Guest Photographer Michael Long - Tips on Indoor Photography

Michael, thank you for your guest appearance today. Not only do I love both your blogs, Michael's Kitchen and Photography By Michael Long, but I have learned much from each of them. Your blogs discuss two of my favorite subjects, food and photography. 


First, tell us a little about yourself:


"I retired in 2002.  In 1973 got my Degree in Photography, freelanced doing mostly Modeling portfolio's, Beauty Pageants, Country Western Singers, and finally worked for one of the major news agencies. Decided it was time to get into something else so I got into furniture making and did that for a number of years. until my health started down hill. Married to a wonderful lady with a lot of patience. After retiring I got into Gourmet Cooking, and from that French, Italian, and Chocolates. Oh, yes I have my time in commercial kitchens, working as a line cook. And now back into photography, doing mostly still life, photo work for my blog and several small customers, doing mostly catalog type things. And enjoying my retirement to the fullest."


Michael, you've had a very interesting and varied career and put two of your loves, photography and cooking, to excellent use. I know my followers will enjoy viewing your blogs and following you. 


Here's some of Michael's photography and his description of some tricks of the trade:

Photo #1

Michael's description of Photo #1: Vanilla bean sugar cookies done for one of my blogs.  The background was peel and stick lino tile, on a piece of particle board, the plate was fiesta ware, and the napkin was paper. Light was from left side window. and a white card reflector on the right.  This was photographed shooting straight down. Photo editing was slight, with a darkened corners only. The camera was a point and shoot about 10 years old.


In photo #1 Michael showed us some great tips. I love his use of the peel and stick lino tile as a backdrop, his use of a while card and the point of view. Very interesting and great ideas.

Photo #2

Michael's Description of Photo #2: this was a practice photo to test for lighting, reflectors, etc. And just for fun. I know that I should have made a batch of cookies for this,  but these were close by. I used defused window light, with black background for the contrast,  on the right side was a gold reflector some distance away.  I was just trying to get a hint of gold in the reflection fill on the shadows. The main cookie on top was hot glued.  I had to do that since that puppy kept falling over. Camera angle was head on at cookie level. Camera was a Nikon D3000.


In photo 2, I love how Michael hot glued the cookie so it wouldn't fall over! Another great tip - use your imagination to solve problems.

Photo #3

Michael's description of Photo #3: This was one of the first food photo's that I had done.  I mean really seriously did.  Home made soup with a window light coming in from the right this time and a single card reflector overhead to get some highlights in the beans.  This was also done with a point and shoot.  The camera angle was about 45 degrees. 




Thank you, Michael, for visiting and sharing your photo tips and photography with us.


Please visit both of Michael's blogs and leave comments. We all love those!
Michael's Kitchen for great recipes and Photography By Michael Long for more great photography and tips.




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Happy Clicking!