Photographing your produce on a phone: a short, practical guide for small producers

If you sell food online, the photograph is doing the job that the smell of the stall does at a market. It is the whole of the first impression. The good news is that a modern phone is more than capable, and almost everything that makes a food photograph look amateur is a fixable habit rather than a limitation of the kit.

Use a window, never the flash

This is the single biggest improvement available to anyone. Put the food on a table beside a window, on an overcast day if you can choose, and turn off every light in the room. Flash flattens food and turns it grey. Daylight from the side gives it shape.

The one thing to avoid is direct, hard sunshine, which produces harsh shadows. A bright but cloudy day is ideal, which is convenient in this country.

Shoot from the side, not from above

Overhead shots suit flat things such as a tray of biscuits or a board of cheese. Almost everything else looks better from roughly the height it would be if it were in front of you at a table. For anything with height, a loaf, a jar, a pie, get the camera down to its level.

Keep the background quiet

A wooden table, a plain cloth, a sheet of brown paper. The food is the subject and everything else is a distraction. Clear away the cereal packet and the car keys. Most photographs are improved more by taking things out than by adding anything.

Fill the frame

Move closer than feels natural. A common error is a small piece of food marooned in a large photograph. Get near enough to see texture, the crumb of the bread or the frost on a leaf.

Edit lightly

Raise the exposure a little, raise the contrast slightly, and stop. Heavy filters make food look artificial, and artificial is the last thing you want when the whole promise is that it is real.

Shoot a set, not a single

For each product take three: the whole thing, a close-up detail, and one showing scale or use, a slice cut, a jar held, a box opened. Listings with a few honest angles convert far better than one perfect shot.

One session, a season’s worth

Set aside an hour when the light is good and photograph everything at once. It is far more efficient than doing one at a time, and your listings will look consistent, which quietly signals that you know what you are doing.

If you are thinking about selling with us, the information for producers at /deliver explains how listings work and what you will need.