Engagement Photography in Hadapsar, Pune

Formal, or relaxed

The two families rarely agree on how formal an engagement should be.

It shows in everything from what people wear to whether anybody expects a line of arranged portraits, and it is almost never discussed.

A photographer who assumes one register will produce a set that reads oddly to the other side.

The practical answer is to do both, deliberately: a short sequence of properly arranged formal frames, and then coverage that is entirely relaxed.

That satisfies everybody and it takes about twenty minutes of the evening.

It is worth agreeing which of the two happens first, and the answer is almost always the formal ones.

People will stand still for arranged photographs early and will not do it once the evening has warmed up.

It is worth knowing that the two families are also forming impressions of each other during this, which affects behaviour.

People are on their best behaviour, slightly stiff, and unusually conscious of being observed by relatives they have just met.

That is precisely why the arranged frames should happen early, while everybody is still composed, rather than late when they are tired of performing.

It is also worth asking whether either family has expectations about who appears with whom.

Seniority, precedence and which relatives are photographed with the couple all matter more at an engagement than at almost any other function.

Getting that wrong is noticed, and getting it right takes one conversation.