Sensual Portrait Photography Tips

Couples love portraits of themselves together, but often their photos only contain one person or the other, as someone has to hold the camera! Couples also don’t often think to shoot the kind of sensual portrait that makes a great keepsake. These two things make a great reason for you to start shooting some sensual couple portraits yourself.

Sensual couple portraits are really all about the pose. A typical pose would be the male half of the couple standing behind the female, kissing her neck, which is arched back. She would have her eyes closed (as would he) and mouth slightly open. This sort of ‘moment of passion’ pose is relatively easy to achieve, but only when your models feel relaxed and comfortable with what they’re doing.

So how do you make your models feel comfortable and relaxed? First of all, shoot them somewhere they feel at home, such as their living room or (even better) their bedroom. Ensure that the temperature in the room is warm, and that your lighting scheme is soft and warm-toned. Some mood music also helps. Once you have this kind of set-up, the rest is all in your attitude – be confident and direct your models to do what you want firmly and without apology. Once you are a little way into the shoot your models should pick up on what looks good and start to improvise without needing too much input from you. Periodically show them the results on your camera’s LCD screen so that they can see how things look and adjust their poses accordingly.

If you think your models might struggle to catch on with the kind of look you are hoping to achieve, it doesn’t hurt to bring along a couple of books of photos that are similar to what you want to shoot. This will help your models understand what they should be doing.

In terms of lighting, a basic lighting scheme would be as simple as one soft box behind you and to the right, lighting the models at 45°, and one light behind the models to light the background and provide separation from it (a normal desk lamp could be used for this).