You are finally engaged! You have started planning your big day, and now it’s time to send out save the dates. Taking engagement photos are a great way to let everyone know your wedding date and to see how beautiful the newly engaged couple looks. Engagement photos are not for everyone. Sometimes photographers will include the photo session in their wedding package that you bought. Other times it is a separate payment that not everyone wants to fork out. A lot of times people hate the photos that looked staged or unnatural, so they opt out of taking engagement photos. I’m here to give you the lowdown on all the tips for shooting engagement photos, and more specifically fall engagement photos!
When we got engaged and found our photographers they offered us a package that included an engagement photo session. I knew that I wanted some photos taken but I had seen so many bad engagement photos that I was scared to do my own. I decided to do some research and figure out what I did NOT want to look like in the photos and what I wanted them to look like. I told my photographers and I think they did a pretty good job on making them look almost exactly how I wanted them to. Now that I have gone through the process I really know the best engagement photo shoot tips for creating beautiful engagement photos together.
Tips & Tricks On Fall Engagement Photos
+ Get to know your photographers and their style. Look at their website and see how they edit their photos. Look at the locations of where they take their photos. You want to make sure that their style matches what you have in mind for your photos.
+ Do your research before the shoot. Look up photos that you do not like and photo ideas that you like. Show them to your photographer so they know what not to make you pose like. Make sure you tell your photographers what poses you want to stay away from and poses that you want to try. Don’t be scared to tell them no or to offer up ideas. You want to make sure you get everything you can out of your shoot!
+ Find a place to shoot that is meaningful to you and your husband. Also, find a place to shoot that will look good in photos. There are some places that in theory sound good but when actually shot by a camera do not look good. Try to take a look at the place you want to shoot before hand so you can give your photographers ideas of places where you would like to shoot at. If you can’t think of a place that is meaningful to you, try to think of places that describe you as a couple. Think of places that go with your vibe so when people see your photos they think, “that totally describes them”.
+ Don’t forget to pick out the time you want to shoot, taking in consideration where the sun will be and how the weather will be. Having the sun shine is great but can also make you squint your eyes, sweat, and cause issues with the camera. The weather is unpredictable I know, but if your photographers are cool with changing the day if the weather is bad then make sure you are constantly checking the forecast.
+ Outfits to wear for engagement photos were my biggest worry. Pick out your outfits ahead of time and try them on first. You only need about 2-3 outfits for your shoot and you don’t have to wear white. You want to pick outfits that will go well with the site you are shooting at. For example if you are taking your photos in the fall, don’t wear a bright neon yellow dress that looks like you are getting ready for summer. You also want to make sure you go well with what your fiance is wearing. You will be taking pictures right next to him, so you two want to blend together. My advice to everyone with husbands who are relaxed about what they are wearing, is to pick out their outfits for them. I just picked an outfit for him that looked good with all of my outfits.
+ Get your nails done and your ring cleaned. Your engagement photos are based around you two getting engaged but also THE RING! During your photo shoot your ring will want to be nice and shiny because it will be in all the photos. Your also want your nails looking pretty too. No one wants to see a beautiful ring on not so beautiful hands!
+ Lastly, the most important thing is to be you! I have seen so many engagement photos where they are so staged that it doesn’t look like the couple at all! You will have these photos for the rest of your life and you want them to display you two as a couple. Not some staged couple that the photographers think look good. Have fun with the photos, laugh with each other, and just enjoy the whole experience!
Our Fall Engagement Photo Session
Our engagement photos were part of your package that we bought with our photographers. Our wedding was going to be in the Summer so we wanted either fall or winter photos. I really wanted to have one of our favorite pictures on our save the date so we decided on fall engagement pictures. We live and met each other in Columbus, Ohio so we decided on a beautiful park in Columbus. The trees were starting to turn so I picked out outfits that would stand out but also go with the fall vibe. I decided to take photos in two different outfits that I thought were the best outfits for fall engagement photos. The first was a muted blue, long sleeve dress from Altered State. I wore cute brown booties from Nordstrom and wrapped a belt around the dress that I also got from Altered State. The second outfit I wore jeans with a light orange long sleeve top from Urban Outfitters with the same brown booties. For my husband I picked out all his outfits. He wore jeans with a white colored long sleeve shirt that had small blue dots all over to go with my blue dress. Then wore jeans with a dark muted navy long sleeved shirt to go with my light orange shirt. My nail color was a dark maroon that I felt went good with all the colors in our pictures.
We had a mixture of some posed pictures but also some fun ones that I had seen on Pinterest. The park that we picked to take photos at is a known one in Columbus. Jake and I had been there before so we had a good idea of where we wanted to take pictures at within the park. I mainly wanted the photos to show the bright colored leaves. Luckily, the weather was perfect on the day we were shooting and we started in the late afternoon, so the lighting was beautiful.
I hope this blog helps you to create awesome engagement photos! If you are reading this and not yet engaged, but just doing research. Make sure you check out my blog post on our surprise Nashville proposal to hint at your boyfriend to get the job done!
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