On Wednesday, Nov. 7 during class time, the students of Culinary Arts had the chance to put down their knives and pans and grab onto a camera. Foods instructor Alice Smith invited journalism adviser Jerred Zegelis to teach her top foods class some tips and tricks on how to take good pictures of their food.

“I’ve stressed to them all along, that you eat with your eyes,” Smith said. “But I think until they actually saw the pictures or what it looked like on a plate, they didn’t understand the depth of it and what that means. You want someone to be able to want to eat your dish with their eyes.”

First, Zegelis focused on showing the students the basics of how a camera works. He also focused on things like how to plate the food, match colors and what way the food is facing. He then showed them how to work with different lighting and techniques, focal points of the camera, and what to focus on. Junior Alyssa Butler said she learned a lot from the experience.

“I think my biggest takeaway was there’s so much more than just cooking food for people,” Butler said. “You can be doing photography, you can be doing science with food, you can be a dietician. I think it’s cool to find out just another thing you could be doing based on foods.”

Butler said that culinary arts is what she enjoys doing and plans to move forward in her life. She said she really enjoyed having this unique experience, combining what she loves to do with a new art form.

“I think it’s just a cool experience to have when another teacher comes into teach a different class about aspects that kind of clash in different classes, cause it’s not everyday a photography teacher comes into a foods room,” Butler said. “I think it’s really cool when they communicate.”