If you love sweets for breakfast like I do, then try out this recipe for Chocolate Breakfast Muffins from King Arthur Flour.
I've been loving a lot of the textural and dark food shots going around on Instagram, and when I saw one with a burning candle as I was eating one of these muffins, I knew I had to try it for myself. My kids loved blowing out the candle for me!
This was my set up. I created a dark corner out of mat board. The bottom is textured naturally from a being under a few other food shots for honey and cookies, and after wiping it down, I was left with some streaks and markings that actually lend a cool effect in photos. Natural sunlight was streaming in along the right side and crept over the top left of the boards, giving me just enough highlights to capture the smoke and crackling in the muffins. I shoot in RAW, and edit in photoshop. I cleaned up the sunlight spots in post, and then played up the textural qualities. It was a lot of fun to run with my inspiration!