Celestial Lights

Posted by "CavalierZee"


By "Ole C. Salomonsen"




[View in full screen. It's magnificent!]

For those who do not know, auroras are caused by solar activity. This is shortly visualized in the video.

Our suns activity varies in 11 year cycles, and we are closing solar maximum (solar max) for our current solar cycle somewhere between 2012-2013, and solar activity has clearly been picking up.

The beginning of 2011 was lots of clouds but weather improved late 2011 and out 2012. This video contains recordings from some of the most spectacular auroral displays I have ever witnessed, and I have seen a few.


For this video I did shoot approx 150.000 exposures from sept.2011 - april.2012 using Canon DSLR's and various wide angle lenses. Approx 6.000 frames in this video. To achieve pannings I used the fantastic Stage Zero + MX2 controller time-lapse gear from Dynamic Perception.

The video is a merge of two parts; the first part contains some more wild and aggressive auroras, as well as a few milky way sequences, hence either auroras are moving fast because they are, or they are fast due to motion of the milky way / stars.

Still, some of the strait up shots are very close to real-time speed, although auroras mostly are slower, she can also be FAST!

The second part has some more slow and majestic auroras, where I have focused more on composition and foreground.

The music should give you a clear indication of where you are :)