Aurora Borealis and Northern Lights mean the same thing: colourful lights in the sky that can be seen in the Northern hemisphere, most typically in Northern Scandinavia, Svalbard, Iceland, North Canada, Alaska and Siberia. In the Southern hemisphere it is called Aurora Australis.
According to the Sami tales this phenomenon is created when the fox waves its tale on the snowy slopes. Skolts (one of Sami tribes) say that Northern Lights is blood bleeding from the earth of the departed who dyed in a bloody way.
In reality the energy source for Aurora Borealis is our Sun although the light itself is created in the upper atmosphere at altitudes of about 100-200 km.
Sun is continuously emitting high energy particles into the space. Some particles from this so called Solar wind end up to the Earth's upper atmosphere. Charged particles surging from the space downwards to the Earth along the magnetic field collide with Oxygen atoms and Nitrogen molecules which will become excited to a higher energy state. When these atoms and molecules return to their normal energy state they will emit visible light.
Atomic oxygen is responsible for the two main colours of green and red. Nitrogen causes deep red and rare blue hues.
23.12.2014: ISO 1000, Tv 20s, F2.8
23.12.2014: ISO 1000, Tv 15s, F2.8
22.11.2014: ISO 1600, Tv 15s, F2.8
18.11.2014: ISO 1600, Tv 15s, F2.8
Aurora Borealis is best viewed against dark night sky. The best time of the year is from September to March (especially early autumn and early spring) and best time of the day from 21:00 to 03:00 with the peak at about 23:30 (so called magnetic midnight when the disturbances in the Earth's magnetic field are at maximum level).
We have so called Ylläs Twilight time 3.10.2016-19.2.2017 from 22:00 - 06:00 when the street lights will be off to decrease light pollution. Your chances to see the Northern Lights will be enhanced even if you do not go to the middle of the wilderness.
The probability for Northern Lights at Ylläs area is about 70%. The probability will increase steadily for higher latitudes up to 100% at the coastline of the Arctic Ocean.
However, the situation is not that simple. Northern Lights will also depend on the 11 year Solar cycle. The intensity of Solar wind (number of charged particles) will change along the Solar cycle (number of Sun spots). The incidence of Northern Lights does not strictly follow the number Sun spots. The probability will increase when there are rapid changes with the Sun spot number either increasing or decreasing.
27.12.2015: ISO 640, Tv 8s, F2.8
22.12.2014: ISO 1000, Tv 20s, F2.8
23.12.2014: ISO 1000, Tv 20s, F2.8
25.12.2014: ISO 1600, Tv 13s, F2.8
Photographing Aurora Borealis
There are a lot of great web sites discussing Aurora Borealis and techniques how to photograph them. However, the photos shown on this page are authentic from Ylläs and Äkäslompolo village. They have been shot during November - December 2014 when we saw Northern Lights quite often.
The equipment has been the following: Canon EOS 70D, wide-angle lenses Samyang 14mm F2.8 ED AS IF UMC and Tokina AT-X PRO SD 11-16mm F2.8 IF DX, remote control and of course a tripod - without it the job would have been too tedious. For anyone interested the camera settings have been recorded below the photos.
The photos have been shot in RAW format and edited with Adobe's Lightroom software. A RAW photo is, as called, raw data that needs to be processed before the photo looks like the photographer it meant to be. In case the photo is shot in JPEG format the camera will do the processing according to the selected settings. The benefit of RAW format (lossless) is that mistakes made when the photo was shot can be corrected more easily and efficiently than with JPEG format (some of original data already lost due to compressing). For this page the resolution of the photos had to be reduced quite a lot.
When looking these photos please remember that the human eye is quite insensitive to colours in weak light. Camera instead can use longer exposure times and will see the colours more easily. Therefore the photos will contain more hues than you saw when the photos were shot.
25.12.2014: ISO 1600, Tv 15s, F2.8
26.12.2014: ISO 2500, Tv 8s, F2.8
26.12.2014: ISO 2000, Tv 5s, F2.8
26.12.2014: ISO 2000, Tv 5s, F2.8
21.11.2014: ISO 6400, Tv 10s, F2.8
26.11.2014: ISO 2000, Tv 15s, F2.8