Digital Emulsion: The Making Of A Lemon Tart

Canon 30D, Canon EF 200mm f/2.8L

This was a self-assigned food preparation photography project. I wanted to document the making of this desert, with all its components, from start to finish. This was part of my on-going effort to photograph human involvement with food, as well as the beauty of all stages of a dish and its ingredients. The dish in this case was a lemon tart with a honey-marscapone cream.

Canon 30D, Canon EF 200mm f/2.8

I was working indoors with the 200mm f/2.8L, trying to emphasize details and create tightly cropped images. A longer lens is also helpful as it lets me stay a little back, out of the way of the busy cooks! This lens choice was very successful, except for the finished project; because the dining room was much darker than the kitchen, and I was working with available light only, I had to push the ISO way up for the shots of the finished product, which will limit how large I can print them; this is most apparent in the red plates. Even the ones inside the kitchen were at a slightly higher ISO than I would have liked, but I decided to try and work with that in post-processing, rather than work against it.