Karlie Russell and Dale Sharpe are a couple of landscape photographers who met while shooting a sunset — so their stunningly gorgeous proposal photo was, in some ways, meant to be. And because said proposal photo was shot against a backdrop of the Northern Lights, stunning gorgeousness was all but guaranteed.
Together, the couple runs DK Photography in Queensland, Australia, and they share a passion for landscape, seascape, and astrophotography. Dale tried to propose to Karlie once before — on a trip to Iceland — but ran into a minor snag. Karlie was trying to keep their luggage under the weight limit and ended up throwing out the bottle of hand cream in which he hid the $4,000 ring, according to The Daily Mail Australia. Oops.
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Time for plan B: Dale started saving up for a new ring, and decided his second proposal attempt would be during a two-month trip to the Arctic Circle. Dale and Karlie had seen the Aurora Borealis together about 30 times, so he felt it would be the perfect setting.
"We both love chasing the Northern Lights and photographing them together," he told The Daily Mail. "So it seemed pretty fitting." We'd say so: Just look at the mythical dreamscape above. It's like stepping into a unicorn dream.
"It was the most amazing display of color in the Aurora that we've ever seen," he continued. "I wanted to take full opportunity and make it happen at its absolute best. The moment was right, it felt good, so why not."
When the lights started glowing with their fantastical colors, he set up a head torch to make sure the couple would stand out against the background. He then asked Karlie to take a selfie with him and put his camera on a timer.
Of course, this wasn't a normal selfie. When Dale pulled out ring 2.0 (safely hidden in his bag), Karlie said yes — and now the travel-loving couple has an engagement photo for the ages. She told The Daily Mail that she was pretty shocked when it happened.
"I kept talking over him, saying, 'What are you doing, what are you doing,'" she said, laughing.
The couple plans to display the photo in their home (because how could you not?).
"The most ironic thing is that we're both landscape photographers, but have zero photos hanging up on our walls of our images," Dale said. "But this is one image that we want to keep for ourselves, and hang up on the wall."