Editor’s Note: In our Letters from the Industry series, we ask food professionals to give us a glimpse into their worlds in an effort to get to know the careers, skills and individuals that contribute to the many facets of the culinary landscape. In today’s entry, food stylist Lisa Homa gives us a behind-the-lens look at the profession of preparing beautiful dishes––for cookbooks and beyond.

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Since he was about four years old, right around the time he discovered that I have a job, my son would send me off for the day with a hug and say, “Good luck with your pretty pictures, Mommy.” Because at that age, that’s all he really knew about my work––that I made pretty pictures.

What he didn’t know then––but has some vague ideas about now––was everything that went into making those pretty pictures. Which is kind of true of most people. And why should they? Who looks at anything––a cookbook cover, a television show, a cell phone––and contemplates all of the planning, management, decisions, false starts, bad takes, talent and skill that go into making it? But thanks to social media and the ubiquity of “food porn,” more people than ever are thinking about and actively engaged in food photography.

Which is why so many people I meet seem to think I have the most fascinating job in the world. Don’t get me wrong, I love what I do (except for that one day early in my career that I spent gluing sesame seeds on McDonald’s buns). I’m trained in both the visual and culinary arts. I apprenticed for years under the doyenne of food stylists, Delores Custer, and I’ve gotten to work with a crazy patchwork quilt of people from B.B. King to Yotam Ottolenghi. But the moment I tell people I’m a food stylist, the oohs and ahhs, misconceptions and questions come pouring out.