Headshots and business portraits are great to shoot. However, I love shooting engagement portraits and couples! Perhaps it has something to do with my love of romance stories and the thought of happily ever-after. When couples book an engagement session, it’s like writing a chapter in a book and they’re asking me to tell a portion of their story.

With their photo session, the couple gets a chance to encapsulate their love, remember where and when their love began, and look forward to the day when they become a married couple. Working with couples gives me an opportunity to see them at their most relaxed, share intimate moments and convey their feelings within each frame.


It’s important to get to know the couple as a unit, but even more important to know what motivates them as individuals.


It’s important to get to know the couple as a unit, but even more important to know what motivates them as individuals and how they play off of one another. I always work to discover their connection and encourage them to display how much they cherish their relationship. Having insight helps when posing the couple and getting the best pictures possible without looking posed and unnatural.


I did a photo shoot with a couple who wanted quirky, fun engagement pictures to send out to family and friends. They had special t-shirts made up just for the shoot.


The groom-to-be—like most grooms-to-be—wasn’t 100 percent certain that a photo shoot was where he wanted to spend his Saturday afternoon. When we started the shoot he stood still, smiling occasionally and sporting a look of silent pleading. His fiancée on the other hand was all about fun.


I worked with him to make him comfortable and get into the spirit of the shoot. Soon he started to relax. He relaxed not only because I made him feel comfortable. He relaxed because of his love for his fiancée and her happiness—something I discovered. I discovered just how much he loved her and that he would do anything she wanted. So a shoot, which started out as almost intolerable (for him), turned out to be fun and worthwhile for both.


Therein lies the romance!


-R