Yukon Aurora

I have wanted to see the Northern Lights for years and this trip to the Yukon made it a reality. We got lucky with the conditions and saw the Aurora our first night and it turned out to be the most impressive of the entire trip. The light display was crazy with the aurora spanning the entire length of the sky, dancing and blazing for hours. It was truly awe inspiring and just looking at the pictures now, while they cannot really do it justice, still manages to bring back those feelings I had when I saw it the first time.

This was taken with my 24mm tilt shift, which I love. I have infinity dialed in and can nail it every time by lining up the two marks I have made on the lens. So after taking the camera out of my bag, I turned on my headlamp, found my infinity mark on the lens, and starting taking pictures. It turns out that when I took the camera out of the bag I must have bumped the tilt knob and I didn't realize it until almost the very end of the night. So yeah, 95% of my shots are out of focus. There was much more impressive displays of light than I have in this photo but all those shots are just soft and fuzzy digital crap. So very frustrating. I think my brain is like that lens, it also seems to go soft and fuzzy at times...

Click the Flickr link to enlarge and view on black.

IMAGE LINK: https://www.flickr.com …/in/photostream​/lightbox/

How Green Is My Valley

Nice shot. I was in Dawson on the nights of 09/04 & 09/05. We got in late (around 1am) on 09/04 as we drove from Haines Junction thru Top Of The World Highway. Both nights did not yield any NL for us to shoot. What night was this shot taken on?

This was taken on Sept. the 4th at little after 1 am. I'm trying to remember exactly where this was, I think about an hour outside of Dawson, up the Dempster Highway. We also had a great show the next night too.

Lovely shot, you obviously had time to find a good location. We went to Norway in October in the hope of seeing the lights, luckily we saw them 8 nights on the trot, unfortunately 7 of those were from a moving boat so choice of background was out the door for me.

That's a cracking shot mate

john crossley wrote in post #17345930
That's a cracking shot mate

Thanks!

sidknee wrote in post #17345927
Lovely shot, you obviously had time to find a good location. We went to Norway in October in the hope of seeing the lights, luckily we saw them 8 nights on the trot, unfortunately 7 of those were from a moving boat so choice of background was out the door for me.

Norway is on my bucket list. It seems though that all of the Aurora shots that I've seen from Norway include a village or some form of light pollution. I'm not sure why that is.

I'm trying to get my head around how amazing this must have been. This is an incredible image and I'm sure the memories are even better. You must have cast shadows from the star light, those are some serious dark skies up there.

Just insanely beautiful !!!!
Well, did you run around like a crazy man or just stop breathing and stare in awe !?
I did both when I saw my first.
Great shot and a memory that will last till the rocker stops..
Thanks

Park Ranger wrote in post #17347852
Just insanely beautiful !!!!
Well, did you run around like a crazy man or just stop breathing and stare in awe !?
I did both when I saw my first.
Great shot and a memory that will last till the rocker stops..
Thanks

Yeah, it was almost unbelievable. I think I first uttered a "Holy *#$%" and then just stared silently in awe.

Looks like your processing killed the EXIF.. mind talking a bit about the exposure? I'm curious as to how one properly exposes for the aurora.

This was 2 shots, 1 for the aurora and 1 for the land. The land was 30 seconds, f/3.5 at ISO 3200. The aurora was 2.5 seconds, f/3.5 at ISO 6400.

I prefer relatively short shutter speeds for the aurora to keep some definition in the lights. I could have used a lower ISO/longer shutter speed but then the lights start looking more like smeary blobs of light. On my Nikon I would have shot it at 3200 if not lower as I can brighten in post without getting noise to the point where the shot is unusable.

fantastic capure!

me.. just seeing a beautiful sunset with clouds and nice color already makes me go 'ooh ***,*** this is beautiful!!' I surely will be more jaw dropping seeing the lights. 'whos that hot naked chic in front of me? get out of the way! you're blocking my view!

but seriously.. I can't imagine how much thrill I would be.

Bcaps wrote in post #17347994
This was 2 shots, 1 for the aurora and 1 for the land. The land was 30 seconds, f/3.5 at ISO 3200. The aurora was 2.5 seconds, f/3.5 at ISO 6400.

I prefer relatively short shutter speeds for the aurora to keep some definition in the lights. I could have used a lower ISO/longer shutter speed but then the lights start looking more like smeary blobs of light. On my Nikon I would have shot it at 3200 if not lower as I can brighten in post without getting noise to the point where the shot is unusable.

Thanks! Heading to Iceland in 2015, hoping to get some similar shots.

DTBaan wrote in post #17348002
fantastic capure!

me.. just seeing a beautiful sunset with clouds and nice color already makes me go 'ooh ***,*** this is beautiful!!' I surely will be more jaw dropping seeing the lights. 'whos that hot naked chic in front of me? get out of the way! you're blocking my view!

but seriously.. I can't imagine how much thrill I would be.

Thanks!

BrandonSi wrote in post #17348024
Thanks! Heading to Iceland in 2015, hoping to get some similar shots.

I came across this after my trip, some good tips.

Awesome capture and love the composition Dave, well done.