Wedding Planner’s Guide to Couples’ Poses for Photographs

Whether you’re a limelight-loving couple who can’t wait to have professional pictures taken, or camera shy and dread the thought of posing for endless portraits, you’ve almost certainly gone online to search up some couples’ poses for your wedding photographs. In our role as full-service luxury wedding planner (aka Magic Maker!), we work closely with our couples and their photographers, ensuring their styles are aligned and they’re in agreement about just how much posing they’re going to need to do. First things first, let’s clear something up:

There are different photography styles for different ‘levels’ of posed photographs.

It goes without saying that wedding photographers are not all the same, and one of the important conversations we have with our couples before introducing them to different options is around the style of imagery they’re looking to have captured. Knowing where your personality sits on a scale of ‘photogenic’ to ‘please no more photos’ means we can align you with photographers who will work with you naturally, and get the most amazing results.

Some photographers are known for spending longer and paying closer attention to detail during family formals or couples’ portraits, meticulously arranging and rearranging to get the perfect shot, and some couples love this because they want that hero photo to hang on their wall forever. Other photographers shoot in a more relaxed style, capturing things as they naturally unfold – you may see this referred to as ‘documentary’ style – and this suits couples who don’t want to feel like they have a camera in their face all day.

There’s also a hybrid option, where most of your day is captured very organically but more time and attention is paid to a specific half hour of the day where you go off to have your portraits taken.

Calling them ‘portraits’ makes them sound very regal, but all we mean by this is pictures of just the two of you. Whether you feel it’s ‘you’ to have two or twenty of these, there is a photographer out there who will work with exactly what you do and don’t want – and our network of incredibly talented suppliers has someone to suit every couple.

What else should you consider when choosing your photographer?

Much like every other element of your wedding, photography is something that needs its own mini priorities list. Consider what’s of the most importance to you – are you looking for chic, editorial style imagery to look back on your memories in cinematic style, hoping for plenty of photos of your families chatting and interacting, or wishing for artistic detail shots and blurred action snaps? Probably the most important things to have in mind when choosing your wedding photographer are:

• Do you see their work and love it? If you’re thinking ‘it’s nice, but we’ll just ask them to make it lighter/more saturated/change their style slightly’, they’re probably not the right photographer for you. Asking them to work outside of their honed aesthetic won’t get the best results for either of you, so make sure your love their work as it is

• Do you click with them on a personality level? They’re going to be spending a lot of time with you on your wedding day, from getting ready with your friends in the morning to hitting the dancefloor with you in the evening, so it’s really important you like being around them

• Budget – of course! Photographers fees vary wildly, and there are usually several optional extras to consider as well, including second shooters which we’ll come back to in more detail

• Have they photographed weddings like yours before? At Elegante by Michelle J we frequently plan large, complex weddings over several days and multiple locations, and with specific religious or cultural traditions (such as Jewish and multi-faith weddings), and it’s important that your photographer feels comfortable in these environments. Timelines may not always be as ‘standard’, and with lots of bespoke elements and various things happening, we want to be sure nothing gets missed 

• And finally, are you in agreement about the level of posing they’ll want you to do for your couples’ portraits? It’s worth having the conversation about how they handle this, so you can discuss your wishes and get on the same page before you’re standing in front of the lens, cheeks burning from holding a smile for so long

As your wedding planner, we’ll always be available to join your calls with your photographer if you’d like us to, and can guide you through this whole process and advocate for you and your wishes.

GET IN TOUCH FOR WEDDING PLANNING

Couples’ Wedding Photo Poses: Inspiration from Elegante by Michelle J Couples

Over the 10+ years we’ve been planning luxury weddings in the UK and Europe, we’ve had couples along the entire spectrum of camera-comfy to snap-shy. And yet they’ve all ended up with the most beautiful pictures of themselves together on their wedding days, because they’ve been perfectly aligned with their photographers. Explore these 7 couple pose ideas and see what inspires you:

Dancing and movement couple photos:

Introducing movement always makes a photo feel more natural and relaxed, and capturing the two of you having a little dance, twirling around or just being playful together works beautifully. Just ask our past couples:

Going for a walk:

Taking a stroll around the grounds of your stately home venue, or wandering up and down the cypress-tree-lined driveway of your Italian villa always makes for gorgeous photos. Hand in hand, chatting and laughing, going for a walk helps you feel at ease and doubles up as another way to introduce movement. See how they did it:

Enjoying the scenery:

If you’d rather not be the absolute centre of attention, making the scenery the focal point can help you feel less ‘on the spot’ during your couple photos. Standing together with the Sicilian coastline, a Tuscan countryside skyline or a Spanish vineyard in the background is always a winner, as you’ll see:

Golden hour:

It’s a photographer’s favourite time of the day for a reason – golden hour gives you the most incredible light, and makes the whole place glow. Take a look at some of C&N and B&C’s sunset-soaked snaps at their weddings in Tuscany:

Black and white romance:

Black and white edits are a firm favourite for couple photographs, because they make them feel utterly timeless and very classy. Some of our favourite Elegante weddings captured in black and white were:

Talk to each other/make each other laugh pose:

If you feel awkward standing in front of the camera, your photographer might direct you to say something in the other person’s ear or try to make them laugh. This results in really intimate, cosy portraits with natural reactions, and the ease that already exists between you on full display.

Editorial drama:

If you’re camera confident and looking for that photograph of the two of you at your best, you might like to choose a photographer with a chic, editorial style who will help you bring the drama. Take inspiration from T&M at their wedding near Florence.

How we manage your couples’ portraits in your wedding day timeline

Planning in specific time for your couples’ portraits on your wedding day is important, even if you know you don’t want many. We’ll intentionally include it in your timeline and liaise closely with your photographer on the day, ensuring that enough time is given but that we don’t accidentally run over and start your party late. You’ll find us in close contact with your photographer (and videographer, should you choose to have one) throughout, and we almost become like an extension of one another’s teams.

The same goes for family formal photographs if you choose to include them – we’ll usually ask you to provide a list ahead of time, so we can plan appropriately and help your photographer with finding and snapping the right people. Looking for 7 different family members in a crowd of 120 can take longer than you might anticipate, so we’ll always have a dedicated member of our planning team on hand to help – when we say ‘full service’ wedding planning, we really mean it, and we run a tight ship because it’s in your best interest. We’re sure that 100/100 couples wouldn’t want to sacrifice valuable dancing time if they didn’t have to!

What if you don’t want your couples’ portraits to be online after the wedding?

As wedding planners, part of the job is using photographs of our weddings to appeal to new couples, and book more weddings – that’s just how the business works. As such, you’ll find lots of fabulous images of our couples and their celebrations on our social media, Pinterest, and blog (will link to all). So what happens if you’d rather not have your couples’ portraits online to be used as marketing material, and would instead prefer them to be for your eyes only?

In short: that’s no problem, and be wary of the planner who tells you otherwise. We’ll always respect your wishes and keep your faces off our online presence if that’s what you request, and in some cases couples allow us to use images of their tables, flowers, stationery, cake and so on, but just not of them. 

We will also very likely ask you whether you’d like to submit your wedding to be featured online, once we have your full gallery of photographs back. There are some lovely publications that we’ve had weddings featured in before, places that other couples can go to get inspiration and find suppliers for their own weddings, and many couples think this is a lot of fun and happily agree. We also have plenty of couples who decline, and you should know that that is also always fine with us.

We’re your wedding planner first and foremost, and we care deeply about your experience leading up to and on your wedding day, weekend or week – we would never want you to feel like a cog in the marketing machine, and our ‘hug not a handshake’ approach permeates everything we do.

View A&A’s Smashing The Glass feature from their Jewish wedding in Florence.

If you’re looking for a wedding planner who will guide you through every step of your journey in as much detail as we’ve gone into here, you’re in the right place. Reach out to schedule your free consultation with Michelle, and get a snapshot of what it’s like working together over on our blog.

CONTACT

The post Wedding Planner’s Guide to Couples’ Poses for Photographs appeared first on Elegante by Michelle J.