Rustic Same-Sex Engagement Session

One of my favorite parts of my job is getting to meet some amazing people and capture their love for each other. That is why I had so much fun creating these images during Koi and Erika’s rustic engagement session. I met them for the first time on the day of the session and by the time we were done I left a fan of them. 

For their session, we went to Peñasquiotos Preserve in San Diego. It’s a huge natural park with some beautiful trails. It has wide biking trails along with some that are more narrow. It also has a few open fields. There are tons of background possibilities at this park, but some of them will require a good amount of walking. 

From the start of the session, Koi and Erika seemed perfectly comfortable in front of the camera. This made it really easy getting some great portraits right away. I would have been perfectly happy with the ones that we got in the first location with the wide path that is why by the second location I started experimenting a little bit with light. 

The second location was a narrow trail just wide enough for two people to walk side by side. The trees were full but there were some leaves on the floor adding a bit of texture to the photo. The only thing missing was some sunshine streaking through the frame. I decided to add my own light to this and I backlit the scene with one of my speed lights. It added that little bit of separation as if the sun was shining through the trees. 

Koi and Erika were so much fun to work with throughout the entire session. The way they interacted with each other and showed each other love was something that I’m happy I was able to capture in these photos.