Couple photoshoot in France

The commonest way a couple session goes wrong is silence: a photographer who says "just be natural" and then waits. Ninety minutes of that produces forty photographs of two people wondering what to do with their arms. Direction runs throughout this session — where to walk, where to stop, what to say to each other — and the results look unposed precisely because they were directed.

The route is scouted for the time of day you book rather than picked off a list. Light moves, crowds move, and a square that is empty and golden at eight is a car park with tourists in it at eleven. Ninety minutes on foot covers enough ground for several backdrops without anyone getting into a car.

It works as well for two people who have been together twenty years as for an engagement or an anniversary, and the same session is what most people book before a wedding to get used to being photographed. Forty retouched photographs arrive in a private gallery within 48 to 72 hours.