Photography Tips · Brussels
Chef and Staff Portraits: Why Guests Want to See Who Cooks
Dishes show what you serve. Portraits show who's behind it. I'd plan a natural portrait of the chef and a few frames of the team at work, taken during a quiet hour with everyone's written agreement. A group photo can wait until the end.
What a face adds to the menu
Plates can look similar from one restaurant to the next. People don't. The chef wiping the edge of a plate at the pass, or the pizzaiolo with flour up to the elbows: these images tell a guest what kind of place it is before they've booked a table.
They also last longer than dish photos. The menu changes every season, while the chef and most of the team stay put, so a good set of portraits can work on your website and in press materials for quite a while.
In the kitchen, not against a backdrop
Put a chef in front of a grey studio backdrop and you get something that looks like a LinkedIn profile. In the kitchen, with the steel counters and the heat lamps over the pass, the same person looks like a cook. So I photograph people where they actually work, in the quiet hour before service, with portable lights that keep the kitchen's own atmosphere.
Ask the team to wear clean whites or whatever they normally wear for service, nothing brand new. An apron with a few marks from real work is fine by me. Hands deserve their own frames too: kneading dough, spooning sauce onto a plate.
Natural beats posed
Most cooks aren't used to a camera pointed at them, and smiling on command rarely works. I let them work first, then ask for a few seconds of looking into the lens between two movements. Those are usually the portraits that look like them.
A group photo of the whole team is still useful for the website and announcements. I'd leave it for the end of the session, when everyone's a bit more relaxed, and take it in the dining room or by the entrance.
Agreement, and what happens when someone leaves
Everyone photographed signs a written consent that says where the images will appear, for example the website and Instagram. Staff can say no, and that shouldn't count against them in any way.
It's worth agreeing in advance what happens when someone leaves. Usually their portrait comes off the team page, while older social posts stay up. Putting that on paper saves an awkward conversation later. The same questions in an office setting are covered in who approves photos and consent in a corporate shoot.
Portraits and plates in one visit
Portraits slot easily into a restaurant session. Team first, before the kitchen gets busy, then the dishes as they come out. You end up with the people and the plates in the same light.
For each important portrait I'd shoot both a horizontal frame for the website and a vertical one for stories. Deciding that before the session saves awkward crops afterwards. What a restaurant session includes is on the food photography page, and the rates are on the price list.
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