Crispy Fried Chicken

After I had read strobist's post on "Food Photography Made Easy", I myself wish to try out David's cheapsake's "lunch box". I had been looking for any chance for me to try out this food photography, but being heavily guarded by my wife, I am literally being disallowed to enter the kitchen.

Not until when I was asked to make a photograph about the latest KFC hot and spicy flavour by HRH the queen of house herself !

Too short notice for the set up as the chicken was our dinner; everything must be done in just 15 minutes before my wife starts to warn me. LOL

So, no "lunch box", no reflective archilic board as background. Then I figured out the grill pan filled with water and the grill from the oven could produce the same result as the reflective archilic board. Hence, carefully place the crispy chicken on top of the grill, fill up the pan with water, set up the flash and fired away.

What happened if there is no diffuser in between the chicken and the flash ? As shown in the pic on the left, the flash is kinda harsh and because lack of diffusion, there is no reflection on the pan-water base.

The diffusion can be done in 3 ways: hand held a tracing paper just above the chicken, umbrella-ed the flash or soft-box-ed the flash, anyway that could spread the flash widely and softly.

I'd done the hardest way by holding a tracing paper just above the chicken; I should had umbrella'd the flash instead.....

Anyway, to bring up the shadow area of the chicken, two white surface paper were placed exactly like what strobist did. The pic on the left was shot without the reflectors and the pic on the top of this post was shot with the reflectors. The different is obvious, right ?

A quick shot of my set up before my wife sounded her warning to me. :P

One flash F42, snooted behind the chicken. The chicken-grill-pan-water combination placed on top of a stool. Not as fancy shot as strobist, but it gives pretty much an overall idea how the set up is.

Of course there are huge room of improvement for my shots. The grill needed to be polished, the pan needed to be thoroughly cleaned.

I think I will made a "lunch box" like strobist did for my general food shots. Good for my wife who can make herself some food shots, and I think this "lunch box" also good for macro still life shot as well. :D