Food photography is a rewarding way to experiment with your Canon camera β and not just because you can eat the subject at the end of a session. Take the time to style your ingredients, control the lighting and fine-tune your settings and you'll find that you can produce food photos worth savouring.
There are, however, some items and equipment that can help you to get the best quality from your camera. A tripod can be useful when you're photographing food from above in a flat lay format, in low light or when you're shooting extreme close-ups, although Canon's range of lenses with image stabilisation (IS) will also really help in these situations. Adding a Canon Speedlite flash or other form of artificial lighting to your kitbag can offer more creative options when you want to give your food photography a professional feel.
Upgrading your lens can have the biggest impact on your food photography. Many lenses have a focusing distance short enough to capture small details, but only a true macro lens gives you a magnification of at least 1x. This means that the subject is recorded on the sensor at 1:1 or life size when the lens is set to its minimum focus.
A macro lens is ideal for revealing the hidden textures, intricate patterns and subtle structures of food that might otherwise go unnoticed, but that's not all that food photography is about. Here we'll look at the best lens options for Canon EOS cameras.