Over the past couple of years, I've had the opportunity to shoot quite a few restaurants in and around San Diego and the Inland Empire. Often, my primary assignment is to capture the food but one of my favorite parts is to grab a portrait of the chef or restaurateur. Sometimes its at the request of the client, but often its for my own creative exercise and portfolio. Chefs are generally personable and passionate but they also tend to be…
Why White? One of the questions I get asked a lot in classes and workshops is how to achieve a pure white background without a lot of Photoshop knockout. Graphic designers like a clean white background so that the subject could be plopped anywhere on a website page or white paper print. This way the photo can be easily shown without borders (or easily extracted and placed on a different background). Lighting and Background Setup The trick in getting a…
It's no secret that the 'ol Book of Faces can be a great marketing tool for photographers as well as just a generally fun place to show off some family photos. Facebook, however, has a tendency to compress, convert, or otherwise mangle your photos if you don't do some image prep ahead of time to maximize their display quality. Here are some steps I'd recommend to optimize your images for Facebook display. I recommend using Photoshop but you could certainly…