The gang after the photo shoot. Thanks Andrew, for the shot!
While we certainly work hard, it’s not every day that the studio’s crew is here at 3:45 a.m. This morning was an early (and special) one, because CBS 2 Chicago reporter Vince Gerasole stopped by to film a live segment about food photography with Steve.
The day started even before the crack of dawn as the studio was set up for the shoot. Josephine was hard at work preparing a breakfast sandwich and a morel dish for the segment, while Deirdre, Andrew, Raymond, and Tom prepared the set. CeCe was also in the kitchen, baking delicious scones for our breakfasts.
Vince and his cameraman Lou arrived and quickly set up the shots. Though Steve had appeared as a guest judge on Top Chef and on NBC News before, live TV is still a bit nerve-wracking. Timing and pacing have to be just right, and everyone, including Steve, Vince, Lou, and Josephine had to coordinate to make sure the shots run smoothly.
Nerves aside, it was a fun and exciting shoot. Steve discussed tips for shooting with your iPhone, and Josephine guided Vince through some of the “tricks” of food styling. They discussed binding muffin crumbs together with Vaseline, how to use a blow torch to quickly brown vegetables, and Steve explained the benefits of using silicone “ice cubes” in beverage shots.
If you weren’t awake at 5:30 this morning, you can still catch the video online. The introductory video is embedded here, and the other videos can be found as links under that. Grab some popcorn!
Normally, Steve tries to keep exclamation points out of our blog post titles, but this one deserves it. After months of hard work, Who’s Hungry? Magazine is finally here!
We’re all incredibly proud of the beautiful photography, wonderful stories, and delicious recipes contained in the magazine. Of course, now that this issue is out, it’s time to look forward to the next one, which we’ll be planning and shooting in the coming months. A big thank you to all the people who made this magazine come true, and now, onward to the next issue!
The alternate titles for this blog post could have been: “How We Searched High and Low for Morels,” or “The Tricky Way We Found Ramps in March.” Gearing up for the launch of our digital magazine this month, we needed to find ingredients to shoot that would make sense in a spring issue. Spring produce includes all those much-anticipated vegetables like peas, ramps, baby carrots, and fiddlehead ferns. But because we needed to photograph the vegetables weeks before the magazine would publish, it wasn’t easy to find warm weather veggies in late February and early March. To do that, we had to become detectives.
One of the first shoots we scheduled involved violets. It was winter, in Chicago, and we needed fresh flowers. After a bit of sleuthing, we found them through Chef’s Garden, a family-owned, Ohio-based company that grows specialized, heirloom vegetables, herbs, and flowers for chefs across the country. Inside their greenhouse, they’re able to grow a selection of edible flowers, even during the Midwest winter months. A few phones calls later, the violets were delivered to the studio for use in our shoot.
The next challenge we faced was finding ramps, the prized spring onions that chefs love for their strong, garlicy flavor. In the Midwest, these highly-anticipated spring shoots normally don’t crop up until May, but we needed them in mid-March. Luckily, Steve’s pal Tim Burton of Maplewood Farms had an early crop of ramps, thanks to the unseasonably warm temperatures in the Midwest this March. Tim was kind enough to drop a few pounds of ramps off at the studio for us to use.
Lastly, we needed mushrooms. While there are certainly some cremini and portabello mushrooms at the farmer’s markets in Chicago right now, we needed spring varieties like morels, yellow foot, and black trumpets. Steve put one of the magazine’s editors, Judith Mara, to the task: find those mushrooms! After a lot of research and calls to foragers and farmers, Judith found the varieties we needed through Foods In Season, a Washington state-based company that started more than 30 years ago by (guess what?) foraging mushrooms.
Though finding these ingredients early was no easy task, it was worth it for the fantastic images that resulted. Right now, those photos are just a peak at what’s ahead at the market, but come the magazine’s launch in a few weeks, they’ll be perfectly in season.
Those readers who follow Steve on Facebook and Twitter might know that he’s been dropping hints over the past few weeks about a big new project that’s in the works. After months of planning, it’s finally time to let the cat out of the bag: In mid-April, Stephen Hamilton will launch the first issue of a digital Who’s Hungry? Magazine.
It’s a natural extension for Steve, and a project he’s hoped to create for years. The online magazine will combine the best parts of a print publication—beautiful photography, in-depth stories, fantastic layouts—with the benefits of an online platform. The stories will be interactive, meaning readers can click to see additional video, links, and information.
Editorially, the magazine will bridge the worlds of food and photography with recipes, travel writing, and behind-the-scenes information about styling. Writers include Steve Dolinsky, Janet Fuller, Judith Mara, and Kate Bernot, with new food and landscape photography by Stephen. It represents the full spectrum of a food-focused life, from home cooking and restaurants to vineyards and farmer’s markets.
Until the magazine is published in mid-April, you can follow the magazine’s progress on Facebook and Twitter. The excitement in the studio is contagious, and we hope you’ll join us in celebrating this amazing new project.
This chefs’ portrait project has been 24 years in the making. It’s one of those ideas that you come across so infrequently: inspiration strikes you, then it marinates, grows, and somehow just sticks with you through the years.
To really describe where this idea came from, I have to start in an unlikely place. When I was in college, I saw the movie Auntie Mame starring Rosalind Russell (not that later version with Lucille Ball… you can skip watching that one). Besides just being a great film, the movie made some interesting stylistic choices. At the end of scenes, the lighting would fade, and Rosalind Russell would remain on the screen, her expression illuminated only by one dramatic spotlight. I loved the technique, and I knew I wanted to use it in my own work somehow.
Fast forward to a few months later: I was asked by some artist friends of mine to shoot their engagement portraits. Being artists, they wanted something dramatic and different, and I knew this was the chance to try out the lighting idea. I posed them against an all-black background, using just one very dramatic spotlight to capture their bodies and faces. We were happy with the results, and I extended this into a whole series of portraits of artists that I knew in college.
Now, fast forward again to about a year ago. Rifling through old images, I found a contact sheet of this artists’ series I had shot in college. I still loved it. I wanted to bring it back, update it, make it fresh, so I reached out to some of the best artists I know: chefs. It began with my good friend Rodelio Aglibot, whose portrait is one of my favorites in the series. Since then, I’ve shot fantastic chefs like Giuseppe Tentori, Top Chef’s Sarah Grueneberg, Art Smith, Gale Gand, and others. I’m hoping to eventually have over a dozen of these portraits to exhibit as life-size prints.
But though this is certainly a project about which I am very passionate, it comes with its own challenges. First and foremost, as you might guess, is the lighting. This set-up is all about the interplay of light and dark, and the subtlety of shadow. When a chef wears a dark coat, it needs to be lit completely differently than if he or she was wearing a light coat, and the height of the chef adds another variable.
Another challenge is at the heart of the whole series: How to coax out a chef’s true personality. Most of these chefs have lived their careers in the spotlight and glare of the media, so they have a “public face” that they put forward. My goal was to get behind that, to capture the chef as a person and an individual. There’s no magic way to accomplish that besides to make the subject comfortable, and to know when to snap the shutter at the moment when the chef is at his or her most “real.” With Sarah Grueneberg for example, I wanted to evoke the idea of her as a fighter. I shot this portrait on the eve of this season’s Top Chef finale, in which Sarah was one of the final two chefs competing. The pasta draped around her neck was meant to suggest a boxer after a fight, because Sarah has never backed down from a tough challenge.
Though the series is still evolving, I’m pleased with the way I’ve been able to update and modernize a great idea I originally conceived decades ago. I may have had to travel back in time almost 25 years to find the inspiration for this project, but it’s proved to be an idea that is as fresh now as it was when I first imagined it.
Like the pizza pull, a photograph of a popping champagne cork needs to look effortless, but capturing and controlling a split-second of action requires the most effort of all. Recently, a winery hired Steve to shoot the uncorking of a champagne bottle, complete with bubbles, fizz, and flying cork.
Steve immediately knew that constructing the complex set-up for the shot was a job for special effects man Geoff Binns-Calvey. The first element to the shot is the flying cork. To control the cork, Geoff attached it to a thin wire that held it in a fixed place. (As a bonus, the fixed cork ensures that no one loses an eye!) The wire eventually disappeared behind other objects in the photo so it wouldn’t appear in the final shot. Then came the truly tough part: How to control the spray of champagne and foam that needed to burst from the bottle at just the right angle.
Geoff rigged an elaborate set of pipes and J-shaped PVC tubes that resembled a plastic bassoon. Even by Geoff’s standards, this was a complicated apparatus, taking up nearly the entire second studio room. Compressed air would eventually force the liquid through this rig and into the champagne bottle. Geoff cut a hole in the bottom of the bottle, then sealed the tubes around it so the whole set-up was water-tight.
Just before Geoff triggered the liquid to shoot through the bottle, his assistant on this job, Martha Schrik, sprayed into the top of bottle with a can of Dust-Off. This imitated the vapor that one sees when opening a bottle of sparkling wine. Finally, it was time for the spray. At the push of a button, the liquid would rush through a hole cut in the bottom of the wine bottle and would flow through the neck, erupting in a splash of bubbles, vapor, and spray. Happy New Year?
To capture this shot at just the right moment requires precision timing by the photographer. Some photographers will use a laser timer that coordinates the strobe, the liquid spray, and the camera, but Steve is able to gauge the timing without one. But wait, where was Steve? Oh, he was hiding behind a giant plastic tarp that protected the equipment from water spray. Even from under the plastic curtain, Steve could tell just when the liquid was about to leave the bottle, and could snap the photo to capture that perfect cork pop moment.
To see the entire crew in action, just click play below. Cheers!
What would Diana Ross be with The Supremes? Or Alvin without his other Chipmunks? Though Stephen is the primary photographer at his studio, he has always surrounded himself with an incredible team of stylists, assistants, and prop masters that play crucial roles in the creation of his photographs. If you peek into the studio on certain shoots, you might notice a bright, smiling redhead buzzing around the studio with an airbrush in hand. She’s Tamara Morrison, the artist who creates the custom backdrops that Steve uses for some seafood shoots. Though she works on backgrounds, her artistry and singular eye for detail are part of what brings the food to the fore. To explain her unique role, Tamara submitted to our lengthy Q&A session:
When did you start drawing and painting?
In kindergarten, I knew that I was an artist because I was teaching other kids how to draw. I was very upset because of the way they drew their houses and trees. The houses and trees were just floating with no ground beneath them. So I took my friends to the window and said “See this windowpane? That is the edge of our paper.” I was trying to teach them perspective.
Did you go to art school?
I took art all the way through school, but I went to regular college. I went to a girls’ school out East, and I studied Art and Art History. Then I went to Indiana University and I graduated with a degree in Fine Art Painting, Graphic Design and Photography. Then I went back and got a master’s degree in educational filmmaking. But no matter what, I always wanted to paint.
Do you do any filmmaking?
I do not. But I paint for filmmakers. My first jobs were with all these still photographers in Chicago, and a lot of them turned into filmmakers!
Speaking of first jobs, how did you get into painting backdrops?
I started my business in 1982. My first job was for a still photographer, and he gave me a photograph that he had taken of this beautiful model with a glass mirror. He handed me this picture and he said “If you can paint this in two days on my building’s roof, you’re hired.” It was pouring rain for those two days, and I was out there painting a photo-realistic painting. It was about 12 x 18 feet and on brick. That was my first photographer, and I got hired!
When did you start working with Stephen?
I think it’s been about 4 years maybe. Geoff Binns-Calvey recommended me to Stephen. I have 900 backdrops for rent and sale in my studio. Geoff knew that I was an airbrush cloud artist, and he realized he needed some help with the backdrops for certain shoots with Steve.
When you come to the studio, what exactly do you do?
Deirdre emails me the layouts ahead of time, then I go to my huge photo reference file. I pull about 20 or 30 pictures of real skies that I think could help me with the backdrop. I’ve probably painted about 3,000 or 4,000 skies and they’re my favorite thing to do. I feel like I understand the sky. The funny thing is that I bring an 8 foot by 10 foot canvas, and then the part that I’m actually painting is about 6 inches tall by about 9 feet wide. Because of the camera angle, I’m painting an entire sky in 6 inches by 9 feet, and lying on the floor while I do it!
How do you manipulate things to the client’s liking?
I can make things that aren’t 100% true to nature. This happened on the last shoot. I brought all of these reference photos, and I made the sky the exact way it would really look with the water, and it just wasn’t reading to camera. So we actually had to flip and reverse the sky so it would be darker at the horizon and lighter up top, but that’s not the way it is in nature. Then it looked great, and since the client is overlaying print on the photo, it has to go with their advertising campaign. Sometimes we’re bending reality. We have to.
Why is what you do unique in the digital age?
The whole physical set-up that we create makes a huge difference. The backdrop could probably be digitized, but the situation is so different every time with the lighting. The way Stephen shoots it, it really works together. A digital creation, for me, looks a little tinny. It’s not a real thing, it’s pixels. What we’re making is an actual, exact miniature of real land and real trees and real waves. The camera sees that and integrates it with the food. We can soften it up, or make it look crisper, we can do that with the focus. But I really feel that being in the environment, working with the photographer, allows better flexibility. They can work on coloring with lighting, or I can work on it with my airbrush. The combination of their technology and really doing it, I think that’s why we’re successful. It’s an integrated look, and I think that’s Stephen’s magic. He pulls it out of me and Geoff.
Feedback is one of the most important resources for an emerging artist, or any artist for that matter. Though it’s so valuable to receive criticism and critique, it can be tough to get some face time with an expert willing to critique your work with an honest eye. That’s why Steve is so honored to be participating in the APA (American Photographic Artists) Midwest Peer Review night on Thursday, February 9. The event is a rare chance for new and emerging artists, including photographers, assistants, wardrobe stylists, hair/make-up artists, etc., to have their portfolios peer reviewed by top commercial photographers in the city.
Steve will be joined by his colleagues Brian Kuhlmann, Paul Elledge, Taylor Castle, Leasha Overturf, Erik Klein, Steve Grubman, Andrea Mandel to review and offer feedback on printed and digital portfolio, and individuals will have 20 minutes with each photographer. This is a dynamic and highly accomplished group of photographers that can offer invaluable advice to newer artists. The event will take place at T.J. Hine Photography at 346 N. Justine from 6:30 to 10 PM, and registration is still open at the APA website. Steve’s looking forward to seeing the work of the next generation of photographers… See you there!
As we hope you’ve noticed, the new blog format allows readers to ask Steve photography-related questions via a link on the right side of this page. Each question is forwarded to Steve, who reads and responds to them. If the questions are especially interesting, they may end up as fodder for a longer response here on the blog.
One such question came to Steve this week from a reader name Mike, a digital photography major at the Illinois Institute of Art. Mike asked: What changes do you predict for the future of commercial food photography?
Steve answers: This is a great question that definitely deserves a longer response. The business of food photography (and photography in general) has been radically changed by the availability of easy-to-use digital cameras and smart phones. Now anyone, including amateur photographers, beginners, even your grandma, can snap hi-resolution images and share them online. Not surprisingly, one of the public’s favorite subjects to photograph is food. Who can blame people for snapping those up-close photos of a ripe strawberry or oozing syrupy pancakes? Food is beautiful, and diners want to share their favorite restaurant dishes or homemade meals with the world.
Because we can see more food photography than ever before, it’s crucial that commercial photographers establish their own style and maintain a level of professionalism that sets them apart. That means staying on the cutting edge of trends, techniques, and equipment, while never losing the particular style or viewpoint that is each photographer’s signature. It also means assembling a great team and maintaining those relationships. At my studio, I am proud to work alongside some of the best food stylists, special effects designers, and assistants in the country. They’re the ones who help make my photographs stand out, because they have skills that amateur photographers just can’t match. Read the rest of this entry »
It was every pyromaniac’s dream: A few weeks ago, special effects designer Geoff Binns-Calvey tinkered with some knobs and valves, a propane tank behind him, and a slightly mischievous smile on his face.
“It’s a good thing we’re not shooting this in L.A. or New York,” he said. “Then we’d be required to have a fireman present.”
Raymond, Geoff, Steve, and Andrew arrange the lightbox under the grill
Geoff was building a custom flame rig that the studio needed for a grilling shot for Smithfield Hams. The client wanted the flames of the fire to poke up through the grill grates, licking the edges of the sausages and vegetables. While this is intended to look natural, it requires us to place the flames in exactly the right spot. Not an easy feat—unless you have Geoff to work some magic.
First, Geoff removed the grates from the rest of the grill and set it over a lightbox. Over the white lightbox, he arranged a pile of red acrylic briquettes dusted with grey powder to look like charcoal. When lit from the lightbox beneath, the briquettes looked so real you’d swear you could smell the smoke.
Don't try this at home.
Next, Geoff wheeled over the custom flame rig. The snaking collection of metal valves, bottles, and glass tubes looked like some sort of mad science experiment. Carefully, Geoff attached the hoses to a standard propane tank and fired up the rig.
The final set-up
Each nozzle is attached to a few small hoses that can be tilted to direct the flames anywhere we want. In this case, we wanted the flames to just kiss the edges of the grilling meat, reminding us of the smokey, charcoal taste of a backyard summer cook-out. At the push of a button, the pilot light ignited the propane, producing tiny wisps of fire for our grill.
Of course, where there’s fire, there should be smoke. That’s why Geoff’s rig also includes a steam component to replicate the look of barbecue smoke. Bulbous glass vials fill with steam, then get released through tubes in between the grill grates.
Both Steve and Smithfield were thrilled with the results of Geoff’s construction. The custom rig allowed us to adjust the flames and smoke exactly as we wanted, meaning we could concentrate on other details of the shot instead of fussing over flames we couldn’t control. Though we shot this in November, the final photo had us momentarily convinced that it was summer again.
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