How to build a Light box for Food Photography

After many months of thinking about it, I finally did it - A light box for food photography! It really is as easy as they say in many sites and blogs around but before you jump ahead, I would ask you to consider a few things, based on my experience.

- Do you really need one? Although a light box gives you the flexibility to click pictures of your food whenever you'd like, nothing can beat natural light when it comes to food photography. Let me repeat that - nothing. A lot of professional food photographers may go for fancy studio equipment but the beauty of food blogging from our homes and kitchens is, this is what we make for our family meals, we are sharing our recipes and what we cook on a day-to-day basis. I wouldn't compare that to commercial food photography any day.

Another thing to consider is, do you usually plan before you cook for the blog or do you cook something and then decide you want to blog about it. If you find yourself doing more of the latter, then a light box may be a good idea because half the time I think that way, its night time on a week day when I am at work all day.

- Do you have the space for it? You can always dismantle your light box and set it up only when you need it but trust me, that won't happen often. So you will end up building it but hardly ever using it if you don't have a fixed spot for it in your house. We recently moved into a three bedroom apartment and I am using the third bedroom as my studio. The wardrobe is where I keep my photography accessories and the light box sits to one side of the room. I don't intend to move it from there or dismantle it.

So here it is, my very own light box!

I pretty much followed the instructions from Food for 7 Stages. The few differences I made are:

- I used a smaller box

- I used tracing paper instead of fabric to cover the slots through which light enters the box

- I used 18W daylight bulbs that give a 100W output

A few initial shots with varying light input - both Straight Out Of Camera (SOOC) and edited.

This is the first picture I took, without bothering with a background sweep or anything. I was super eager to see the results. Remember, this was taken in the night, at around 8:00pm. Taken with one light - SOOC.

Another macro shot, taken with one light - SOOC.

The first food shot, taken with one overhead lamp - SOOC except for watermark and straightening. I didn't have the other two lights set up when I took this so I had to depend on editing to make it look better.

Same picture, after editing.

Enter three lamps - first food picture with all three lamps as shown in the light box picture above. No editing done - SOOC.

One of my favourite light box pictures to date (I haven't taken that many yet, I always turn to natural light if I can help it). This is a very lightly edited picture taken in the light box, again, in the night.

I have taken a few more and recipes are coming up soon for this dishes. Going forward, I will clearly mark the picture setting when posting pictures because I expect a good mix of both kinds of pictures in future posts.

Comments

Happy Cook

January 12, 2011 at 8:30 am

Wowo looks so good the pictures, I made a light box from jugalbandi they are good but have not used it that much, but i think my WB setting in camera is not orrecct as it ia always having a slight dull color. When i edit in photoshop it gets better though. The first and the lst picture in my latest post is taken with light box.
I see you also used daylight lamp i have been looking for that here and have not got it, will still search for the lights .

Anonymous

January 12, 2011 at 8:23 am

Great work. I never realised making a lightbox was so easy. Thankfully, I get glorious natural light most days of the year, so I haven't felt the need for one. But like you rightly pointed out, I do want to photograph some dishes cooked at night. Will try my hand at this when I can. Thanks for the post.

- Gowri

Sig

January 12, 2011 at 8:13 am

*turned

Sig

January 12, 2011 at 8:13 am

Great job Nags! Love the way the pics have turn out! If you live in a place like Seattle, you don't have a choice but to rely on studio lights, 9 months out of a year. :). I bought a lightbox, was too lazy to build one, but now I am too lazy to use it. I just use the lights directly with the diffusers 🙂

Usha

January 12, 2011 at 4:34 pm

Nice post Nags! I was thinking of doing something about the light. I usually cook in the evenings and I don't take pictures after sunset. I will try building the light box. I think it might be useful at least in the winters.

Paaka Shaale

January 12, 2011 at 4:11 pm

Lovely post nags!!! Thanks soooo much for sharing 🙂

?

January 12, 2011 at 3:12 pm

Agree with you on the natural light. Almost all of my photos were taken in natural light; and yes, sometimes when you finally decide to blog about a dish, you find that the 'light' is gone! Have seen RV's post and your box looks compact and neat.

Miri

January 12, 2011 at 2:56 pm

I have often thought of how helpful this would be since a lot of my pics for recent posts have been spoilt by the fact that they were taken in yellow light in the evening - part laziness, but mostly because if I cook before we eat there is not time to set up white light etc etc. The light box would be great to have. Thanks for this demo and ideas 🙂

Sharmilee! :)

January 12, 2011 at 11:52 am

The last pic gives the best justification for all the efforts put in, nice post too. Thanks for it!

Nags

January 12, 2011 at 8:27 am

Hope you try the light box for your food photography, Gowri 🙂

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