Kosher Style

Kosher Style - Amy Rosen’s New Cookbook

I recently had the pleasure of working on Amy Rosen’s new cookbook, Kosher Style. This is my third book i’ve shot with her and it’s quite different from the other books we’ve done together. Previously we teamed up to shoot Toronto Cooks and it’s sequel Toronto Eats. Both books focused on Toronto’s Restaurant scene and it’s chefs. This time around it’s all about Jewish food hence the funky title: Kosher Style.

Our goal here was to give a modern look to traditional kosher foods. This was a really fun learning experience for me and I got to try all kinds of foods i’d heard of but hadn’t had the chance to try like Gefilte Fish, Knishes and Blintzes.

I was fortunate enough to shoot this cookbook with an incredible team. Michelle Rabin handled the food styling and Madeleine Johari was the prop stylist. I couldn’t be happier with the results. The book doesn’t come out until later this fall, but i’m happy to be able to share a few of my favourite images with you.

Dark Matter

Staying with a minimalist approach, the next series I created is Dark Matter. Here my intention was to use darkness as a key component in the shots.

“The most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious.”

— Albert Einstein

Shadows have always been something I’ve enjoyed working with to create a sense of depth and mystery. I love how they creep into every little contour.

“Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.”

— Leonardo Da Vinci

Steam Bath

New Year, new resolution. Stay on top of updating my blog. I haven’t been very good at that lately. So here goes.

Most of the work I do here in my studio is food focused. I shoot mostly with commercial clients and my specialty is food photography. One of the things I try to do at least quarterly is to take some time away from the more commercially inclined work I do and carve out some time, typically a week, to shoot creatives that give me a chance to try out new techniques or creative concepts. Sometimes this work falls under the category of food photography, other times not. The main goal here is to play around, and create work that I typically don’t get to do on the jobs i’m working on.

I think it’s really important for photographers to make time to do this, especially when they are busy and running a successful studio. If you don’t, it’s easy to fall back into a certain creative complacency and your growth can become stunted.

The first series I shot is titled Steam Bath. The goal here was to create atmospheric shots while maintaining a minimalist approach. I think we achieved this quite nicely. Really the only propping elements in these shots are reflection and atmosphere.

I’ll be posting more shots from my creative week in the coming days. All of these shots were done with stylist Madeleine Johari, my wife and creative collaborator.

Road Trippin'

“The great home of the soul is the open road.”

— D.H. Lawrence

I love road trips. I especially love solo road trips. Just me and the open road. Audiobooks, real books, music and wandering. Quite simply, there is nothing i’d rather do.

Road trips give me time to reflect, to roam and play. Over the years, the adventures I've enjoyed most are the ones i’ve planned the least. I’ve learned that it’s so important to give yourself room to listen to your intuition and change course or stay put whenever the moment strikes.

“The only real valuable thing is intuition”

— Albert Einstein

One of the reasons I’ve always loved road trips is that it gives me the opportunity to step out of my daily life. This gives me the much needed clarity that gets lost when I’m knee deep-deep in the thick of it at the studio. Doing this gives me the opportunity to assess how things are going in life and if I have the right priorities, values, goals, etc..

So with that being said, here's a little tribute to the open road!

Death Valley, California

Mojave Desert, California

The Yukon, Canada

Northern British Columbia

Cape Breton, Nova Scotia

Banff, Alberta

Jasper, Alberta

Ireland

Texas

Salt Flats, Utah

Catheys Valley

Catheys Valley, California

One of my favourite landscapes I’ve shot throughout the years. Maddy and I recently framed this one for our home. This was actually shot on the trip where I proposed to her. I can still feel that sun. Golden sunsets that seem to go on forever. I’ll always love this place and what it means for us. California has had a rough year - let’s hope 2018 is kinder and gentler to her.

Let’s wish the same for us as well.

Campbell's Recipe Photography

Campbell's

Over the past 2 years I've had the opportunity to team up with Campbell's to shed a new light on their recipe photography. Most of the work i've done has focused on their broth and condensed soup recipes.

Here are a selection the recipes i've shot.

Butternut Squash + Roasted Garlic Bisque

Curried Carrots with Cashew and Cilantro Dressing

The Walrus

Chaga Mushrooms, Secret Potato Labs, and Mourning the McPrawnster.

I recently teamed up with The Walrus for their May food-focused issue.

Here are a few of the shots from this series.

Food and props by Madeleine Johari

New Found Tide

“What is essential is invisible to the eye.”

— Antoine de Saint-Exupéry

This past October, I set out to photograph something that has been top of mind lately - Time. That 'essential' thing 'invisible to the eye.' What I I love about photography is the ability to capture what the eye can’t see. In this case, the passage of time was my focus. I came home with this 8 image series titled 'New Found Tide.' With ‘tide' representing both the ocean and the Old English use of the word - relating to time.

To slow everything down and shoot in a more deliberate way.

I wanted to shoot this series because of a strong desire to slow things down and reflect. My personal and professional life is great and I have little to complain about. But with a one year old daughter, another baby on the way, along with aging parents, time and it’s scarcity is something that’s been at the forefront of my thoughts for a while now. I’ve been an extremely ‘busy’ person for many years now and that’s something i’ve always taken a lot of pride in. However, I’m now at a point now where i’m starting to question the value of always being so busy. Often there is a feeling of needing more time, or a sense of frustration at the realization that there just isn’t enough time to do all the things I want to do. This is why I felt it was important for me to shoot this series - I wanted to slow everything down and just sit, observe the tide, and shoot in a more deliberate way.

A quiet, meditative series exploring the passage of time.

I decided to shoot off the coast of Newfoundland because I had been there once before and recall staring out at the ocean and feeling as if I was standing at one of the four corners of the world. My intention was to create a quiet, meditative series exploring the passage of time. Knowing myself, I figured I would have difficulty resisting the urge to instantly review images once exposures were complete. So I shot film, and this provided the delayed gratification that felt appropriate for this project. The shoot process was slow and deliberate with exposure times varying from 1 minute to 1 hour. Just sitting there, simply being, while the film was being exposed was important because I was forced to truly take in the scene. The sights, sounds, the smell, the feeling of the cold ground and the unrelenting ocean wind blowing in my face. I did this for a week - 6am to 6pm and it was wonderful. The photographs in this series were all shot in Placentia Bay - an area approximately 100km wide about an hour and half drive from St. John's.

Anyways, I do hope you enjoy this series.

For those interested - there is a limited set of prints available. You can check them out here.

With Gratitude,

Ryan Szulc

Kauai

A tribute to my favourite place in the world. Food styling by Matt Kimura Prop styling by Madeleine Johari

Kauai_001 Coco Loco cocktail Na Pali Coast Jumbo Garlic Opae Hanalei The big Kahuna Burger -Pork belly & grilled Pineapple. Kauai_008 Taro Fields Mermaids Cafe Spam Musubi North SHore Tunnels Beach Rambutan Taro Burger Kalalau Trail Kona Brewing Co. Kapaa Kauai Juice Co. Ha'ena Beach Hanalei

Death By Chocolate

We all love chocolate, it’s undeniable. So I teamed up with food stylist Matthew Kimura and prop stylist Madeleine Johari to explore the deep dark pleasures of chocolate.Before jumping into the photos, here a few things about chocolate that I bet you didn’t know.

• The blood in Psycho’s famous shower scene was actually chocolate syrup.

• In fact, chocolate was consumed as a liquid, not a solid, for 90% of its history.

• The Aztec emperor Montezuma II drank more than 50 cups of chocolate every day.

• The Aztecs and Mayans Used Cacao Beans as Currency

• The inventor of the chocolate chip cookie sold the idea to Nestle Toll House in return for a lifetime supply of chocolate.

• M&Ms were created in 1941 as a means for soldiers to enjoy chocolate without it melting

• Every second Americans collectively eat 100 pounds of chocolate

• Chocolate magnate Milton Hershey cancelled his reservations for the Titanic due to last minute business matters.

• Eating dark chocolate every day reduces the risk of heart disease by one third.

• A lethal does of chocolate for a human being is about 22lbs.

Photo credits: Food stylist: Matthew Kimura Prop Stylist: Madeleine Johari Post-Production: Matt Gibson

Death by Chocolate Chocolate Shards Tempering Dark Chocolate Pistachio Bark Double Chocolate Salted Caramel Cookies Hot Chocolate Chocolate Cake Chocolate Pot de Creme Nutella Dark Chocolate Mint Pistachio Bark

https://vimeo.com/120155547