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About
Each month Dutchess Tourism features a local photographer to help showcase the beauty of Dutchess County.
This month meet Kimberly Glatz! See some of her work and learn more about why she loves photographing local businesses in Dutchess County.
Hi! I'm Kimberly. I'm a professional food & beverage photographer in the Hudson Valley. It's a fun, tasty and sometimes messy job, but I wouldn't have it any other way. You can find a collection of my work at www.ShotbyKimberly.com
Oh man, this is SO tough! There are so many amazing places to visit, eat and experience here in Dutchess County. I'm constantly in awe of how much there still is to explore when I've lived here for over 30 years and feel like I've already experienced so much. But, that's the beauty of our area, isn't it? It can seem so untouched yet so full of new adventures. Every time I visit somewhere, I always think of how crazy it must be to live in a tourist area; meeting so many new people every day, from all over and giving them recommendations on sites to see, your favorite restaurants, and a place only locals know about. Just recently it hit me that we now live in a tourist area; I'm constantly meeting people from all over who may ask me one simple question and I'm there gushing about the Hudson Valley for 45 minutes. It's absolutely amazing that the place I've called home my entire life, is now on others' bucket lists to visit.
If I were to enjoy a full weekend around Dutchess County, here's what you'd find me doing. My first stop on Friday would be Ready Coffee in Wappingers Falls to fuel me up for the day and have a great conversation with the barista at the window. If you ever need an immediate pick-me-up and want to see some smiling faces and people who genuinely love their jobs, Ready Coffee is a must. My day is going to exist completely of antiquing & thrifting. Some of my favorite places include the Bottle Shop in Millbrook, Hyde Park Consignments, and Hyde Park Antique Center in Hyde Park. After a full day of sifting through vintage, it's Mill House Brewing Company in Poughkeepsie for some dinner & drinks in a cozy ambiance. This is a frequent stop for me but can you blame me? Between the All American Burger, Fried Calamari Salad, Shinebox cocktail, and an impressive award-winning beer list, it's without a doubt one of the best restaurants not just in Dutchess County but in the Hudson Valley!
Saturday is dedicated to historical places and art, so off to Vanderbilt Mansion for a stroll through the gardens followed by Mills Mansion for a tour of the house and a walk along the Hudson River. Then I'd head down to Beacon and grab lunch at The Beacon Daily. Their Fried Chicken Sandwich is what your dreams are made of, I promise. Then it's off to Dia:Beacon, which houses one of the largest collections of modern and contemporary art in the country in an industrial building that was once a Nabisco box-printing facility. With a full day of history and art, dinner is take-out dumplings from the best dumpling place around these parts, Palace Dumplings in Wappingers.
Sunday is reserved for nature. The Hudson Valley is littered with hiking trails, walking paths and bodies of water. Possibly a kayak trip around Bannerman's Castle, or a walk along the Dutchess County Rail Trail and Walkway over the Hudson. It's a great way to get your mind and body ready for the full week ahead. Ending the perfect weekend with ice cream is a no-brainer and it would be at Kelly's Creamery in Dover Plains, my favorite ice cream shop; the literal and figurative cherry on top! (See what I mean when I said before "...ask me one simple question and I'm there gushing about the Hudson Valley for 45 minutes").
I've always been a Canon user. I picked up my first manual film camera (which belonged to my father) when I was just 14 years old and took a black and white photography course in high school. Currently, I'm shooting with a Canon 5d Mark II. It's not the latest and greatest model and that's okay! It does the job and I know it like the back of my hand. Depending on the type of shoot, where the shoot is, and length of shoot some other items I may use are: continuous softbox lighting, off-camera Alien Bees strobe, reflectors, backdrops, and props.
I wish I could just pick one favorite but we have such an abundance of amazing Dutchess restaurants and bakeries! Some of my favorites include Mill House Brewing Company, Sweetbakes Cafe, Kelly's Creamery, and The Green Bowl.
I have several places on my wishlist to shoot including the restaurants at the Culinary Institute of America, Henry's at the Farm, Il Figlio Enoteca, Savona's Trattoria, The Roundhouse, and The Amsterdam, among so many others!
Lighting is your BEST FRIEND! I mean it. Nowadays cell phones are taking such unbelievably crisp and detailed images that all you really need to do is 'find the light.' Let's say you want to photograph a burger. Find a window that has great natural lighting. You want to put the burger by the window, not necessarily RIGHT on top of the window but close enough that the light is on the burger. Now you want to photograph that burger with the window light on the side of it or on the front of it, meaning you don't want to take a picture of the burger with the window in the background of your image. This will make the burger be in shadow and the window will be bright and blown out. Take a couple with the window light to the side of your frame as well as with the window behind you (careful with this one, depending on how big the window is you may get a shadow on the burger so be mindful of that!)
Another tip is ANGLES! In food photography, there are really only three main angles; straight on, at a 45º, or from above. Depending on the item and how it's plated will determine how you will shoot it, or visa versa. So the burger from before you wouldn't want to shoot from the top down because all you'll see is the top of the bun. The main components of the burger are hidden and doesn't pull the viewer in to want it. Even at a 45º angle, you may not see everything in-between the buns, so straight-on is the best angle for burgers. Tip: You may want to place the bun a bit further back than normal to help see what's inside and have the light be able to reach between all those nooks and crannies.
We eat with our eyes first. If the image looks great between the lighting, focus, angle, and colors, you'll pull the viewers in. They'll want to know what that item is, when it's available and where to get it.
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