Wow can you believe the Easter season is right around the corner? I’m sure many of you are making plans for family meals and traditions, or casual entertaining, or maybe a kid’s party. It’s a great reason to get out some spring-time decor and put some beautiful and delicious food on the table. And some of us will have our cameras in hand trying to capture it all.
Here are five helpful tips to help you immortalize the effort you made to make it look festive. (Plus, stay tuned till the end for some tablescape inspiration from a few other great bloggers.) Because if you have a mental checklist of “must-have” shots to make sure you’ve captured the important elements, then you can have fun and photograph anything you want. Or put your camera away and enjoy the event!
1. Take detail shots. Flowers, centrepieces, place settings and beautiful food are all candidates for great detail shots. And make sure you get photos of anything that was handmade.
2. …and full tablescape photos. Stand back far enough to get the whole tabletop in the scene, maybe even some of the surrounding space.
3. Shoot from a variety of angles. It’s our natural inclination to stand beside a scene and shoot down at a 45° angle…mix it up by shooting from above for a bird’s-eye view or at eye-level for a look through the scene. (By the way, phone camera photos are great too! Add a cool filter, maybe some text, it’s all fun…these tips aren’t just for DSLR’s.)
4. Shoot in as much natural light as possible. Turn off your on-camera flash. Set the shutter speed slow, the aperture large and your ISO high to let in as much light as possible.
5. Take at least one photo of the “during” or “after” at your table. Food dished out onto a plate, the people enjoying the event, the end of the day with only empty glasses and plates left. This helps to complete your photo story and keep your good memories alive. It’s ok to have a bit of blur as the action takes place. And if the photo doesn’t look that beautiful to you, always try it out in black and white to see if that improves it for you. (I know, inevitably someone will wear something that clashes with your decor. Seriously.)
More Inspiration
And in case you need some inspiration for making your table look festive, check out some of these gorgeous ideas…
Marianne Songbird, the queen of simple and always pretty table settings, has a complete gallery of posts.
And I love these modern spring table settings at styleathome.com
And I love these modern spring table settings at styleathome.com
Have fun, and happy photographing!
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