A Trio Of Engagement Photo Tips

The other week Shawn and I had our engagement photos taken. I’m too shy too put them up on the blog (though if you know me on Facebook, you can check them out over there) so you’re just going to have to trust me when I say that they turned out great.

And the whole experience of getting them taken was also great, as well as quite educational. I had a lot of faith in our photographer, my friend the very talented Christopher Manson, and I knew the end result would be beautiful photos. But I was worried about the actual process. Shawn and I are hardly naturals in front of the camera and I was concerned that our photo shoot might be long and painful.
It turns out that that concern was completely invalid because in addition to being talented, Chris is also quite funny and put us both at ease. So there’s engagement photo tip #1: find a photographer who’s not just good but is also funny, friendly and some you both mesh with personality-wise. Though Chris did take a lot of shots, our shoot never felt long and it was actually fun instead of being painful.

Engagement photo tip #2: have a plan but be flexible. We knew we wanted photos that were relaxed and casual looking and set outdoors. Since we live near Toronto's biggest (and in my opinion best) park, High Park, we decided to take them over there. But we didn’t plan the exact location, instead letting Chris pick the spots that he thought would work best. This turned out to be a great approach since having a general location saved time and stress but not having a specific spot allowed Chris to his thing while further reducing stress on our end since we weren’t worry about what we’d do if our specific spot was occupied or somehow unusable (in case you're wondering, Chris had us pose sitting on the ground in front of a flowering bush and then do a bunch of standing poses down by the pond).

And finally, for tip #3, make sure to apply a heavier than normal coating of loose or pressed powder over your foundation/concealer. Between the lights and the pressure, you will be sweating and the last thing you want in your photos is a shiny face. And if you can, apply a bit of that powder on your male partner. While he might protest, the end result is worth it.