8 Best Engagement Photo Ideas To Try With Your Couples

Engagement Photo Ideas For A Memorable Session

Author: ShootDotEdit

/ Categories: Wedding Photography Ideas

With every couple having their own style and personality, there are endless engagement photo ideas you could come up with to offer them a memorable engagement session. Additionally, conducting an engagement session is also a great way for you to spend time with your couples, experiment with their portraits, and possibly even book another wedding! For a couple, an engagement session means spending some quality time together while also getting some stunning photographs. Since your focus is going to be solely on the couple, it’s also a good time to experiment with lighting, locations, poses, etc. And this blog is here to help with some engagement photo inspiration!

Best Engagement Photo Ideas To Try With Your Couples

1. Breathtaking Locations

a wedding couple standing on a beach with the vast ocean in front of them Image Credit: ShootDotEdit Customer @apollofields

Did your couple choose a special and beautiful location to create unique engagement photos? Commemorate their experience with engagement photo ideas that allow plenty of room for breathtaking scenery. Whether you’re at the beach or the mountains, or in the middle of a desert - try to find angles and perspectives that also include the surrounding landscape in the couples portraits. Beach engagement photos are definitely a good idea during the summer months, so if your couple is reaching out to you to help them select an engagement session location, then a beach during the golden hour could be perfect to create romantic and dreamy photos!

If your couple wants something more adventurous for their engagement session, you could suggest heading towards the mountains. A little hike session (if your couple is up for it) is also a great way for them to bond and for you to get some awesome action shots. We’ve had the honor of seeing some amazing mountain engagement photos from some of our customers, we’d 100% recommend that for couples who want breathtaking views to become backdrops for their engagement photos.

2. Candid And Fun Engagement Photo Poses

a groom giving a piggyback ride to the bride while her hair is blowing in the wind Image Credit: ShootDotEdit Customer @kellyiswilde

If this is your couple’s first time being photographed professionally, then take the wonderful opportunity to guide them through the photo shoot with some great engagement photo poses! Most couples, especially if it’s their first time being with a professional photographer, will feel awkward in front of the camera and might have a hard time following your posing cues. So what’s the best way to pose an awkward couple? Let them get comfortable and settle into the rhythm of going through different poses. Before you bring out your shot list, we’d suggest you give them simple cues that involve actions so they can focus on the action instead of just standing in a stiff pose. This way, you get some cute candids and photos of them in motion too!

As they start to get comfortable, you can also give tips to your couple to create some fun moments. For example - when you ask the bride-to-be to hop on her fiancé’s back, you’re bound to get laughter and smiles in your photos! If that’s not their style, then you could even simply ask them to hold hands, keep talking to each other, and walk towards and away from you.

3. Capture The Romance

a couple embracing and kissing each other Image Credit: ShootDotEdit Customer @stephanie.heymann.photography

Who doesn’t love classic romantic engagement photo ideas? One of the best engagement photo poses is a couple sharing a sweet/passionate kiss or the moment right before their lips meet. However, not every couple is a fan of PDA, so make sure you discuss the kissing shot in advance. No matter what location you are shooting in, try to incorporate romance into the engagement photos. An engagement is a new milestone in your couple’s life, and as they get ready to spend the rest of their lives together, these engagement photos will remind them of exactly how excited and loved they felt in that moment, even years after they are married.

Another tip to add more romance to your couple’s engagement photo ideas is to take photos during the golden hour/sunset. Silhouettes, a dancing pose, a classic portrait, a kissing shot, a lovely forehead-to-forehead pose - there are so many outdoor engagement photo poses you could try. However, if sunset engagement photos are in the game plan, keep an eye on the clock and scout the location in advance, so you know exactly where and how to pose your couple.

4. Cool And Casual Engagement Photos

a couple posing with fast food and soda in the hand Image Credit: ShootDotEdit Customer @loversoflove

Not all clients love to dress up for a dramatic and dreamy engagement photo session. Some like to choose comfort and style themselves in outfits that they would pick out on any regular day. If your couple is laidback and just wants to hit up their favorite cafe or ice cream parlor for their engagement session, there’s a lot you can do to take cute engagement photos even then. However, we’d recommend that you prepare just as you would for any other engagement session. Even if your couple is super chill, they’d want their engagement photos to reflect their bond, the romance, their chemistry as well as their personalities. So as their photographer, your job is to take photos that reflect all that.

5. Highlight The Engagement Photo Outfits

a bride embracing the groom from behind in between a road with trees around Image Credit: ShootDotEdit Customer @melissafechapmanphotography

We love a twinning moment! And don’t you just love it when couples put in that extra effort to match or coordinate their outfits for the engagement session? So if you do have clients who’ve put in that effort, then their photos need to reflect that too. In order to do that, make a list of poses that highlight your couple’s outfits. If you are shooting outdoors, then look for backdrops that align with your couple’s outfits.

Moreover, you could also help out your couples when it comes to outfits. Once you finalize the location or locations, then you could help your couples finalize outfits that go with the location. Plus, since it’s just you and your couple, you could perhaps even suggest an outfit change (depending on the time you have with them).

6. Playful And Funny Engagement Photos

a couple having fun dancing in the sea Image Credit: ShootDotEdit Customer @brandiallysephoto

Getting your couple to move around is one of the easiest ways to get unique engagement photos. The emotions felt at a particular moment are precious, and if you’re fast enough to capture those moments, your couple will be on cloud nine when they see the final results! They could try taking each other on a piggy-back ride, or one partner could pick up the other and spin them around - these poses are bound to get some lovely candids. If your couple chooses to shoot their engagement at the beach, let them play around and splash water on each other. Some couples just don’t do well with stiff poses, so one of the tricks you could use to create some memorable engagement photos is by asking your couples to just improvise.

7. Seasonal Engagement Photo Ideas

a couple goofing around surrounded by greenery Image Credit: ShootDotEdit Customer @dianenicolephoto

Each engagement session is special in its own way. With every couple having their own unique love story, the seasons in which engagement sessions take place can be useful to add that extra charm while narrating their love stories. All seasons have a distinctive look, and if the focus of your couple’s engagement session is the season, then use backdrops and other aesthetics that highlight the season too.

Fall Engagement Photo Ideas: With hues of orange, yellow and red adding vibrance during this season, you can click amazing pictures of your couple surrounded with nature. Some engagement photo ideas for fall could be going to the park with the couple (and perhaps even their fur baby) and encouraging your couple to bring out their inner child or letting your couple have a fun leaf fight or just drop leaves from above (definitely get an assistant onboard for this).
Spring Engagement Photo Ideas: As nature blooms and thrives during this season, it makes for the dreamiest engagement session. Also, since nature is coming alive again and you can see all shades of vibrant colors again, we’d recommend you also head outside with your couples for this one.
Winter Engagement Photo Ideas: Even though it's cold and possibly snowing outside, winter engagement photos are all about being cozy and warm! Capture your couple in twinning sweaters or, better yet, enjoying a cup of hot chocolate surrounded by the snow or in the comfort of their own home. But if your couple wants to show their glamorous style or wants to have a snowball fight, then going out for the photo shoot could also be an option!
Summer Engagement Photo Ideas: Dressed in easy breezy summer outfits with the sun shining bright and wind in your couple’s hair, you can take some bright summertime engagement photos with picturesque landscape and backdrops! However, for both parties to stay cool during the photo shoot, if you are shooting outdoors, try to find spots where you can also find shade.

8. Engagement Photo Ideas With Furry Friends

a couple kissing with their pet around in the middle of the street surrounded by trees Image Credit: ShootDotEdit Customer @looyengaphoto

A couple with a fur-baby would love to include their pets and make them pose with them for their engagement session! Plus, people LOVE photos with pets in them. It’s most likely that if your couple does want to include their pet in the photos, their pet already knows what they need to do in order to get those paw-dorable photos. Also, if the pet does decide to do something unplanned, like chase butterflies or go for a swim in the middle of a session, capturing that and your couple’s reactions to it will make for some amazing memories for them. If you are shooting with your couple’s pet, just make sure that the venue or location you’ve chosen is pet-friendly.

Further Read: Bokeh Wedding Photography Tips And Tricks

An engagement marks a new beginning in a couple’s life, and if they’ve chosen you to record this beautiful time in their lives, then you best be prepared to give them a fantastic experience. Whether they want their engagement photos to remind them of a particular season or they want to capture these memories with their fur babies, or they just want something casual and go to their favorite diner - when they express their ideas to you, think about how you can give them the experience they desire while also delivering top-notch photos to them.

At ShootDotEdit, we strive to help you level up your wedding photography business. We realize how important time is for wedding photographers; therefore, we help you get more of it by lessening your post-production workload with our professional editing services. To learn more about how we can help, check out our pricing plans.

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