In food photography, a window is often used as the main light. If you position the food so that the window is a back light, the side of the food facing you will be dark with the shadows falling towards the camera.

To make the food look appetizing, we generally fill or brighten the shadows.

The fill in a photo studio may be another light but in my home window studio I am using a piece of white computer paper to reflect the main light – which is the light from the window – back onto the garlic to brighten the shadows and  even out the light.

No fill.
Fill.

Adding fill evens out the light. It reduces contrast. You can’t simply correct for this in post. When you do, you will lose detail in the brighter areas to get a good exposure on the areas in shadow. Look at the garlic in the back. Without fill, the detail is lost.

  • Shot without fill. Adjusted in Lightroom Mobile: Exposure +65, Highlights + 25, Shadows +100, blacks -60
  • Shot with fill. Adjusted in Lightroom Mobile: Exp0sure +60, Highlights +25, Shadows +100, blacks -60.

Photograph a small object by a window with and without fill. Make small jpgs of your original files. Then adjust the two files so that the image looks as good as possible with a good tonal range.

Label all four files and put them in a post on OpenLab with a short description of how you added fill and how that is different then simply brightening the shadows with software.

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