living in south jersey as portrait / wedding photographers we get lots of requests to do engagement shoots on the beach. while the beach can be an ideal location on certain days of the year it can also turn very cold, windy, and bright the majority of the time. fellow photographers often ask us “how to shoot engagement portraits on the beach?” our approach to beach photography is quite simple: we like to find a location on the beach that offers us plenty of options… things like piers, jetties, wooden steps, beach walls, & dunes all work well. having different textures available to you during your shoot will allow you plenty of options for posing your couple and discovering interesting composition opportunities. it is also a huge advantage to schedule your session about an hour or so before sunset. having the sun low in the sky will provide more flattering lighting on your subjects, this is key for portrait photography. we also like to shoot half of our session on the beach and half around the surrounding neighborhood to give the session more dynamic. the next time you have have to photograph some portraits on the beach, try our little tips and don’t just shoot the big blue sky and ocean the whole time. (:
without further ado, lets introduce our super fun-tastic couple: samara+dani
samara+dani met us over at the beach in margate, nj for their engagement session on a chilly afternoon a few hours before sunset. these two were a complete ball of fun and up for every crazy thing we asked them to do in front of our cameras. we couldn’t have asked for anything more. (: dani & his partner raina run a killer clothing boutique in northfield nj, called simply fly boutique – while samara sticks to laying down the law. next time you’re in town, make sure you stop in to say hello and tell them how “rockin hot” they looked in their engagement pictures. (: enjoy.
here are some more engagements on the beach we photographed recently in the south jersey area: antoinette+ricky – ocean city nj – shannon+rj – ocean city nj – jessica+brad – margate nj
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