"I'm not photogenic" is something we hear from roughly 70% of our clients before a session. After thousands of shoots, we've learned it's almost never true. The real issue is usually that people don't know what to do with their bodies when a camera appears. Here's what actually works.
The Biggest Mistake: Looking at the Camera
The most natural moments in photography almost never involve someone staring directly at the lens. That's a headshot pose — formal, professional, and useful for LinkedIn. For lifestyle portraits, engagement sessions, and family photos, the magic happens when people are engaged with each other or with their surroundings, not with the camera.
Our direction is almost always: look at your partner, look at the horizon, look at your child — not at me. When we want a direct camera look, we ask for it specifically. Unprompted eye contact with the lens is the number one thing that makes a photo feel stiff.
Movement Is Your Best Friend
Static poses require conscious thought about where every limb is — and that self-consciousness reads in the photo. Movement short-circuits the overthinking. When we ask couples to walk together, the first 10 steps look awkward. By step 15, they've forgotten we're there.
We use movement prompts constantly: "Walk toward that tree and tell them something you've never told them." "Run." "Spin her." "Pick up the kids." The resulting images are genuine because the people in them are genuinely doing something.
What to Do With Your Hands
Hands are the hardest thing to manage in a photo, and the thing people obsess over most. Our advice: give your hands a job. Hold your partner's hand. Put one hand lightly in a pocket. Hold a bouquet, a jacket, a bag — anything that gives your hands a reason to exist in the frame without just hanging there.
For couples, we almost always have someone's hands in contact with the other person — a hand on a waist, fingers interlaced, a hand on a cheek. It looks natural because it is natural. Humans touch each other.
Breathe Before Every Shot
One technique we learned from a portrait photographer we deeply respect: before every important shot, ask your subject to take a slow breath and let it out. The exhale relaxes the jaw, softens the shoulders, and drops the tension that accumulates when someone knows a camera is pointing at them. We do this before every family formal and every solo portrait.
Laugh on Purpose (It Sounds Weird, It Works)
Genuine laughter is almost impossible to fake — but fake laughter, started consciously, often turns real within seconds. We'll say "fake laugh, go" and watch the forced giggling become real as the awkwardness of the exercise hits. The resulting images capture genuine joy, not a performance of it.
Wear Clothes You Actually Feel Good In
The most photogenic outfit is the one that makes you feel most like yourself. We've watched clients light up in a well-fitted casual dress in a way they never did in a formal gown that felt out of character. Confidence in what you're wearing translates directly into how you carry yourself. Never wear something new to a photo session — wear something you've lived in, know you love, and feel like yourself in.
Trust Your Photographer
The most relaxed clients we work with are the ones who let go of control and trust us to tell them what to do. You don't need to know how to pose. You need a photographer who knows how to see, how to direct, and how to create the conditions for natural moments to happen. That's our job — not yours.
Walk into your session knowing: we've done this hundreds of times, we see you clearly, and we will not take the shutter until something real is happening in the frame.
