I decided to roll the dice, that my CV joint on my car wouldn't blowup, for a run up north out of city lights to see the aurora--& I'm so glad I did! Two shots from northern California: First is from Doyle & the second is from Frenchman Lake. What an amazing display! For a time the aurora covered a 180 degrees from east to west & was overhead & could be seen in the south! I shot these photos with a 15mm f/2.0 30sec ISO400.
@SonOfSandor It was fairly faint to the eye. I could see streaks and a little color. It was strongest at Doyle. I could see the streaks through my windshield while on the highway. Still, not a lot of color though. A 30sec exposure made all of the difference.
@mycotropic Thanks! If you can afford a fast wide angle lens get one and practice on the milky way. I could have shot these with my slower 16mm f/4 zoom but I would have had to crank up the ISO to 1600. No big deal with modern denoising algorithms in Darktable, however.
@mycotropic Sure, you'll just need to crank up the ISO more than I did. Start with a solid tripod, use the in camera timer (to reduce shake), generally it is recommended to turn off image stabilization when shooting from a tripod (but there's an on going debate about that), and start with 16mm f/4 ISO1600 30 seconds. Check for over exposure and adjust the ISO up or down as needed.
@elaterite Wow, great choise, to roll the dice. Amazing night and even though I like both images the econd one is absoulut stunning with the reflecions on the lake and really nice that you can see a couple of trees on thier own- Good that your car didn´t broke down.
@ambivalena Yes thanks. So happy I went! Just wish I'd gone to Pyramid lake. But I'm happy with the photo from Frenchman. Tired to get to the water but I wasn't able.
@elaterite Great to have so many different choises of locations. For some reason there is hardly any places in my neighbourhoods with a free horizon to the north.
@ambivalena Oh, that would make it difficult not having a clear view to the north! But this aurora was even overhead! When I tried walking down a long boat ramp, that was closed, to get to the water I made a shot straight up through the trees. I'll post it later. I got lost walking. I was totally unprepared & without my usual hiking headlamp. The ramp seemed to end, where there was some construction equipment, & was nowhere near the water. Anyway, I think I'll try and get another hour of sleep.
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