How to Take Your Own Engagement Photos: A Fall-Inspired DIY Guide

Engagement photos are a beautiful way to capture the love and excitement of the journey between you and your partner, but hiring a professional photographer can be expensive. As someone who is a hobbyist photographer, I decided to do our own engagement photos this past fall. In this post, I’ll walk you through my experience capturing the photos in a breathtaking fall setting in a local park, complete with vibrant leaves, a serene pond, and the perfect mix of natural and flash lighting.

Why DIY Your Engagement Photos?

Taking your own engagement photos allows you to:
✅ Save money
✅ Take photos at your own pace
✅ Capture exactly the vision you want
✅ Enjoy a fun and intimate experience with your partner

Armed with my Canon R6, the RF 28-70mm F2 lens, a tripod and a remote shutter, I set out to create engagement photos that felt warm, romantic, and timeless.

Step 1: Choosing the Perfect Location

For this shoot, I selected a picturesque fall setting with a pond nearby and trees bursting with vibrant autumn colors. Fall is an ideal season for engagement photos because the golden hues naturally enhance skin tones, and the soft light adds a romantic feel. When choosing your location, look for:

✔️ A mix of open spaces and natural backdrops (trees, water, trails). This will allow for a nice creamy and blurred-out background.
✔️ Places with fewer people to avoid distractions in the background. Nothing worse than having strangers in the back of your photos.
✔️ Locations that hold special meaning for you as a couple. Make the memory a good one by choosing a special place.

Step 2: Camera Gear & Settings

The Canon R6 paired with the RF 28-70mm F2 was perfect for this shoot, offering stunning sharpness and a beautifully blurred background. I shot in RAW to ensure maximum flexibility in editing.

Settings Used:
📷 Aperture: For these shots, I used an aperture of F2 to F2.8 to blur out the background nicely. Ensure that you and your partner are positioned along the same plane to ensure that both subjects are in focus.
📷 Shutter Speed: 1/500s - 1/640s, depending on lighting conditions.
📷 ISO: 100-400 for natural light shots, 400-800 when using flash in lower light.
📷 White Balance: Auto (adjusted in post if needed)

Step 3: Balancing Natural Light & Flash

Lighting plays a key role in engagement photos. I used a combination of natural light and my Canon 430EX II Speedlite to enhance the images:

☀️ Natural Light: For golden hour shots, I positioned my fiancé and myself with the sun in our faces for a soft, glowing light. This created a warm and romantic feel and the sun was still soft enough to not give harsh shadows. This was not the case as we worked towards the noon hour, as you will see in some photos. The harsh light would require a bit more work in the Lightroom post-processing part of the shoot.

💡 Flash (430EX II Speedlite): For shots where we were standing under a tree or in some shade, I used my flash off-camera with a diffuser to create soft, natural-looking light while maintaining the warm ambiance of the scene.

Pro Tip:
When using flash outdoors, dial down the power to avoid an artificial look. If possible, bounce the flash off a reflector or nearby surface to keep it natural.

Step 4: Posing & Capturing Emotion

The key to capturing natural engagement photos is to make the session fun and relaxed! Here are some poses that worked beautifully:

❤️ Arms Around: Whether it's your arms around your partner, your partner's arms around you, or both, this will create a nice intimate feeling.
❤️ Walking Together: Holding hands and strolling along a leaf-covered path creates movement and authenticity.
❤️ Forehead Touch: A simple, intimate moment that feels effortless and loving.
❤️ Back Hug: One partner wraps their arms around the other from behind for a cozy, affectionate pose.

Pro Tip:
Because it was just me and my partner, I shot in single shot mode. We took the photo, looked at the result at the back of the camera, and if we didn't like it then we took the shot again.

Step 5: Editing for a Polished Look

Editing is where your engagement photos truly come to life. I used Lightroom on the iPad Pro M4 to refine my images.

🎨 Adjustments I made:
✔️ Increased warmth to enhance fall tones.
✔️ Adjusted contrast & clarity to make details pop and to give a light and airy feel.
✔️ Fine-tuned skin tones for a natural glow.
✔️ Cropped to 3:2 ratios with the mindset that I will print out these photos.

Pro Tip:
I edited in Reference Mode on the iPad to keep images consistent in exposure and colour across the entire set.

Final Thoughts: Should You DIY Your Engagement Photos?

Absolutely! If you’re comfortable with a camera and willing to put in some planning, taking your own engagement photos can be a rewarding and personal experience. We had so much doing it too!

✅ Choose a meaningful location
✅ Plan your lighting and camera settings
✅ Use natural interactions and movement for authentic moments
✅ Edit with care to create a polished final look

Would you try DIY engagement photos, or do you prefer hiring a pro? Let me know in the comments! 📸🍂