Photography for food and beverage increasingly gets better each year as the hospitality industry expands and breaks new ground in the marketing sector. It is important for your food and beverage to be visually appealing because many people eat with their eyes as well. If doesn’t look good, then they won’t be excited to try it. It enhances the experience and can create something bigger than just a meal or a drink when they decide to stop in. Increasing the quality of your food and drink content on your socials will gain traction and attract people to your accounts. Having a quality camera and making the posts look good will make a huge difference in the traffic of your socials. There are many different aspects to this part of hospitality marketing that can make your photography and videos above the others. This content becomes more of an art than anything else and it is interesting to see how much goes into it.

Food Photography

When picturing your food there are various things that you want to think about. First you are going to want to find inspiration from other food blogs or posts that you have seen. Once you have that you can find a way to make it your own. I would make sure you have an aesthetic in mind this could be more edgy with a mess, or a bite taken out or classier with the linens and utensils around them neatly. Be sure to always add creativity and make it unique to you and your establishment. The backdrop is also essential for having a good post. You’re going to want to make sure it fits your restaurant or hotel with dark, smooth and shiny conveying more premium service. White, light, and rustic will be more of a laid-back vibe to your picture. Having props like silverware, plating and a tablecloth will tie together you photo and make it feel like they are there with you. This is easy to complicate and adds too much clustering the photo and taking attention away from the food. Methods that will help keep the concentration on your food are picking a color palette and creating a harmonious picture. Garnishing is a unique aspect of making your picture look great and a garnish can add a pinch of reality, freshness and a pop of color to complete the shot. Adding all these aspects with moderation will level up your food photography. People won’t be able to take their eyes off your food and will have to come try it.

Drink Photography

Drinks are so unique with a variety of different colors, garnishes and consistencies. There are so many things you can do to make a drink a creative masterpiece. Capturing that in a photograph can really turn into something very distinctive and eccentric. This takes planning because capturing cold drinks requires planning on a different level than normal. You will have only minutes to get the best picture because the drinks’ fresh garnish can melt as well as the ice. Ideal lighting for a good picture would be side lighting from a single bright window that will give you more than enough light for a beautiful image. One of the most important aspects of drink photography is the glass you are pouring it in. There are so many different glasses to choose from and some just fit a drink better than others. For example, the martini glass fits all martinis. When you are ready to take the picture, it’s going to look best at a natural forty-five-degree angle as if you were seated viewing the drink. Preparing fresh garnishes can completely change the look of a drink and add character and flare. Adding a strawberry to a strawberry margarita is something that will complete the drink and complement the color as well. The number of tools a bartender must make extraordinary garnishes opens to so many different styles and ways to customize your cocktail It becomes art and being able to express that on your socials will attract customers and demonstrate you are a well-crafted establishment.

Food and Drink Media Production

Picturing the food and drink is very important but some people want to know how it’s made, and a video can translate that. There are a handful of videos you can make with food and beverages. You can make recipe videos, hands and pans videos, cocktail videos and how-to videos as well. Showcasing the food and drink in the video format really brings it to life and allows you to add so much more to it than some pictures would allow you. When a bartender makes a how-to video about a drink with good video quality the result is always satisfying. The same goes for food videos and they get an exceptional number of likes. This allows the user to get a satisfying experience and then also get a video they could save for later and make the food or drink themselves. This is a big part of most successful restaurants’ marketing plan, and they should integrate this in their posts weekly. These tactics are not only used by restaurants but many spirit companies trying to showcase their product. Companies like Jose Cuervo and Baileys promote how their drink can be made into something delicious by highlighting their spirit along with the recipe. It is hard to not look stylish while making cocktails, especially if they are visually appealing. Food and drinks are often used to tell a story. Videography and media enable that story to expand and put your own twist on it because it is such a creative industry. There won’t be an end to the amount of different content ideas you could do within food and drink that will only get more inventive and expressive as time goes on.

Sources:

Food photography tips and tricks (canva.com)

How to Photograph Drinks like a Pro – Moody Mixologist