This series took several hours since not only was I the photographer, but I was also the bread maker. Homemade bread is a staple in our home and it only made sense that I should document the process for my stock photography portfolio. I took the studio to the kitchen since it was much more practical than taking the kitchen to the studio. Tripping over studio equipment in the kitchen for the day while bread was rising or baking was worth the trouble.

The wall behind the table was actually white, but I wanted more of a contrast to highlight the bread and I wanted to add some warmth that is generally associated with home and comfort food, so I hung a dark burgundy colored cloth to cover the area of the wall that would be in the frame. Then I set up the camera on a tripod and connected a remote shutter release cable and pocket wizard. Two strobes were used – Alien Bee 800′s, both in softboxes on lightstands, also connected to Pocket Wizards.

It’s a bit tricky to trigger the camera and the strobes at the same time, but it can be done. I connected a Plus II Transceiver in the camera’s hotshoe, and connected the PW’s camera/flash port to the camera’s motor drive (on the side of camera). That PW was set to channel 1 and transmit mode set to “both”. Then I hooked another Plus II Transceiver to one of my strobes and set it on channel 2. This light will trigger the 2nd flash when it fires. My husband – who is not a photographer, which is why he only gets to hold the PW and push the button, which he did with considerable skill – holds the third pocket wizard to act as the transmitter which is set to channel 1. Then the strobes and the camera will trigger at exactly the same moment. More information for setting up this relay mode can be found on page 8 of the pdf file from the Pocket Wizard website. I printed that page and have it stashed in my camera bag since it just seems bassackwards to set it all up that way and I don’t set up my camera to trigger remotely enough to remember how.

Aperture for the bread kneading shots was at f/22 to keep sharpness throughout the important detail area. The lens was the Canon 100mm and focus was set to the center of the work area.

∗ Licensing information for these images can be found on iStockphoto by clicking HERE. Click on images to view larger and to read image descriptions.

       

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