Polarlights in January

Last night, a friend sent me a few snapshots he had taken with his cell phone, letting me know that the northern lights were visible. I had noticed them several times in recent months, but had never managed to photograph them properly.

Faster than you think

In no time at all, I grabbed my Canon M50 and tripod, put in the battery and a fresh SD card, and tried my luck. The first pictures were indeed underwhelming. Mainly, I could see a sky that wasn’t completely black, with two tree tops in front of it. Even before I had set the exposure time to 8 seconds, I noticed that the green glow had already moved and was barely visible. I always find it fascinating how quickly the northern lights move.

Fortunately, I had seen more shimmering directly to the northeast—even better: green and red colors stretched across the horizon. There, I managed to take a few nice pictures showing several streaks. I’ll share my two favorites with you here, even though the internet is already full of photos of the aurora borealis.

Starry sky above a house roof, behind which a green ribbon of color stretches across the entire width of the image. Above it is a slightly less bright reddish ribbon of color.
View from my kitchen window
Night sky with a leafless tree crown in the foreground. Glowing wind turbines can be seen in the distance. On the left side of the sky is the green and reddish band from the previous photo. On the right side, a slightly narrower but stronger green band can be seen.
Several bands of color from the aurora borealis