YRSFood,
Wilmslow Food Workplace Photographer.

As a food photographer we are often asked to then become industrial photographers - going back stage so to speak in the factories, smoke houses and processing plants to capture the creation process of a product. Some of these processes are not for the faint hearted - an issue with so many consumers now being so disconnected with the origins of the food. So we first ask to go around the process to understand what is suitable for shooting and not - the image, will after all, tell all.

Then there is the issue of misconceptions - black pudding being made with powdered blood... so what we shoot has to be managed, directed and carefully controlled for things going on in the background. Then we have the staff element - overalls have to be perfect not soiled from day to day activities. Once the walk through has taken place we simply and unobtrusively photograph the process from a distance - no grip and grin shots unless asked! Some of these areas will require us to be escorted, which we understand - as will the need for shocking pink hair nets and bright blue shoe covers or glowing yellow wellies! YRSFood, Food Photographer Wilmslow.

This area of restaurant photography is very quickly moving to Facebook captured images - and it should do, as hiring a photographer all the while is impossible! People enjoying your establishment should be captured real-time and with real people. The only problem is that some of the images may be of poor quality due to lighting or the consumption of a few drinks!

That's why some of our clients bring us a long for the less busy times - lunch times perhaps not evenings - to engage with your customers and gently document the atmosphere.

A lot of the times, however, we suggest bringing in models to act the process. Why?

Model release forms (and now GDPR), to put a finer point on it. To get a close up image and not a crowd image that is professionally taken, requires a signed model release form, which gives you as the establishment owner their permission to use the image. So to get around that most clients use their staff, friends and even family to create a table level atmosphere which we photo-shoot.

A new and exciting side for us, as farmers and growers realise the importance of getting professional images that demonstrate their investment and care to produce some of the worlds finest products. We also mention harvesting in the title, and this is not just for farming - harvesting of food universally - fish farms, fishing trawlers - their harvest from the seas. We have even shot seaweed farming. So an exciting area that is bound to develop more and more, as food producers wish to show quality, care or welfare, traceability, efforts for sustainability and the results of reduced impacts upon the environment.

UK is leading in so many food and agricultural things and it's great to see it being celebrated. When shooting, all our gear is armoured, so no problems with weather or mud, we work out a shoot plan to get the right images on the day and in fact include a calendar plan - sometimes the shoot can start in March as crops are planted and end in August as they are harvested! Other times it may be in the small hours as fish is landed or seasonally driven as food is only available at certain times. We work the schedule around these needs.