Ever since I began my blog in 2006, taking pictures of everything I cooked has been the easiest way to share my passion with others. I wanted to express through images a mood, the atmosphere at a party, the difficulty or simplicity of a recipe: all things that food can communicate through photography. In the beginning, I wasn’t much of an expert, but I have made a lot of progress over the years. A few months ago, I decided to take things a step further; I wanted to get my online followers even more involved. That is why I decided to begin making recipe videos.
With a video, you are able to cover certain aspects that you can’t communicate to a reader. In this way, photos and videos, for my work at least, become complementary. It’s like eating a strawberry: I can describe in words how big, glossy red, juicy to the bite it is… I can take a photo that highlights all of its qualities – in the right light, it may almost seem like a jewel… but, in the end, food is all about involving all of the senses, and the visual is an important part of it. That is the reason behind by recipe videos.
Another reason behind my move towards recipe videos is the universal nature of images; my blog is followed by readers both at home and abroad, so I publish in two languages – Italian and English.
Every time I translate a post, I try to adapt to the different measures: from grams to cups, from expressions to slightly different moods. And then along came the recipe videos and, with them, I surrendered happily to a universal language.
For obvious reasons, having to stand in front of the camera, I gave the job of filming to Tommaso (www.tommyonweb.com), who was up for the challenge of acting as film director.
Before we started out on this new adventure, we sat down to work out our intended style and what we wanted to communicate. Here is the result:
[youtube width=”918″ height=”516″]https://youtu.be/jW2j5XPTkPU[/youtube]
The recipe videos should be complementary to the text and photos already found on the blog, thus reflecting the same Tuscan, rustic and home-cooked style. That is why we chose to film everything free-hand. The films aren’t shaky, as you might expect, and, for us, they make the video more natural and personal.
The frame focuses mainly on the hands, rather than on a front-on medium close-up, to make the recipe steps as clear as possible.
[youtube width=”918″ height=”516″]https://youtu.be/chZc4zQJj98[/youtube]
When we made the recipe video for the cantucci, we received an enthusiastic response from foreign followers, who had finally understood a step that might seem trivial, but for them wasn’t at all easy to grasp. Thanks to the videos, they saw with their own eyes the various steps of the recipe – cook a first time, out of the oven, slice up the biscuit block, cook a second time. The Italian term ‘bis-cotto’ (twice-cooked) finally acquired the right meaning.
It’s only been a few months that we’ve been doing recipe videos, but we already feel as though we’ve learned a great deal and new ideas are born every day, with inspiration coming from other, more expert videomakers, but also from steps in a recipe that are difficult to explain in words and that seem perfect for a video. All-in-all, this new language has been a great success.
Giulia Scarpaleggia
Giulia Scarpaleggia, teacher of Tuscan cookery courses for tourists, Tuscan food blogger, writer and photographer, 33 years old, from Colle Val d’Elsa (Siena).
I started my blog in February 2009. In January 2012, I began working full-time as a food blogger and teacher of cookery courses.
In December 2012, my first book ‘I Love Toscana’ was published by Food Editore in Italian and English.
In September 2013, I won the Macchianera Food Award for best Italian food blogger.
In September 2014, my second book, ‘Cucina da Chef con ingredienti low cost’ (Chef Cooking with Low Cost Ingredients) was published by BUR.
Blog: www.julskitchen.com
Twitter: @JulsKitchen
Facebook: Juls’ Kitchen
Pinterest: Juls’ Kitchen
Instagram: JulsKitchen