one.

I really love your videos! I just shared this one on my Facebook page with a shout out to you.

The flame is back, yay!

This really a great video and tutorial...Always enjoy to watch ur vid....Thank you so much for sharing your experience and knowledge.👍👍👍

Could you do more editing videos ? Where you show how you edited some pictures of your feed ? Love all your videos ! You’re an inspiration 💕

Great video, you’re so great at explaining things 😍

I love this intro so much!

I always learn something interesting, thank you! : D

Thank you! I've been ploughing through the book, but you make so much more sense... and you're so much more concise :) !!

Excelent teacher!!!

Watch your color grading, the blacks are clipping, Joanie ! Great video as always !

perfect explanation!!

If your camera has a B&W shooting mode, where you can see in B&W, you can use that while composing and setting up the lights to see the tones... then when that looks right, switch back to the color and see the difference, or try and see the tones in color...

You are the best love listening 2 you 👍🙃thanks for all the tips

Love this video! 💕

very helpful and informative thanks

It's great to learn how to control light to your advantage and that cheesecake looks fantastic. Can you share the recipe?

Very like!

very nice video thanks

Congratulations for 100k subscriber.

You are the best teacher 👍🏻

Joanie! I'm so happy I found your "new" channel! It's amazing! I followed Joanie Simon and loved that too! Keep up the good work. I'm so happy for your success.

You have turned out to be my favourite Ma'am !!! :)

I love your book club. Going to go bankrupt early lol. I'm using it as advices also for the gifts to my creative friends

Hey.. love ur vids ❤️ 💕.. could u make a video about various types of lights and setups u can use for food photography

This helped me so much answering why my pictures look a bit flat. I do only use natural light and I mostly work with light coming from the side of the object (the food). I have tried with backlight but that makes it way too harsh and shadowy almost every time. Not the pleasant amount of shadows like you had. Why is it like that? ☺️ If anyone here could help too I would be very thankful. 😄

I hope you see my comment, All my photos looks very flat when using soft box or big octa I wish you make a video when to use soft box and when to use light directly behind 5 in 1 diffuser All my images are flat except when I shoot with direct light behind diffuser But nothing works with me with soft box or octa box Although I follow all your guildines and I learnt food photography here

Very well explained.... thank you....congratulations for 100k.... 😊

So happy my windows are already straight 😂. I had to laugh so hard. But really, another amazing video! I truly appreciate your content. Keep up the amazing work!

Nice. it is still difficult to have a good depth. Thank you.

Mind blown 🤯

Thank you so much 💗

I really love this topic, "lighting" because of this topic, we can create any kind of picture and a different mood and i love shadow in my photo and of course dark mood type is my favorite. Thanks!