Northern Lights on the horizon

[Nate]

Finally got some time to look at my weekend photos, and caught this in a some what break in the clouds.

Rare to see it this bright in Idaho and on a night off work, so had to check it out. Sky was bright ,white like, could pass for city lights but no big towns north of me.

 

I used my 77D full spectrum/Canon 40mm/ Filter is a uv/ir cut that passes a bit more into the IR side.

Used DXO Photolab 6 to process

 

ISO 1600, f3.5, at 8.7 sec

 

This DXO program has probably the best noise reduction I've seen, but at $219usd it better be great.  looking forward to trying handheld UV this summer.

[colinbm]

Wow, thanks Nate.
Something I am never likely to see.

[lukaszgryglicki]

Great pic! I was on a Polar Expedition in Svalbard for 13 months, so I saw many, I loved them!

 

[Nate]

Thanks @lukaszgryglicki That would have been so cool to see that all the time, pretty rare where I'm at.

 

@colinbm I find it a treat to see them too where I'm at. There's a few Southern Hemisphere night sky objects too I'll never get to photograph. I'd like to photograph the other end of the Milky Way core, and an upside down Moon. JK In space there is no up or down.

[Doug A]

Remarkable event and capture. Your post processing looks great, not over done. I remember the northern lights occuring once in Missouri. Once. Very long ago, probably the '80s .

Thanks for sharing,

Doug A

[Nate]

Thanks @Doug A I wish I took out my Tokina 11-16mm for this but would have just been full spectrum as no room for filter mounting in camera body.

[Kai]

On 3/3/2023 at 5:28 AM, Nate said:

Finally got some time to look at my weekend photos, and caught this in a some what break in the clouds.

Rare to see it this bright in Idaho and on a night off work, so had to check it out. Sky was bright ,white like, could pass for city lights but no big towns north of me.

 

I used my 77D full spectrum/Canon 40mm/ Filter is a uv/ir cut that passes a bit more into the IR side.

Used DXO Photolab 6 to process

 

ISO 1600, f3.5, at 8.7 sec

 

This DXO program has probably the best noise reduction I've seen, but at $219usd it better be great.  looking forward to trying handheld UV this summer.

Yes Nate - Deep-Prime XD ist great!!! :)
And your picture is too... :D

[Nate]

Thanks @Kai All weekend I've been taking high iso shots and running them through deep prime XD testing the limits.

[dabateman]

These are nice. If I lived in a place with the lights, I would try to grab an IR and/or UV shot. I have seen a nice shot in IR somewhere. 

[Nate]

Thanks @dabatemanI really never thought about photographing this in IR, probably would of made it a little easier. I was kind of caught up in the visuals and unprepared. When I got to location, I had about 20 min till clouds covered the sky. Hoping I get another chance not 15 years apart again.

[otoien]

While auroras are rare further south, the reward is often more colors, especially with respect to red.  Very nice image, Nate

Auroras these days almost occur daily around here, weather permitting their view, however we tend to get the more boring monochromatic green color.

As noted, we have had threads on IR auroras here before. IR exposures are about the same as the visible light.  both Birna and I posted IR-auroras as comments in this thread: 

 

[otoien]

 

OK, here is the IR capture I posted in that thread . False color adjusted to my liking, but not too far off from what my standard preset for the  D40x IR 720nm would give me.

 

[Nate]

Thanks @otoien

 

Excellent capture!  I think I'd be out taking pics of it every free night. 

You sure are given quite the sights up there.

[otoien]

Thanks, just to follow up, here is one from 3 weeks ago that was a bit more colorful than normal. I added some contrast and saturation to bring it out better but routinely use daylight WB for these captures, so there is no artificial color shift caused by manipulated WB. Around here these kind of colors sometimes appear when the aurora is less intense. The purple and reds are typically not very visible to the eye, which has low sensitivity in the red end of the spectrum so it looks pretty gray. 6 sec exposure  with Nikon 12-24mm @14mm and F/4 on unmodified D500 at ISO1600,  captured from right in front of the door to my cabin, facing south. An advantage of living in a dry cabin is the need to take a check outside pretty often. :-)

 

[Nate]

Excellent pic! It's nice to see how it would have looked from up north.

[otoien]

Thanks, Nate.

[Andrea B.]

Loved seeing your Northern Lights, Nate.  So unusual (and wonderful) that they reached Idaho.

[Nate]

Thanks @Andrea B. I hope I get another chance to get some pics of it here.