For someone who is looking to build a cake portfolio...other than taking pictures when making cakes for others. Do any of you decorate dummy cakes just to take pictures of them? I have a few friends with older kids with birthday's coming up and I am going to make cakes for them as my gift, so I am going to take pictures then. But I am looking for ways to build up my portfolio. And where can you purchase dummy cakes? Thanks.

I have decorated dummies just to take pictures of. You can start off with plain white, then add ribbon, then add brooch(es), then add fondant cut outs, stencil, etc. You can also do one design on one side, another on the back, since you don't see the whole cake in the photo. So you can take pictures of various styles, having only covered one cake with fondant/buttercream. When you get bored of white, strip the dummies off and do another colour/style.
Search for dummy cakes on here and you will find a couple of companies in the US who ship these. I can't put links up because they are blocked and I got into trouble the other day for spelling one of them out with spaces...

For a visual on starting with a blank cake, adding ribbon, adding flowers, etc.... look for Indydebi's flickr photos. She has her's on there and it's interesting how many different looks you can get just by adding elements one at a time.

I am going to check it out, thanks.

When I first started putting my portfolio together, that is exactly what I did. Decorate one side of the dummy snap a picture and turn to decorate the back a different way. This gets you 2 different looks/pictures with one cake. Remove one of the tiers and get a completely different look. I sometimes pull my dummy back out to try new techniques. No cake to waste!

Can cake dummy's be covered in BC?

To see Indydebi's flickr page, just go to her profile. Then at the bottom you'll see links to different things. Her flickr page is one of them. If you still can't find it, i'm sure you could pm message her. She is SOOO funny!

If you are decorating dummy cakes just for photo purposes attach any fondant or gumpaste pieces with some shortening rather than a liquid. They will easily peel off and you can start again with a new design.

I think it's Daisy's Pink Center Cake. Here's the link: http://www.flickr.com/photos/55969028@N00/3557930383/

Dallas Foam in the US has great dummies and cheap. Got a whole set of 4" tall rounds for about $13 and they ship pretty fast too.

Dallas. Foam. That's the name of the place (remove the . in between) Sorry guys, I was just trying to help.

I'm wondering about the actual putting together of the portfolio. Do you all think it's better to use digital media or a hard paper copy of your work? I have lots of cake photos but I'm uncertain what medium would be more appealing to my clients and potential clients. Any advice?

I'd probably make a Shutterfly or Snapfish book for your coffee table. Something for people to flip thru while they're meeting with you. Pretty inexpensive too.

I bought the styrafoam dummy cakes from Joann Fabrics and I decorate them all the time. They're pretty cheap.