Using fabrics in your food photos might sound simple, but it’s not as easy as you think. There’s a lot you need to consider when you’re working with fabrics in a shot, besides the color. The shot above is with linen napkins. Linen looks great, but it’s a beast when you want to get wrinkles out of it.
#1. The Fabric Color May Shift
The main thing you need to know about photographing fabrics is that our cameras may see the color of that fabric VERY differently.
Fabrics are obviously made with dyes and inks. Many of them also have brighteners and whiteners in them as well. All of these can massively shift how the color will look in your image.
Above is a table runner I just bought from Crate and Barrel. I love Crate and Barrel! We pull props from them almost every shoot. See the color of this in their website? It’s a nice dark blue-gray-slate color, right? They are calling it Graphite. The photo on their site looks just like the table runner in person. Guess what? It photographed horribly!!!
This is no joke. That lovely slate gray color photographed like what you see above!!! This is the SAME table runner – with a matching napkin that did the same thing. The dyes in these fabrics photographed purple. I even put a neutral gray card into the test shot to make sure my color balance was correct, and it was.
If I was to use this fabric, I would have to fix this color shift in Photoshop. If I were to tweak the entire image to fix the fabric color, then my food would have a strange color to it. This was going to take masking in Photoshop to get the background neutral and the food looking great.
This is not unusual, and there’s nothing wrong with the table runner. It’s meant to be a table runner, not a prop in a photograph. Clearly, Crate and Barrel did some major tweaking on their product shot of this to make it match the color in person, as they should have.
#2. Test Your Fabrics
Whenever you are going to use fabrics in your shot, test them in your lighting to make sure they are going to work.
This is a fabric test shot for a job I was doing. The shot was of a large plate of shrimp cocktail. The orange shrimp looked great on this turquoise background. In order to pick the fabric we wanted, I photographed about 4 or 5 different fabrics in the lighting I was going to use. This is the best way to see what you are going to get.
#3. Use a Table Felt Under Your Fabrics
The other thing I always use when shooting fabrics is a table felt. This is what you would put on your dining room table under your tablecloth to protect your table.
In the image on the right, you can see my pressure steamer. I love using that – it will actually get out wrinkles in linen, which most irons can’t do without a lot of work.
#4. That’s Right, Spray Starch, I said it
Ladies, remember Spray Starch? Well, I’ll use that on napkins sometimes too.
#5. Pick Fabrics with Subtle Texture
When picking your fabrics, pick ones with a nice texture to it. Linens DO photograph beautifully and their texture is subtle where you just see the weave of the threads.
This texture should be very low key and not distract from your image. As I always say, your image is about your food, not your props, not your backgrounds, and not your fabrics. All these things should complement your food and bring your eye right to it.
#6. For Napkins, Pick Fabrics with Body to Them
When picking napkins, it’s great to have a little bit of stiffness in the fabric. If it’s too soft, it just lays flat on your surface. You want your prop fabrics to have some body to them. In the shot above you can see I’m just using a corner of the napkin and it’s not laying flat on the surface.
#7. Get a Selection of Fabrics – Don’t Use the Same Ones Over and Over
I see it all the time. I even catch myself doing it. Using the same backgrounds, over and over. Well, if you’re putting them up on your blog every week, we’re gonna see it too. Switch it up! Hey, I’m telling you to go shopping for fabrics!
Notice I said fabrics, and not table clothes. Table cloths are so expensive compared to fabrics, so save yourself some money and buy fabrics instead.
Also, get a selection of fabrics in case one or more of them have crazy dyes that will shift on you when you shoot them. It is not possible to predict how a fabric will shoot.
Here’s about half of my favorite fabrics. I store them like this to protect them from dust, and when I go on location, they are easy to transport.
#8. Get Your Fabric from Large Discount Stores, NOT Designer Fabric Stores
If you are in a major city, there are always garment districts that have loads of fabric stores at really low prices. In Los Angeles, our garment district is downtown at around 9th St and Maple Ave. The fabric stores are packed into these blocks down here. The main massive one is called Michael Levines on Maple.
Sure, the designer fabric stores will have gorgeous fabrics. Do you want to pay $150/yard? I sure don’t, and neither do my clients.
#9. Get Enough Fabric to Cover Your Set
If you’re one of those bloggers using a 50mm lens, then you’re going to need more fabric to cover your shot as that’s a wider lens for shooting food. I would suggest at least 4 feet. I always buy two yards of fabric to make sure I don’t run out of anything. I often shoot on a 4ft x 8ft surface so I make sure to cover that.
If you are using a smaller table and have a horizon line, then you’ll only need a few feet of fabric to cover that.
#10. Iron Out the Obvious Wrinkles
If you are using fabric as a surface and your eye keeps going to a wrinkle in your shot, get the iron out! It’s surprising how many wrinkles show up when we take photos. The amount of wrinkles you’ll see depends on your lighting.
So if you see wrinkles, guess what, so will your viewers.
Now, I do have to say that sometimes, wrinkles are ok – as long as they aren’t distracting, and they look very natural. That’s a hard thing to do, but I’ve seen it work in some shots.
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Steven Thompson
This is one of my biggest challenges. Thanks for the helpful tips!
Christina Peters
Hi Steven, indeed. I curse at fabric on set all the time.
Cherie @ FoodRecipesEasy
Hi! Your blog is too sweet to say NO. This is my fourth article and hope I could spend a couple of hours.
Alison Dallon
Loving your site! I’m getting ready to purchase a bunch of fabrics to have on hand for shoots. Is there a particular type of fabric that you like to purchase? I’m overwhelmed by the selection. 🙂
Christina Peters
Hi Alison, I really liked linen blend fabrics. These look like linen, are less expensive than linen AND much easier to iron. They also have nice texture to them so you can tell it’s a fabric instead of seamless paper.
Patricia Barbosa
Hi Cristina,
I’m so glad that I found your website. Actually a FB friend sent your link. I want to return doing my Food Photography and also improve my Food Styling.
I’m reading all your tips even the Ebook, it’s amazing!
Looking forward for more great tips! 😉
Christina Peters
Glad you’re enjoying the blog and the ebook Patricia! Thanks for following me!
Anne-Marie @ This Mama Cooks! On a Diet
I would recommend a steamer over an iron just because you don’t need to set up an ironing board. I’ve steamed fabrics on my bed or couch. Or you can hang fabric on a skirt hanger and steam them that way. Plus steamers are kinder on fabrics vs. an iron, which can leave a “shine” on fabrics over time. You can pick them up at Sam’s or Costco for a reasonable price.
Christina Peters
I Anne-Marie, steamers are great, but we use both steamers and irons all the time. When you have a wrinkle on your fabric and you have everything all set up on a surface, steamers can be very tricky to use at that time. An iron works great for getting into areas on your set to smooth things out and not get steam on your props or your food. We steam the fabric first with a pressure steamer, before anything is placed on set, the fabric is on top of a table felt and laid out. Then after steaming, we place props in our shot, the last thing we place in is the food. During this time wrinkles can creep back into the fabric and that’s when we bring out the iron. We also use irons to make fabric squares look like they are napkins by ironing all the edges over to look like seams. I know you guys hate irons, but they really are handy.
Rob
Christina, great tips! Thanks for sharing. I recently had a similar experience you had. I purchased some linens from Jo-Ann Fabric and Craft Store and one of their linens which was lime-green photographed yellow. Some post-production work was definitely needed to correct that.
I’ve also had bad experiences when using leather as a surface. It also came from Jo-Ann Fabric and Craft Store. Because the leather had a laminate/somewhat glossy appearance, the light reflected really poorly on it.
Christina Peters
Hi Rob, Leathers can be very difficult to photograph. They can have the same dye issues as well. Reflective surfaces are a little tricky to shoot on. You just have to make sure your light is angled to not give a hard highlight.
Melanie @ Carmel Moments
Great ideas! I didn’t realize how something could look so different and totally change the pictures.
Thanks for the inspiration on fabrics. I really need to get more!
Have a great day!
Christina Peters
Hi Melanie, Yes, it’s shocking how much dies and pigments can shift. I have donated so many fabrics to Goodwill because of this problem.
Stephanie Weaver, MPH
Some great tips! I would never have thought of buying a table felt… brilliant. I store my fabrics in a closet using pants hangers, so they have fewer wrinkles to deal with. But I never thought about testing them in photographs… I have had the issues you talk about, but didn’t know why. Thanks!
Christina Peters
Hi Stephanie, I wish I had room to store my fabrics on hangers. I get more wrinkles with folding them the way I do. Glad I solved the fabric color shift mystery. It is shocking how much they can change on camera and there’s no way to predict this.
Mandy
Great tips, Christina.
Thank you for sharing.
When I started, I used to buy place mats as props, then I was limited by the size of place mat. Now I am buying fabric, which i can use as table clothes, cut them into smaller sizes and use them as napkins. Fabric is definitely more versatile.
Christina Peters
Hi Mandy, excellent tip! I totally forgot to mention we use fabrics and cut them down for napkins all the time – we just iron the edges to look like they are finished. Thanks for the comment!
Justin @ Salt Pepper Skillet
Great tips! Thanks for sharing. I recently did some test shots of kitchen towels for a local store that sells very colorful kitchen accessories. Man o man was it difficult to get the color right.
Christina Peters
Hi Justin, yes indeed, getting accurate colors is the most difficult part of shooting fabrics, especially if they are products you are shooting to be sold. The colors have to be accurate and that’s where Photoshop comes in. In days of film, this was a nightmare. You didn’t find out the colors shifted until you got your film back hours after the shoot!