Aurora and lens help

[Stargazer Jack]

Hi all,

The time is getting closer till I go and see the Northern Lights (hopefully) and I need a bit of help.

Firstly, when looking at the lights with yours eyes, are any colours visible when watching or this depend on how bright they are?

Secondly, what would be an ideal lens for imaging the lights. The cost doesn't matter that much as I will try and rent the lens however a cheaper one would be better.

Thanks in advance

[Capricorn]

The most usual colour seems to be green, reds and blues can be present, so yes they are in colour.

Since a display can be hundreds or thousands of miles wide/long I would suggest a decent wide angle lens. On an old 35mm the obvious being a 50mm f/1.4 but the newer DSLR's have smaller sensors so 28-30 or less seems appropriate.

Suspect like mine it came with a zoom around the 18-70 range. Set it to something wide, 18-25mm, and put it on a tripod. Not sure if the auto will handle the situation (Flash will be useless so switch that off). Metering could get itself confused.

To avoid shake use a tripod and if possible use the timer or a remote release. Probably have to try a few setings first to see what comes out.

Don't think you will need anything special, other then a decent usable lens, suspect the main item would be the instruction manual in case you need to switch modes and set values up that you don't normally do. I found this out last weekend with mine - found that Manual is really the Aperture and Shutter settings combined. So to set a new exposure duration I had to go into the Shutter mode set it there then come back to Manual. Plain weird.

Read the camera instructions before, that way you can spend more time getting pictures, take a spare memory card or two,if you don't have them.

Where are you off to ?

[Stargazer Jack]

Thank you for all of that information and I am going to Iceland

[Capricorn]

Know they are green because I have seen a couple when flying back from Canada, not exactly bright.

I suspect that the main problem will be convincing a DSLR to get a picture. The programming in them is really for daylight conditions. So getting them to do something like an Aurora at night could be a fight. Thats why I said read and take the camera instructions.

I was looking at a set of images on CN taken by someone with a DSLR, they are good, very good and thought I might wander off and have a go. Meant setting to Manual and having an exposure of 20-30 sec. Took me 2 hours indoors to work out how to set that up on the camera. You could be in a similar situation was my thought.

Mine now has a Manual state of 30 seconds, f/4.5, focus I will have to set when I get to use it outside. Idea is I have the basic set up and will alter just one parameter at a time to see what comes out.

Enjopy Iceland, there should be a lot to see there, hope the sun is in a bad mood and throwing things out.

[Stargazer Jack]

Thanks for all your help once again

[callump]

If you are looking for lens, i'd suggest something widefield - like a 10-30 zoom, or prime in that range - f/2.

Exposure time depends on brightness - i would go for anywhere between 10s and 30s. If the aurora is moving a lot, then shorter exposures are better.

Probably the aurora will visually just look white (perhaps greenish), though you might see some colour on rays.

On the camera the colours will look a lot more obvious.

With very energetic aurora you can see red patches visually (i've seen these from the south of england), but i'm not sure these are commonly seen at higher latitudes.

Callum