Food in Action
A
lberto Zamaniego Figueroa is a photographer and creative director who first became interested in photography from his father, an engineer, who carried his camera everywhere. “He used to take photos of building structures and many other visually interesting objects. After years of looking at his photos, I finally understood that he had a very sharp eye, using different angles, playing with colours and black and white,” Alberto recalls. He was 13 years old when his father finally let him use the Canon Powershot A560 camera. “I was shooting all sorts of stuff but mainly shooting some off-road action on our trips.” Alberto studied Science of Communication at the University of Baja California in Mexico and intended to become a sports journalist. “During my uni days, I studied a year of photography as part of my degree. I wasn’t very sure what I wanted to do with this, but I thought maybe I could do some photography and make some extra money.” His photography teacher who used to run a sports photography website gave Alberto his first taste of working as a photographer. One day he asked Alberto to shoot some content for his website, and Alberto agreed. “I was a massive fan of Off Road Racing (very famous in Baja California, California, Nevada, and Arizona). Me and my best
friend used to camp in the desert and wake up with the smell of VP racing fuel and the sound of 800 hp Off Road trucks driving pass our tent.” He can clearly remember the first photo he ever took and relates that something clicked for him that day. It was then that he decided to redirect some choices in his life. After a couple years of shooting and selling photos, Alberto landed his first job at a production company and became a professional off-road racing photographer with Vildosola Racing. Alberto began to focus his attention on food photography in 2014. The agency he was working for at the time had a client who required food photography. “I was excited as I love cooking and food; I’m some sort of a frustrated chef,” he says. His very first assignment was shooting some hamburgers in a gas station for a big pharmacy chain with locations all over his state. “The food was crap, and the presentation was very poor, but we managed to make it look okay.” Alberto continued to work with more and more culinary clients. Because it was his job to make the food good, he began studying more about food photography, styling, lighting techniques, equipment, natural light, etc. “A couple of my friends started working in restaurants or opening food places in the city. So to develop my skills, I traded my photography for some free food. It was
ArtDiction | 14 | September/October 2021
