Seeing the Auroras for the first time

I did it.

After day-dreaming for years of seeing and capturing the northern lights, it finally happened.

From end of March to beginning of April, I spent 2 weeks in the polar circle in Norway, half in Senja and half in Lofoten. 2 locations I had already visited 2.5 years ago in summer time.

At the time I wasn’t much into night photography and quite frankly, my images didn’t have anything unique. But I knew back then I wanted to come back there in winter to witness and capture the northern lights, a phenomenon I had never seen until today.

Now, most of us here know that even if you plan to travel there for two weeks, you might still not see the auroras because of the solar activity or weather conditions.

It remains a bet that you leave up to chance.

Still, one reason that led me to decide to go this year is because media has been sharing how 2024 would be one of the best years for northern lights due to the solar cycle that reaches solar maximum this year.

And as many, I fell for it and learned quickly after it was falsely advertised, thanks to the great work of Adrien Mauduit (https://www.nightlightsfilms.com/), a scientist now specialised in auroras and living in northern Norway.

It seems that solar maximum does not necessarily mean greater auroras.

But the trip was already planned and my goal unchanged: meeting Lady Aurora this year.

The logistics

Instead of flying to Tromsø, I landed in Stockholm, rented a car there, and drove all the way up to Senja first. I did this for 2 reasons:

1. I have family in Stockholm I wanted to spend time with before and after the trip

2. It appeared that renting a car in Sweden costs 3-4 times less than in northern Norway.

The trip took 2 days, ~10 hours of driving per day and about 1’800km one-way.

To my great surprise, I arrived exactly on the day where the greatest solar storm of the season hit earth, leading to the first days I spent there to showcase incredible auroras from day 1.

I realize how lucky I am and how this is not common for the majority to have this as a first experience of the northern lights.

So I made it my responsibility to capture them the best I can. And to tell deeper and more personal stories through the pieces that are born from this adventure.

Below I will be sharing two of the images I have already finished creating.

“Farewell”

Auroras have different representations in different mythologies and cultures.

Some viewed them as a curse or bad omen, and some believed they represented ancestors communicating with the livings. Whichever you choose to believe in, experiencing them feels like you’re witnessing something from another world. When they are so strong they illuminate the whole landscape and you see them dance at unbelievable speed with your bare eyes, it is hard not to want to chase them forever after that.

Earlier this year, I lost my Swedish grandmother. And although the grieving will take its time and come in different forms, I like to think my nights under the Auroras were part of this process. I like to think the reason they were so present, so strong, and so colorful throughout my entire stay in the polar north had something to do with her. In a sense, it was the best farewell I could hope for, and the most beautiful one.

May this image help you connect with your loved ones. The ones already gone and the ones still by your side. This is also what photography and art is about. Bringing a message from the past to the present for a better future.

This image has been created during the first part of my trip, at the famous Segla mountain. Not a difficult hike, but a very cold evening and night, where we stayed till nightfall.

The sky part has been captured the night before, as the auroras were not active on the night I shot the landscape. The rest of the elements (cave foreground and landscape panorama) have been taken all standing at the same location.

“Reflection”

I found very few images of this little cave, which looks bigger than it actually is. Finding it was one of my biggest priorities to create this image. Little did I know how tricky and sketchy it would be to trying to find it in winter. Walking in knee-deep snow in the middle of boulders made it quite dangerous as you couldn’t really tell where you were placing your feet. So I would not recommend anyone doing it in those conditions, and the fact that there was no traces of anyone trying to find it confirmed it.

The sky was taken a few nights earlier and when going through my files, I realised how one of the images had almost the exact same shape as the beginning of the mountain range so I went for it. I did not distort the file to make it fit on purpose.

What I enjoy the most about the image are the icicles reflecting the auroras. Obviously they didn’t have the reflection because the sky was taken separately, so I had to reproduce the natural effect you have with icicles.

Took me a few RAW files to study how the light can hit the ice and how the subject reflected is always inverted.

So with a few trials I managed to reproduce what I think would be the most realistic outcome you would get if this was a single shot.

More images will come in the next weeks. I have been working on two other images but my time dedicated to editing is a little limited right now.

I also decided to share more in depths the editing process, the settings, and the RAW files of my images with my students who joined the Visual Storyteller Program, including the RAWs of the image above. This is to help conceptualise better an image with only the RAW images you capture before we actually get into the post-processing breakdown.

If you wish to be one of them and learn how to create these kind of images, you can join the waitlist in the link below:

You can also find more information on the program on my website: https://www.angelfux.com/program

Thank you for your time and see you in the next one,

Angel