You can always tell when wedding portraits are trying a little too hard.

Hands placed just so. Smiles starting to look painful. Kisses looking like they’ve been held for seven seconds and are just waiting for applause.

And then there are The Other Ones™.

The ones where you can practically hear what she whispered in his ear while holding onto his lapel for dear life. The ones where her waist starts to look weird without his hands gripping it. The ones that don’t feel like “wedding portraits” so much as evidence of the sweetness in your story.

Lea and Grayson’s portraits fall squarely into that second category. 

They didn’t approach their wedding day like a production. They approached it like— wait for it— their wedding day.

(You know, that whole best-day-of-your-lives business? The one where you spend an entire day being totally, publicly obsessed with each other and totally, completely present with your people?)

Let’s talk about how you get that vibe for your own wedding portraits, shall we? 

1. For the Love of All That’s Good and Cinematic, Please Stop Performing For The Camera

(This one might sting a little.)

On occasion, a couple will roll up to their wedding portraits acting like they’re about to shoot the cover of Modern Bride & Groom Quarterly. Deep breath. Serious face. Slow spin. Dramatic pause, just for effect.

Meanwhile I’m standing there thinking, “Who are you, and what have you done with my couple?”

Lea and Grayson didn’t suddenly become cinematic strangers in couture. They look like two humans who just married their best friend and are low-key still in shock about it.

That photographs far more interesting than anyone’s idea of creative wedding poses would. 

2. Let Your Hands Go Where They Want To Go

Your hands already know your person.

Believe me, they won’t forget the small, subconscious places they’ve been reaching for since year one.

The hands tucked into a back pocket. The thumb nestled at the base of the spine. The fingers hooked into a suit lapel like you’re claiming property.

That is tenderness. That is familiarity. That is ten times more intimate than any “creative wedding pose” post you’ve ever saved.

When Lea leaned into Grayson, her hand didn’t hover awkwardly in midair, waiting for me to tell her where to put it. It assumed the position, exactly where it always does. And his hands responded exactly how they always do— by promptly finding her waist or the space between her chin.

You want wedding portraits that feel lived? Let your body default to its habits. Your love story has one heck of muscle memory; all you have to do is trust that it will show up.

3. Choose A Venue You Feel At Home In

This one is a sleeper hit. You probably didn’t think it would find its way into this particular blog post.

But I’ve said it once, and I’ll say it again: the venue matters, even when it comes to creative wedding poses.

For Lea and Grayson’s wedding, Woods and Co. set the mood within seconds. 

You drive through the bluffs of Pepin, winding into the woods, and then suddenly there’s this stunning, modern structure tucked into the trees. Café lights lining the path. Ceremony site with grand doors waiting where rock and sky for guests to arrive. Huge (and I mean, HUGE) windows swallowing the light. Wood and matte black details adding a certain sense of drama to it all. 

Lea and Grayson moved like they belonged there.

When your venue feels like you, your shoulders drop, and you settle in and stay awhile. And when you’re settled, your wedding portraits show it. 

Need a hand finding a Minnesota wedding venue that feels like home? I’ve got your back, right here.

4. Trust That Your Wedding Photographer (Hi!) Is Moving At Lightning Speed

As you scroll through these portraits, you’ll notice that the perspective changes every five seconds.

Wide shot against the bluffs. Tight crop on hands. Side angle catching the veil mid-shift. Backlit hair. Low angle making the couple look more cinematic than they’ve ever looked before. 

How’s that happening, you might ask? I am not standing still. I am side-stepping, crouching, adjusting by inches, watching how the light moves, and backing up into a shrub (worth it). 

You don’t need to create variety. You don’t need to “switch it up.” You don’t need to ask, “Should we do something different?”

You just stay in the moment, together. I handle the rest. 

Creative wedding photoshoot ideas are fun in theory. In practice? Variety in your wedding portraits comes from your wedding photographer shifting her vantage point— not making you break a sweat right before your vows. 

5. Stay In The Moment After The “Moment”

The kiss is great. The half-second after the kiss? Even better.

There’s this liminal moment between when you think I’ve stopped clicking the shutter and when I’ve actually stopped clicking the shutter. (AKA, approximately never.) And it is sheer cinema, every single time. 

The laugh that breaks out when you accidentally bump foreheads while trying to crawl out from under the veil. The way your hand adjusts on his shoulder because your heels are feeling a bit wobbly on the forest floor. How you glance up through your lashes at your husband, still trying to wrap your head around the fact that you get to call him that for the rest of your life. 

If you freeze for the moment, we only get the moment. If you keep moving, we get the magic.

6. Decide To Be Present All Day (Not Just During Your Wedding Portraits)

This was the difference-maker. Lea and Grayson made the decision early on that they weren’t going to perform their wedding day for the camera (or for anyone else, for that matter). 

They wanted to be 100% present with all of the people who showed up to celebrate their love story. And because they went into their day with that mindset, portraits weren’t some switch they had to flip. It wasn’t like they had to turn on the ‘camera mode’ version of themselves.

They just… stayed present.

If you spend your entire day actually in it— hugging harder than necessary (no such thing), laughing louder than you thought possible, listening and snuggling during speeches instead of scanning the room for the camera— that energy doesn’t disappear when we step away for wedding portraits.

It carries through.

Florist: Lake City Floral | Make Up: Cindy at Northern Style & Co. | Hair: Amy at Lady Vamp Artistry | DJ: Oreo Says Go | Dress Shop: A and Bé Bridal | Dress Designer: Jenny Yoo | Suit: Mens Warehouse | Dessert: Nothing Bundt Cakes | Food: Meatheads Catering | Day of Coordinator: Sarah Antinozzi | Venue: Woods + Co

TLDR; Creative Wedding Portraits 101

If you want wedding portraits that feel like lived moments instead of something you practiced in your bedroom mirror:

​​1. Stop performing. Truly. No one handed out Oscars at the rehearsal dinner.

2. Let your hands land where they always land. On his jaw. In her hair. Thumb hooked in the lapel. Fingers laced without thinking about it. Your muscle memory knows more about intimacy than any “creative wedding pose” ever will.

3. Choose a venue you feel at home in. If the space makes you exhale the second you step into it, your shoulders will drop in the photos. 

4. Trust that your photographer is moving like a caffeinated squirrel around you. I’ve got angles. I’ve got light. I’ve got a sixth sense for when your foreheads almost touch.

5. Stay in the in-between. That’s where the good stuff lives.

Creative wedding photoshoot ideas are fun to scroll. Save them if you want; I’m not the Pinterest police.

But wedding portraits that feel lived in come from presence. And that, my friends, cannot be faked.