Behind the Camera
Honest note: no ads, no Amazon affiliate. Affiliate and referral links are always marked. Full disclosure.
People ask what I shoot the food with, so here’s the honest kit. Fair warning before you spend a dime: the gear did not make the picture. Light made the picture, and patience, and taking forty frames to keep one. A good phone in good light beats an expensive camera in bad light every single time. If you want to go deeper anyway, this is what’s actually in my bag, and if you want the fully-nerdy photography version of me, that lives over at Kara Hudson Photography.
One money-saving, planet-saving note up top: camera gear is the easiest thing in the world to buy used. Bodies and lenses last for years, and a lens from ten years ago still makes the same beautiful picture it made then. KEH is where I’d send you first for anything on this list. They’re right here in the Atlanta metro (Smyrna), they’ve been the trusted name in used gear for forty-plus years, and buying used keeps a perfectly good camera out of a landfill. Local, reputable, and planet-friendly, which is about as good as a “where to buy” gets. Buy it used, spend the difference on a trip somewhere worth photographing.
Nikon Z5 (the body I actually shoot)
Full-frame, mirrorless, and honestly more camera than most people will ever fully use. It’s not the flashy one, it’s the dependable one, and dependable is what you want when the food’s getting cold and the light’s going. Everything on this blog since I got it was shot on this.
Where to buy: KEH (used) (Atlanta-based; buy used first) · Nikon USA, direct (for new)
NIKKOR Z 24-120mm f/4 S (the lens that lives on the camera)
If I could only keep one lens, it’s this one. Wide enough for a whole table, long enough for a plated close-up, sharp corner to corner, and it almost never comes off the body. Probably eighty percent of what you see here was shot with this lens.
Where to buy: KEH (used) · Nikon USA, direct
AF-S NIKKOR 85mm f/1.4G (the pretty one)
An older F-mount lens I run through the FTZ adapter, and worth every bit of the fuss. This is the one for the dreamy, melty background, a single glass of something, a portrait, the “how did she blur it like that” shots. Not a daily lens; a special-occasion lens.
Where to buy: KEH (used) (a great one to buy used) · Nikon USA, direct
105mm f/2.8G VR Micro (the macro, for the food close-ups)
Also F-mount, also through the FTZ. This is the one for the extreme close-up: the blistered chile skin, the crumb, the beads of oil on chili crisp. If you’ve ever wondered how the texture shots get that close, it’s this lens.
Where to buy: KEH (used) · Nikon USA, direct
FTZ adapter (the little piece that makes the old lenses work)
Not exciting, but necessary: it’s what lets me use my two older F-mount lenses (the 85 and the 105) on the mirrorless Z5. If you’re moving from an older Nikon to a Z body and you love your current glass, this is how you keep it.
Where to buy: KEH (used) · Nikon USA, direct
Renting (Atlanta): Aperturent
The most underrated money-and-clutter saver in all of photography: you don’t have to own it. For a big event, or a specialty lens I’d use once in a blue moon, I rent from Aperturent, a local Atlanta outfit (they’ll deliver nationwide too, but I like that they’re ours). Renting a lens for a weekend beats buying one that lives in a drawer the other 360 days a year, it keeps my money with a local business, and it’s the same logic as buying used, just taken one honest step further. Rent the fancy thing; own the workhorses.
Where to rent: Aperturent (Atlanta, local pickup or nationwide delivery)
And how I process (not a purchase, just the honest answer)
I sort and process in Adobe Bridge, which is free and does more than people give it credit for. I’m not going to tell you that you need a subscription to make a good food photo, because you don’t.
Honorable mention: the one I want and haven’t bought
Nikon Zfc. It’s the retro-styled one that looks like the film cameras I grew up around, and I want it purely because it’s pretty, which is not a good enough reason, which is why I haven’t bought it. Putting it here so you know I’m as susceptible as anyone. If I ever cave, you’ll hear about it.