For future photo sessions, if you really love that outdoor strong light look, check out the paintings of Hongmin Zou (on this site). He poses his subjects with the direct sunlight coming over their shoulder and none of the light falls on their faces.
Doing that would give you an opportunity to show subtly modelled features and no extremes of contrast but still gives you a lovely outdoor portrait.
An exposure tip: I would imagine he bounces light back into the faces with a reflector placed behind his camera as he shoots. That seems especially likely on the one shown below, with the woman in purple.
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