Auroras
Chasing auroras and other stuff
Aurora
I’m picky about what I want in my Aurora pictures. Random photos of shafts of light in the sky don’t cut it for me anymore. I want foreground, mountains, and snow-filled trees showing scale, too. Which means I don’t go out chasing them around much.
To begin with, my mountains are to the south, so I need to see a really good forecast before I even bother to adjust my sleep schedule. Such as a predicted G3, 7kp+ forecast or better. I need auroras that will reach south of me, over the mountains. Then I need clear skies and ideally, a quarter to half moon over my left or right shoulder, casting side light onto a preferably snow-loaded landscape. I never get the full recipe, but usually just enough to make the endeavour worthwhile. Which was the case last Tuesday.
As I drove the ten miles up the winding valley road, I could see greens and a touch of red in the sky over the mountains, which meant I would at least be getting out of my truck when I got to the lake. Even though the skies around me were clear, and the forecast was for clear skies, the mountains often have clouds anyway. My first clear view down the lake showed the mountains at the far end to be mostly clear of clouds. So I started off down the lakeside trail, heading for one of several spots I’d already scouted out and marked on an electronic map for just such a night.
My first spot was just over a mile down the trail, and since I didn’t have snow-loaded trees, which weren’t all that important for this composition, I ended up spending all of my time here. My other composition, further down the trail, would feature trees much more prominently, which I really needed to be full of snow, with a dash of moonlight as well, which I didn’t have this night. Spruce trees without snow on them become black holes of nothingness in night photography.
As I headed off down the trail, the auroras I saw driving up had died down to nothing more than greyish, barely visible smudges in the sky. But taking a quick snap with my iPhone, which can see more than I can, showed them to be light green auroras with a touch of red.
I was overdressed for hiking at 20°F, but not overdressed for standing around in 20°F for hours on end. Instead of stopping to layer down and then layer up later when I got to my spot, I unzipped my outer layer and hiked slowly to avoid breaking a sweat.
Anyway, I left the parking lot about 8:30, and three hours later, I got my favorite shot of the night.
I could definitely see this with the naked eye!
A little moonlight on the mountains and some snow-covered trees would have been nice, but as always, I’m thankful for what I do get.
The auroras flared up this bright several times during the night, but this was the only time they were centered over the far end of the lake when they did flare up.
I flipped my camera vertically on my tripod and tried to get the mountains and the center point of the auroras above my head in one shot, but it was not to be. My wide-angle lens wasn’t wide enough. However, bright auroras were behind me, helping to illuminate the mountains nicely.
After about five hours in this spot, the coffee wasn’t hot anymore, and I was feeling a chill. So I left my camera on interval shoot mode and went for a walk up and down the trail to warm up a bit. At one point, I went down to the shoreline to investigate a tree half in the water, possibly to use as foreground for a different composition, and as I walked back, I paused here, thinking I might get a selfie out of it. It worked.
Just after my walk, I got treated to about twenty minutes of pulsating auroras. Everyone is familiar with the usual wavy curtain look of regular auroras, but pulsating auroras are when ripples of energy flash across the sky, exciting the auroras into flashes of excitement. It’s hard to explain, but below is a crappy video of it.
They were bright enough to cast shadows around me.
Anyway, the almost half moon rose above the horizon off to the left of my composition and was on track to arc across the sky above the mountain at the end of the lake. Which, as far as my camera is concerned, is the same thing as someone shining a flashlight in your face. Photographing auroras down the lake was over for this night. I started hiking back to my truck around two thirty and was home in bed around four.
Other Stuff
Winter Camping
I’ve been winter camping before, kind of, in various half assed ways. But now, I want to start actual winter camping, as in going somewhere for a few nights in a tent. The only reason I haven’t been doing this already is that it’s a pretty significant gear investment for something I may or may not stick with. However, between our increasingly milder winters and the gear I do have, I think it’s time to start easing into it, which I think I can do with minimal cost. I’ve also found that when I immerse myself in a place, typically by spending several days camping, I get better pictures, which is a pretty good motivator.
So, I’m starting to put together a winter camping setup.
Here’s my tent. It’s a military surplus ‘combat vehicle crew’ tent that I got fifteen years ago, basically for free. It’s 20-25 years old but is in brand new, never been used condition. It’s 10’ X 10’ and 6’ tall. A little on the big side for one person, not terribly heavy, and I can easily pull this along behind me on a kids sled. I may eventually install a stove jack for a small wood stove, but I will stick with a buddy heater for now.
Can’t beat the price, and if I do stick with winter camping, I’ll know exactly what I want in a new, smaller and lighter tent after being out with this a few times.
I’ll be spending the night out in the back yard in this here shortly.
Any experienced winter hot-tent campers with some tips to share out there?
I guess that’s a wrap for now.
Thank you for being here,
Sean Mitchell
Eagle River
Awesome shots. Thanks for braving the cold.
...wow... only word for it... !