Here’s a quick behind-the-scenes of yesterday’s halibut photo. I quickly snapped this BTS image with my iPhone before I cleaned up the scene, and yesterday someone asked to see it. I used two-lights: an ABR-800 with Moon Unit for some pretty strong back-light, and then filled in the front of the dish with another Alien Bee light with a large soft-box.
- Canon 7D, Canon 70-200 f/4L IS lens, 1/125 sec at f/5.6, ISO 100
For camera gear I used my Canon 7D with the Canon 70-200 f/4L IS lens extended to 200mm for all shots to compress the background and make the main subject stand out.
The white table-top is a piece of wood I picked up from the hardware store, painted white and then painted with “crackle” paint to give it a distressed look. The final image here doesn’t show the table too well, but when it is visible in food images it adds a nice, subtle texture to the image that I really like.
Here’s a quick behind-the-scenes of yesterday’s halibut photo. I quickly snapped this BTS image with my iPhone before I cleaned up the scene, and yesterday someone asked to see it. I used two-lights: an ABR-800 with Moon Unit for some pretty strong back-light, and then filled in the front of the dish with another Alien Bee light with a large soft-box.
- Canon 7D, Canon 70-200 f/4L IS lens, 1/125 sec at f/5.6, ISO 100
For camera gear I used my Canon 7D with the Canon 70-200 f/4L IS lens extended to 200mm for all shots to compress the background and make the main subject stand out.
The white table-top is a piece of wood I picked up from the hardware store, painted white and then painted with “crackle” paint to give it a distressed look. The final image here doesn’t show the table too well, but when it is visible in food images it adds a nice, subtle texture to the image that I really like.

Nicole S. Young is a photographer, published author, and educator specializing in Lightroom, Photoshop, and photography. She is best known for her books on food photography but is widely versed in various photographic genres, including landscape, nature, stock, travel, and lifestyle.
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Thanks for the behind the scene look. Most impressive.
My wife and I just got done shooting cookies. After some trial and error with flashes, we ended up using window light and bounce. Now we’ll try this halibut set up which is closer to what we were looking for. I was using an 85mm 1.8 but I also now want to try the 70-200 like you did! Thanks for sharing!
What kind of soft-box are you using one the Alien Bee?
So THAT’s how these pics are done. I need to take more care when doing food photography. I just haven’t been happy with my images so far.