Northern Lights

I'm sure everyone was pretty much aware about the solar flare that caused some serious activity with the Northern Lights.

It was pretty dang cool.  I missed the first night of them, and I guess they were amazing.  I saw them the second night and was in awe.  I honestly haven't seen any Northern Lights since the night Shayne & I flew into Anchorage after we were married from the airplane.  Pretty sad I've lived here for almost 7 1/2 years and I've only seen them once.

But, this week made up for it.

This particular night we actually got a babysitter so Shayne & I could go out to dinner and then to a lake to set up my camera on the tripod and take some photos.

It took me a bit to remember how to set up my shutter to manual mode with my remote, but I finally did figure it out.  This night they weren't quite as active, and it was freakin' cold!!  So, we didn't stay out too long.  It also started to snow, hence the little flecks in the pictures.

I started out with my camera pointed straight up to the sky, but then realized there was nothing to give the pics dimension, so I tried to focus on the trees on the horizon.  For the first couple of pics, my shutter speed is between 1-2 minutes, that's why they are so bright.  Then for the bottom ones it was usually around a minute.  At this point the lights were starting to die down so they are darker.

I wish the lights had been more active with the trees in focus, but I think they still turned out pretty good.  It was fun playing with my camera and watching the lights dance all over the place.  I hope we get some more nights like this next winter so we can go play again.

It was also fun to hang out with Shayne...what a fun date night!