Food Photography Tips

Street food photography can be a challenging project. Here are some great tips courtesy of London based food blogger Mike Tsang. 

Image: Mike Tsang

He likes to use the Canon EOS M5 he also suggests if you are an amateur photographer take a look at the Canon EOS 2000D.

It’s great for food photography and the auto functions are perfect for capturing that delicious sizzling burger.

When you are confident with your shooting start using manual mode and adjust aperture, shutter speed and ISO to the specific shot and conditions. With time you will get some great shots out of your equipment.

Here are some great tips from Mike on how to shoot street food photography:

Apply the basics of food styling         

‘Whether you are taking pictures of the street food from above or from the side, there is much one can do to improve the styling.

Evenly distribute and fill empty spaces with plates, side dishes, glasses and cutlery in a way that frames the food you want in shot. If eating from a small table, distribute the food and drink evenly to ensure you capture everything in shot using the Canon EOS 2000D and experiment by adding a little motion to the image. Pouring sauce onto the food is another creative way of filling the frame.’

Fried chicken tacos at Pergola, Paddington, London.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bk93bJvAWhZ/?hl=en&taken-by=freshmikeeats

Apply a little creativity

‘If you want your photos to stand out on Instagram it’s important to think creatively about how you showcase the items you photograph. You shouldn’t be afraid to have a little fun and try something different to encourage the viewer to ask “how did they do that?”

By setting your Canon EOS 2000D camera to a very wide aperture f/ 1.4, adjusting the ISO sensitivity to 200 and shaking the cup, you can capture drops of melting ice falling off your frozen tea!’

Yifang Fruit Tea, London

https://www.instagram.com/p/BlVyn63gSx-/?taken-by=freshmikeeats

Shoot from the side with no angle

‘Everyday street food such as hamburgers, kebabs and sandwiches can come in different heights and layers and are better captured close-up and from the side. For this photograph consider using a 35mm lens setting with an aperture of 1.4, then position the camera at the same height and as close to the food as the focus will allow. This will result in an impressive picture that highlights the food’s intricacy and deliciousness in stunning detail.’

Black Bear Burger, Hawker Union, London

https://www.instagram.com/p/BkryhQxAotT/?hl=en&taken-by=freshmikeeats

All images were taken with the Canon EOS M5 using the Canon EF 35mm f/1.4L II USM. Mike Tsang also uses the Canon EOS 2000D for capturing street food photography.

Images and tips courtesy of Mike Tsang and Canon.

Hopefully these tips will help you with your food photography. I would love to see your food photography so comment below or tweet me with your latest food shots.

This edition by Fred Felton | Twitter @fredfelton 

Your Social Media Goals For 2018

A new year brings with it new goals.

In the world of social media that is constantly changing it is time to reflect on your best goals for the year to make sure this year is your best yet in the land of social media.

Here are 5 easy goals to get you started for the year:

Be Careful What You Put Out There

Last year we saw some awful social media fails resulting in backlashes, people getting fired, people resigning, people losing everything all because they posted the wrong thing.  So be careful what you put out there. Once it is out there, it is out there and people will be quick to screen capture it and share it with their followers. It escalates when celebrities with millions of followers start sharing it as well. So think it through before you hit enter.

How Many Hashtags Are Enough?

Unless you are on Instagram where the hashtag is king you don’t really need to post something with close to 100 hashtags.  Just 2 or 3 are perfectly acceptable. 

What’s Your Story?

Many social media networks like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter have added in their own version of a story section which enables users to post a story into their updates. So take full advantage of it and share a day in your life in pictures or updates.

Upload That Video

YouTube videos get more and more popular daily. Do you have an idea for a great video? Well shoot it and upload it.  Share it with your friends and family. Who knows you might just get a million views and build your brand out of nothing.

Help Others Out

No matter what it is be it a great job opportunity you saw or funding grants for students, help others out by sharing the news. Who knows you might just get someone a job and help them on their way to a wonderful 2018.

Fred Felton | Social Media Consultant & Keynote Speaker | Twitter @fredfelton 

5 Tips To Keep Your Email Account Secure

The internet is a wonderful place and at the same time it is a dangerous place.  There are hundreds of hackers out there just waiting to get access to your email and even worse your email password.

With that they can have free rein and even access your social media accounts and send out fake emails and fake social media posts from your accounts.

Here are 5 tips to keep your email account secure:

Keep a watch for strange emails

Be on the look out for strange emails that may look like they come from your email host company or even from social media companies.  Check from which email address they actually came from.  Most companies will not email you to type in your password or email address.

Protect your password

Don’t give out your password to anyone and don’t type it into emails if someone asks you to.  Make sure your password also has a mix of letters, numbers and characters and is over 8 characters long. 

Change your password regularly as well

It’s very easy to get into a lull and enjoy your passwords, you remember them so well but in terms of security it is a very dangerous thing and it’s always best to keep changing it regularly. 

Have different email accounts for different groups

It’s always a good idea to keep your email accounts separate for the different needs in your life.  For example I have email accounts for the following:

·         Friends and Family

·         Business

·         Newsletters

That way you can very easily see if a strange email pops up in your account.

Report Spam and Phising

Most email accounts now have an option whereby you can report strange emails or suspected spam or phising.  In the long run this will help email companies find out who is real and who is trying to get your important information out of you.

Fred Felton | Social Media Specialist & Keynote Speaker | Twitter @fredfelton 

50 Apps That Will Blow Your Mind

Greetings Dear Readers

This week I was asked to appear on LotusFM and chat on the Alan Khan show all about Apps.  I was asked to bring a list of 10 Apps.  I found plenty more.  This is the result and you can find some wonderful apps in this list.  Just a warning, some of them can be very addictive and some have resulted in families having huge arguments because people are too busy playing with their apps.  Enjoy!

Apps list (There are 50 Apps here plus a few extra just for good measure!)

Games 

• 2048 - addictive game
• Candy Crush 
• Angry Birds
• Plants vs Zombies 
• The Room
• Words With Friends – made famous by Alec Baldwin, Airplane Steward asked him to stop playing

Photography 

• Instagram 
• Pixlr-o-matic  
• Pocket Light Meter – a light meter for photographers

To Do Lists

• Wunderlist 
• Any.do 
• Evernote 
• Clear+

Travel 

• Waze A GPS 
• Mango App
• Uber your own mobile taxi 
• TripAdvisor
• Find my Way – transport schedules - for BlackBerry devices
• Gautrain App

Audio 

• Garage Band to make music 
• Hokusai a recording tool for journalists

Social Networking 

• Ubersocial for Twitter and Facebook 
• Flipboard - magazine style view of your social feeds
• Vine – small videos
• Jelly – crowd sourcing answers to questions,

Chat 

• WhatsApp
• BBM
• WeChat
• Skype
• Mxit

Banking 

• FNB lets u use geo-payments to pay people 
• Standard Bank App
• Pebble from Absa
• Nedbank App

Bloggers 

• Tumblr 
• Wordpress 
• Blogger 

Shopping 

• PriceCheck 
• Checkers App – has discount vouchers 
• Pick n Pay App 
• Mr Price App – you can find your size of an item and shows you which store it is at
• Ster Kinekor App book tickets and use it to show your ticket so go ticketless. Uses passbook. 
• Snapscan - a simple payment option 

Video 

• Ted - interesting talks you can watch
• YouTube
• iMovie – you can edit your movies

Books 

• Kindle  - your own private library 

Security 

• Find my iPhone - enable it and then install this app on another ios device to find it, lock it or erase it or play sounds

Fitness 

• Endomondo - great for workouts, plotting your cycling or training. With thanks to @gordsreid 

Weather  

• YahooWeather

Presentations 

• Haiku Deck 
• Paper which is a sketch app

Cloud Storage 

• Dropbox 
• Box 
• Google Drive

Mail 

• Gmail 
• Mailbox

Weird Apps

• 20 Day Stranger

Futuristic Apps 

• Wikitude - augmented reality app uses phone camera so you can see interesting data around u.        

GoogleGlass Apps

Good site to learn how to build apps www.code.org

Do you have a favourite app?  Let me know which is your favourite app and why?

+Fred Felton 

Communications Strategist & Keynote Speaker

Falconscove

e - falconscove@gmail.com 

100 Social Media Influencers In South Africa and counting #followsa

Greetings Dear Readers

Been very busy guest blogging for @IdeaBounty and getting some wonderful writing
and social media workshops ready for the near future.

Along the way I came upon a article on the Top 100 Social Media Influencers in the World.
I tweeted it out and the likes of @PoppieSlops and @franki1 tweeted me asking why don't
we have a list of the top 100 Social Media Influencers in South Africa.

So I told them I would start it for South Africa along the way @MelAttree suggested
we make it a wiki file which means that all of South Africa can contribute.

So feel free to contribute and add who you think should be on the list.
It's over 100 people and counting at the moment.
Interesting note, I am getting most of the feedback and suggestions via Twitter.

Top 100 Social Media Influencers In South Africa

Click on the link and see if you or someone you know is on it.

The names you see on the list are their Twitter names so go see who they are and add them
if you don't know them yet and chat to them.  You might just make a good friend.

Tweet me on @fredfelton if you have any suggestions, like it?  hate it?
You can even jump right in and edit it.

At the very worst you can add them all to your twitter account and you will have
a very interesting timeline.

It's an ongoing experiment so keep sending me your suggestions and I will try add
it to the list when I can.

Hopefully we can make it a yearly list.


Fly high, Fly free


Fred Felton
Speaker  & Social Media Engineer & Author
Falconscove
A Digital Media Agency
Social Media Is Our Biz
www.falconscovesa.blogspot.com
email: falconscove@gmail.com
twitter: @fredfelton