Top 5 Tips for Beautiful Fall Photography

(All photos in this post are edited with presets from the Warm & Organic Millennium Collection and photographed by Rebecca from BeckStar Imagery)

Top 5 Tips for Beautiful Fall Photos

Without a doubt, my favorite time of year to shoot is in the early Fall.  It's the perfect time for family sessions and mini-sessions, too.  I love capturing all the beautiful colors in this short window mother nature gives us. 

Today, I'm excited to share some helpful Fall photography tips for making this a successful season for your photography business. 

Here are a few ways to make the most of your Autumn photo sessions:

1. Take Advantage of the Fall Colors

Fall is the perfect time of year to shoot outdoors.  When the leaves are in full color, just before they fall off the trees, they offer a gorgeous backdrop for any type of photography. 

To boost the contrast and Fall colors, even more, try attaching a polarizing filter to your lens.  Polarizing filters will subtly increase the contrast of your image in-camera and save you from having to add contrast in post-processing.

(Before & after using Warm & Organic Millennium Presets)

2. Wear the Right Clothes

If you are photographing individual or family portraits, suggest that your clients wear solid colors.  If they insist on patterned clothing, make sure the pattern is very basic.  There is already so much color in nature during Autumn that it can make heavily patterned clothing appear extremely busy against the backdrop of bright Fall colors.

Also, pay attention to the color of the leaves versus the color of your subject's clothes.  Try to get your client to dress in colors that are complementary to red, yellow, and orange.  These include shades of blue and green; of course, the classic black, white, and gray combo is always a winner! 

For more information, check out our What-to-Wear to a Photoshoot Guide for Families here.

(Before & after using Warm & Organic Millennium Presets)

3. Lighting

In the fall, you may deal with sunny or completely cloudy days.  Here are some tips for shooting in both situations!

For sunny days, try shooting when the light is soft – either in the morning or early evening.  Shooting at Golden hour is ideal.  This time of day will decrease the harsh shadows on your subject and illuminate the leaves on the trees, creating a stained-glass effect with all the colors.  Click here for more information on taking photos in the harsh mid-day sun.

If the sky is cloudy, you may find that the scenery looks a bit gloomy.  Don’t fret, though! 

A tiny pop of flash will increase the contrast and saturation of the colors of the leaves and illuminate your subject.  Don’t overdo the flash – a little bit goes a long way.  The goal is to avoid creating shadows with your flash, so you will, most likely, need to set your flash close to its lowest setting or use a flash diffuser.  Here is an excellent cheat sheet for lighting.

(Before & after using Warm & Organic Millennium Presets)

4. Camera Settings

Fall is the perfect time to take advantage of shooting with a wide aperture to create some dreamy, blurry background bokeh that will make viewers swoon!  A wide aperture (for example, between f/2.8 and f/4.5) will blur the leaves while maintaining perfect focus on your subject. 

On the other hand, you can try experimenting with a narrow aperture (f/8 and higher) to get more of the leaves in focus.  This can result in some interesting shots, but you MAY find the increased focus on the leaves makes the various colors too busy and takes the focus away from your subject.

(Before & after using Warm & Organic Millennium Presets)

5. Post-Processing

Depending on where you live (and many other factors, including weather, lighting, etc.), you may find your images need additional post-processing to achieve a beautiful Fall look.  Or you may just want to enhance the warm red & orange leaves that can only be found for a short time every year.

You can certainly play with the many Lightroom sliders to enhance various Fall colors.  However, my absolute favorite way to edit Fall photos is with the Warm & Organic Millennium Preset Collection (for both Lightroom desktop & mobile) and the Bold & Vibrant Lightroom Adjustment Brushes (Lightroom desktop only).

These beautiful presets & brushes will quickly transform and infuse your images with warm, vibrant colors, golden hues, and rich color enhancements that are perfect for a Fall look.  Often these enhancements are completed in one click, but as with all presets, sometimes you may need to make some minor adjustments to exposure and white balance settings in Lightroom, depending on your camera and shooting conditions.

As you can see from all the BEFORE and AFTER photos in this blog post, the Warm & Organic Millennium Preset Collection does an incredible job of enhancing and unifying the various tones and colors that occur naturally during the Fall.

(Before & after using Warm & Organic Millennium Presets)

And if you use Photoshop and want to add something extra special to your Fall images, check out the Falling Leaves Overlays and Photoshop Action Collection, which I use to add gorgeous leaf overlays to many of my Fall images.  This unique collection includes over 100 leaf overlays authentically created from "real leaves," several beautiful Fall toning actions, and more.

Do you have any questions or comments about Fall Photography?  Leave us a comment below - we would LOVE to hear from you!  And PLEASE SHARE this post using the social sharing buttons (we really appreciate it)!