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If the pandemic taught us anything, it’s that online learning is here to stay. And if you are looking at starting or growing your food photography business, I want you to embrace learning food photography online. For several reasons.

The first one is that it’s undeniably convenient. If you have a computer, you can learn. Wherever you are, whenever you want.

The second one is that it can be incredibly affordable. Most of the information you are looking for is out there, waiting for you on YouTube or independent creators’ blogs. Yes, finding the right information for free is going to require a lot of time from you, but if time is all you got, then go for it!

If you would rather save some time and get straight to the good stuff, there are a lot of places where you can learn food photography online. The prices greatly vary but very few of them are going to set you back like a college degree in the US would.

In the list below, I will share with you my favorite resources. Some are free, and some are paid. But they are all extremely valuable.

 

Finally Master Manual Mode

 

Before you start learning food photography online, you need to get the basics straight. That means knowing how to use your camera and control your settings so you can get the exact image you have in mind. My friend Joanie Simon has a great course called Beginner Bootcamp, which walks you through all the settings you need to master your manual mode.

Another great place to learn food photography online—or video, knitting, watercolor…whatever it is you want to learn—is Skillshare. {By the way, if you click that link, you can get a free month of Skillshare Premium!} They have an incredible number of classes on topics like food photography, video, video editing, stop motion, etc.

Besides the fact that they have classes on just about anything, they also have a great app. There, you can download your classes and watch them offline.

For around $10 a month, you can get access to thousands of Skillshare classes. Each class has a project so you can apply your skills and share your work with members around the world.

The classes range from twenty minutes to several hours, so you can always find a video that fits your schedule. 

Learn Advanced Product and Food Photography Techniques

 

One of the best things I did for my food photography career {and for my sanity, quite honestly} was to learn to use artificial lighting. This has allowed me to work around my creative energy and not around the available light. It also allowed me to walk into any client shoot with confidence, knowing that even if the lighting situation is less than ideal, I can make it work with artificial light. I have learned everything I know about artificial light from Joanie’s Artificial Academy and I cannot recommend it enough.

Before you tackle artificial light, I recommend you learn to figure out how to tame {and see} light in general. The e-book from Rachel @twolovesstudio, the Art of Light, is the most inspiring book I have ever read about “seeing the light” in photography. Do yourself a favor: go and get a copy right now. At a whopping $27, it is probably the best investment I have ever made for my business.

Besides her e-book, Rachel is one of my favorite food photographers and the creator of some of the best food photography online classes out there. I was lucky enough to work with her directly as my mentor in 2018 when I won a free six-month mentorship she was offering. We worked on topics such as finding your style, creating an engaging and cohesive portfolio, finding and approaching clients, etc. She was {and is} an amazing mentor. I am unbelievably grateful to be able to learn directly from her.

A lot changed for me after I discovered her materials. I’d tried to learn food photography online with other courses, but many of them were quite basic and geared towards food bloggers, not photographers. I have since taken every single one of her classes and she never disappointed:

• Composition Essentials is a masterclass on food photography. Rachel goes way beyond the basic composition tools, showing you advanced tools illustrated with numerous behind-the-scenes moments and invaluable food styling tips.
• Lightroom Masterclass. The best class I have taken on Lightroom and the one that really allowed me to step up my editing game.
• She also created Retouching Food Photography, an in-depth course on the art of using Photoshop to retouch your images, create composites, and even make your own GIFs.

 

Each one of her courses comes with detailed cheat sheets and homework to keep you engaged and practicing. She keeps private Facebook groups reserved for her students where she reviews work and answers questions. She even creates regular challenges and reviews them in the groups. Best of all, she is constantly adding new materials and sharing live sessions.

 

Perfect Product and Food Styling Skills

 

Resources on Food Blogging

 

Dani Meyer from The Adventure Bite is putting together an amazing amount of content on the business of food blogging. She has classes on mastering the sales process, the food blogger funnel, and her amazing Food Blogger Academy, which will teach you everything you need to know from how to dial in your mindset to branding, systems, and workflows.

All her classes come with access to her Facebook group, Food Blogger Entrepreneurs Academy, where she personally answers questions and gives feedback. If you want the top of the top, you can sign up for Food Blogger Insiders, her coaching program. I was a part of the beta testing group, and I can tell you that this is worth every penny. The wealth of knowledge that Dani shares and the accountability she holds you to has done wonders to get my business to the next level.

Perfect Your Systems and Grow your Business

 

One of the main things I struggled with when I was starting my business was to find information about how to actually run a business.

Most educators were teaching food photography, styling, or lighting techniques, but topics like pitching and pricing were kept like a national treasure.

Luckily, I started working with a coach before I could afford it. That tremendously helped me figure things out.

I also took courses like Food Photography Pro from Rachel Korinek and Fulltime Framework from Joanie Simon. They are currently not running those programs, but Joanie recently launched a course called Profitable Pricing, which is, as you probably guessed, all about pricing your photography work. And I have to say that it is THE best course I have seen on pricing, by a long shot. I have been a photographer for many years (and thus dealing with pricing for a while) and she had me really thinking about my pricing strategy. She also includes an incredibly useful and well thought Excel spreadsheet to help you determine the price for each project. So, needless to say, I strongly recommend you invest in this course!

I am also constantly keeping up to date on topics like marketing, copywriting, productivity and more.

I also invested in an incredibly expensive mastermind {I won’t share it here because, quite honestly, I don’t recommend it…} and to this day I still spend tens of thousands of dollars a year on education.

This has allowed me to figure out how to run a business. Drawing from my previous experience as an executive assistant, I was able to make it a streamlined business. I also used my experience as a graphic designer to curate an amazing client experience which has allowed me to get {and keep} a lot of amazing clients. If you need help with that, make sure to check out my Client Proposal Toolkit, it will create an amazing client experience and save you hours of time.

Today I am extremely lucky that I get to share my experience and my systems with you all through this blog and my Instagram account.

Also, since June 2020 I have had the joy of teaching my method to my students through the EDIT Framework, which I try to run a couple of times a year. This program helps food and product photographers scale their businesses and attract their ideal clients with confidence {and clarity}.

Finally, I am working on a new program for photographers who want to find more clients, so keep your eyes peeled if this is your case, and sign up for the newsletter to be the first informed when this new program is launched!

 

There are, of course, a lot of other resources out there to learn food photography online, but there is also a limited {very limited} number of hours in a day. So I try to stick to the resources and educators I listed here for now. They have enough content to keep me busy for the next ten years!

I am curious to hear: what are your favorite classes and go-to online resources?

Editor’s note: This post was originally published
in December 2018 and has been completely revamped
and updated for accuracy and comprehensiveness.