Craft Cocktails {and how to take better photos of drinks}

This Dirty Martini photo was taken at a pop-up bar in Tucson

In an ongoing series of how to take better pictures, I decided it was important to share with you some tips on how to take better photos of drinks. Soooo I have to confess I am known to be a drinker of Craft Cocktails. If you follow my personal travel / food / coffee / life in pictures on Instagram you might notice, and maybe possibly worry (please don’t) at the number of craft cocktail pictures that make an appearance. I certainly do love my cocktails. And I love wine, too. But more often than not I just love the experience of going to the place, ordering the drink, photographing the drink, and drinking the drink. Repeat. I recently did a post on How to Take Better Photos with your iPhone and I want to branch out a bit and talk about how to take better photos of drinks using your iPhone.

So here are FIVE tips for how to take better photos of drinks, especially craft cocktails, with your iPhone:

ONE: Put it in portrait mode, find an interesting backdrop. Look for colors, patterns, light coming in from behind, twinkle lights, uplighting on bottles, or generally something interesting. The Shanghai skyline, for example, makes a great backdrop!

Dirty Martini at Bar Rouge on the Bund in Shanghai, China

TWO: Place your cocktail in the appropriate place against the background and get low (at eye level with your phone or lower) or change your angle, maybe taking it from above.

craft cocktail photography by jacquelynn

this colorful cocktail was at the Mayor’s Table Pacific Pub & Kitchen in Newport Beach CA

Grand Inna Bali Beach Resort

THREE: focus your phone by touching the screen at the point where the drink meets the rim / is visible through the glass so as not to get the background or the glass in focus instead of the drink. Sometimes using portrait mode works here, sometimes it can be finicky depending on your distance from the subject. Experiment!

Caffe Boa in Tempe AZ

FOUR: introduce light (if needed) on the subject (you can have the person you’re with use their phone light, or you can use a candle, or if you happen to have a mini-flashlight handy (who doesn’t) that will work too).