10 Photography tips for beautiful engagement photo sessions

1. Get to know your couple (and let your couple get to know you)!

We know, we know. This is one of the first things we say in all prompting related guides. But it’s for good reason, we swear! In order to deliver the photos that your clients dream of, avoid cringe-worthy faux pas, and truly be able to authentically tell their love story, you gotta know who they are! Take the photos they want, and also the ones they didn’t know they wanted by personalising your shoot to your unique couple’s desires.

This initial stage is also super important in letting your couple know what kinda person you are too! Cultivate trust by having a proper conversation with them before you shove a lens in their faces. Let them know what your shooting style is. Are you easygoing, flexible, and open to improvisation or do you have a more strict and pre-planned approach in photo sessions? Are you willing to trespass to take photos in areas that are semi off-limits? Partial to a bit of liquid courage before the shoot?

This is about breaking down professional barriers, and getting to know your client as the beautifully complex people that they are. We know for a fact that the more comfortable they are with you, the more fun the shoot will be.

2. Pre-plan poses to suit their vibe.

Use some of Unscripted’s pre-shoot questionnaires to lay the groundwork, and follow up on their answers in conversation so they know you’ve been taking an actual interest in their lives.

Once you’ve gotten a sense of what your client is looking for, begin to get the creative juices flowing. The Unscripted app is full of inspiration! Save some poses to your photoshoot mood board with your specific client in mind, and look over them a few times so they feel familiar.

Work with your clients’ personalities and know that every love is different. Base your plan on their questionnaire answers. If you’re working with introverted couples, the piggy-back rides into the sunset probably won’t work here.

3. Keep it simple.

Have a favourite lens for portraits? A favourite all-arounder? Perhaps a resident back-up camera body that lives in your car? Great. Roll with that. One of the keys to a low-key engagement shoot is minimal gear. The less stuff you bring, the less intimidated they’ll be (and the easier it’ll be for you to tromp up around and keep up with that lovesick couple energy)!

Keep your workflow pretty simple too. Less chop and change and more flow. Start with some seated poses that feel a bit more relaxed, and then flow into some fun icebreaker engagement photo prompts. Once everyone is laughing and having fun, it’s time to ease into more intimate and reflective engagement posing to build up the lovely connection they’re feeling. Once they’re feeling loose and comfortable, finish up with a few silly, energetic poses to get them moving.

4. Think like a director.

Remember that you’re helping your couple tell their love story through imagery, not capturing the stiff ‘look-at-me-and-smile’ moment. Bringing movement and emotion into posing is less about posing and more about directing. Pretend you’re a movie director and think in terms of movement and action. The final static image is a snapshot of a life in motion, and it’s often the little, in-between moments that are typically the most natural and authentic. If you can create the environment with your couples that allow them to naturally relate to one another and interact with their environment, you’ll be light years ahead of any photographer that asks them to stop and smile at the camera.

At a later point in the session, you’ll probably even find that the couple may begin to pose themselves as they get comfier with each other and you. All you’ll have to do is throw in some prompts to freshen things up and draw out more authentic emotion!

TIP: Show the couple the first few shots, and give them lots of encouragement! Don’t be afraid to be a little silly, and tell them how excited you are about how the images are turning out.

5. Dress for the location.

There are so many things to keep in mind when deciding how to ask your couples how to dress for their engagement photos, but coordinating outfits doesn’t need to be a fraught experience. In fact, the less bells and whistles and distracting elements, the better. In order to get your photos looking cohesive and sophisticated, please, we repeat: PLEASE avoid matching outfits. Achieve cohesion by selecting a few focal colours and textured clothing items, factoring in the time of year and temperature and comfort and background colour palate. Will you be shooting on the beach amidst neutral tones, or in a lush forest with rich greens? Selecting a colour palette that compliments rather than competes with your backdrop will elevate your images. Playing with texture and light can yield some really ethereal and beautiful compositions, too! It depends on what you and your couple are game to explore.

6. Manage expectations.

No matter what they say, your clients have expectations. And their expectations will absolutely influence their perception of the service you provide. It’s probably fair to say you base many of your buying decisions on expectations that have been set for you, too. By that same token, your couple needs to know you won’t get every single shot they imagine, and that to a certain extent, you’ll have to work with the conditions that present themselves on the day. Perhaps bake this into your quote T’s & C’s, letting people know you’re not liable for factors that are out of control such as faulty equipment, thunderstorms, or leapfrog accidents; thus unhooking yourself from any potential sticky conversations you may have to face if all goes pear shaped.

7. Switch up the angles.

There’s so much to think about when posing a couple that sometimes it’s easy to forget how much room there is for play behind the lens. Once you know you’ve got “The Shot” for one particular pose, experiment with different angles and provide a bit of variety to the final sequence of images. Hone in on the details, try out different crops, back up to include more context, and just allow yourself to try something new!

8. Bring your environment into the frame.

Once you’ve been shooting for a while, you’ll begin to look at everything in this whole world as a potential photography prop. The jury’s out as to whether this is a blessing or a curse but using your surroundings as props opens up a world of possibility. You could shoot through flowers or trees for a romantic blurry foreground or shoot in a sunshower and have floating golden flecks of sunlight peppering your frame.

9. Chase that perfect light.

The holy grail of photography locations is generally somewhere where the light is soft, diffused, non-directional, and the background is pleasing (but not distracting). Golden hour is sweet and romantic, and blue hour can really bring the magic. Want to know what the sun will be doing, and when? Unscripted’s Sun Tracker has your back. The less you have to worry about avoiding harsh light, or modifying with flash or reflectors, the more you’ll have the mental capacity to hone in on the finer details, like that engagement ring on intertwined fingers, or the knowing glance that speaks of years of love between people.

10. Bring on the PDA (in subtle or extravagant ways).

Remember that when you’re shooting couples they’re already in love! It’s not too much of a stretch to ask them to hold hands or smile at each other. Kisses (if your couple is comfortable) are a lovely way for the couple to reconnect with each other and forget that the camera is there. But remember that engagement shoots are all about showcasing a couple’s love and telling their story.

While you’ll most likely be prompting the couple in front of you to hold hands, they’ll want you to hold theirs too. Expressing love in front of a camera can be a really daunting thing (there’s a reason we choose to stay behind the lens) and your presence on a shoot can make a huge difference as to whether your couple has fun or not. So remember: get to know them, keep it simple, and be confident in your capacity to direct and tell a story. You’ve got this. The eventual wedding will be a cinch.