Thursday, October 6, 2011

How to photograph the Aurora

Lots of questions came in the past few weeks after my last blog post with regards to how I am able to photograph the Northern lights. Besides finding the buttons in the dark and managing the cold, it's actually pretty simple. Here are a few tips...

1. Use a tripod

2. Set your ISO high - at least 1600 or maybe even higher

3. Switch everything on your camera to Manual - as well as manual focus, which should be set to infinity (in the dark it is hard to see focus, so focus on a light source at least 20 metres away).

4. Use a wide angle lens and open your aperture as wide as possible (f2.8 - f4)

5. Use a cable release so you don't need to touch your camera, or set a countdown timer to let the camera settle after you release the shutter.

6. Play with various exposure lengths, from 1 second to perhaps 10 seconds, and use the digital gift of instant playback to see how brightly exposed the lights are.

7. And for video - well just keep taking photos at regular intervals and put those images together later on to make a video, like the one below, which is 15 frames per second. Good luck!


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