Primo Foods – How we did this amazing Food Styling Photoshoot

Styled Photo of Primo small good food in the shape of a Christmas Wreath

Hungry yet? Take a look at our latest commercial food photography shoot for Primo. The speciality nature of this shoot meant we shot over 2 days at a specialist kitchen studio in Sydney with specialist food stylist and food technican.

Working with Primo is always creative and fun but always requires a lot of attention to detail that their brand commands. They came with a clear vision of what they’re after, where it’s going to be used and even what colours should be used. Clients who come prepared and have a clear vision for their deliverables save themselves a lot of time!

Primo needed a suite of content including several photo, video and stop motion assets for their socials to promote the use of their products in various recipes, seasonal charcuterie boards and school lunches.

Primo Styled photoshoot - cheese and salami arranged in the style of a checker board

Having Meredith our Studio Manage the full production team meant Primo had a single point of contact from brief all the way through to delivery. The production team consisted of a photographer, videographer, food stylist, food tech.

Primo small goods being used on a home made pizze

Location

Having a studio with a kitchen is a must-have for commercial food photography shoots that involve food prep and cooking. Whilst we could have done this in our Alexandria studio we knew we’d get better results if we went offsite and used a kitchen studio with professional appliances, multiple fridges, ovens and heaps of counter space – this specialist studio enabled us to not only have the kitchen prep space but also the a studio area to shoot the products right after they’ve been prepared.

Food prep and styling

The food stylist took charge of prop sourcing and styling, while the food tech did the prep and cooking in the studio kitchen, meaning it was fresh when we were ready to shoot.

Food styling sourcing tip: Non-perishable props was sourced from Major and Toms in Sydney, they’re a great resource for creatives and have an extensive prop range.

In this case, the props included cutlery, chopping boards, cheese, salami, 2 enormous Christmas hams and about 300 olives. (Safe to say we didn’t have to buy lunch that day, one of the perks of working on a food shoot!)

Another fun fact: the fire in the fondue shots is real, the stylist was able to source a miniature fire pit for this. (Fire extinguishers were on standby, and we made sure to ask permission to have a naked flame from the studio owner beforehand!)

Photo of Primo small gods styled with crackers
Primo Styled Photoshoot with small goods and foccacia

Shoot Day 1 – Stills content

Our first day was all stills – while FBS shot each dish, the food tech was busy prepping the next one. Most of the shots were from similar angles which made things run more smoothly – no need to reset the camera and lighting for each new shot!

We shot charcuterie boards, fondue, cheese pulls and of course – the Christmas ham. Their branding guidelines asked for clean, simple imagery utilising pops of their signature red colour.

Shoot Day 2 – Video content

The second day was a shorter day which focused on video content. These were all shot in portrait orientation as they were captured with Instagram reels and TikTok’s in mind. Primo said they were interested in short, simple content for socials while avoiding the drawn-out step-by-step approach of traditional recipe videos.

Behind the Scenes of the Photo Shoot

Our studio manager recorded some behind-the-scenes content for social media production while we were shooting – it’s often quite helpful to have 1 person dedicated to shooting BTS content at a photoshoot instead of relying on clips from everyone in the team. They can just focus on that one job while everyone else is doing theirs.

The BTS content showed the amount of work that goes into producing a commercial food photography shoot – why a stylist and a food tech are important, where to get props and how to use them. It’s something you can easily add on to your photoshoot that gives an extra perspective to the process.

Final Shoot-to-image-delivery timeline

Actually, the photos required very little retouching, and in this instance the client was editing the video footage themselves. This meant everything was ready to go within just a few days! We shot this on 22nd + 23rd September and the final stills were ready for use on the 26th. The timeline was discussed ahead of the shoot date – we know how tight deadlines can be, so no time is wasted when providing final products to our clients.

If you have a food shoot coming up and would like to find out more about how the FBS team can help bring to life a Styled Photoshoot, eCommerce Photography or Video then contact us for a chat today.

FBS Production Team:

  • Photographer – Daniel Sponiar
  • Videographer – Jorge Rivera
  • Food Stylist – Kendra McCarthy
  • Food Tech – Brigid Fenn
  • Assistant / Producer – Meredith Cohen

This article was written by Front Back and Sides Creative Studios based on a real photo shoot with Primo Foods.

Styled photography Beauty2 Front Back and Sides

Front, Back & Sides is a product photography studio in Sydney. We are dedicated to producing content for eCommerce & social media, our team of professionals keep up with emerging trends in product photography, video and product styling so your products and digital marketing is eye-catching and high converting.

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