The client:
It was wonderful to work on this festive styled food photography commission for Browns at the Buttercross. Browns is a much loved food hall stocked with produce from the Lapwing Estate in South Yorkshire and other local farms.
The brief:
The focus for this shoot was to style and create a series of images to illustrate the Browns Christmas food brochure. There was a fantastic range of products to photograph, covering sweets and more formal Christmas dining options.
Photography approach:
As is typical with any location based styled food shoot I arrived with a ton of props and backdrops. I always have a good idea in advance of what looks I want to create. However there are usually so many variables on the day in terms of how the food looks and the lighting that it is sensible to be ready for anything. My mantra for shoots and kit is always if in doubt bring it!
For the first part of the shoot I opted for a clean Scandi look. This studio set was actually built outside on a roof terrace. I choose soft wood look boards with some subtle festive styling through candles and blurry copper wire lights. It was lots of fun working with chef to achieve a perfect flame on the Christmas pudding!
I then moved the set indoors for the savoury dishes. Moving to a darker wood look but keeping the soft nod to Christmas through candles and foliage.
The final set was in the private dining room at Browns. This is a rich opulent room with a beautiful wooden table top that offered some fantastic reflections to work with. A Christmas tree was dressed for the background to give a hint of twinkly lights. All natural light was stripped out for this image with lighting provided from a large soft box.
All images were shot in portrait format to fit the final requirements for the brochure layouts.
Image portfolio:
This series of images showcases beautifully the transition of styling and photography approach across the 3 different sets. The shoot finished with a full team image for the brochure. This features the front of house team as well as the staff from the farm.
