UKC

Hi folks,

My wife is away to Iceland in Feb and hopes to be able to see and photograph the Northern Lights.
I have a Nikon D5200 and a tripod, can someone please advise me on the best settings to use to capture them.
She is not the most tech-savvy person so simple instructions would be good!

Unfortunately I will be stuck here working....

In reply to Beardyman:

I too would love to do this, which means that I have never done this however the following links should give you some pointers.

http://www.ukclimbing.com/articles/page.php?id=6741

And for a remote trigger release
http://www.triggertrap.com/#products/triggertrapmobile1

In reply to Beardyman:

Shoot in manual. Wide aperture, shutter around 20 seconds, ISO depending on the other settings. Set lens focus to infinity. Make sure you cover the viewfinder with tape to stop light bleed. Use mirror lock up and a remote trigger.

In reply to chrisprescott: The length of exposure will depend on how bright it is - this was only 4 seconds https://www.flickr.com/photos/38420795@N04/12823922873/in/dateposted/ and this was 20 seconds - https://www.flickr.com/photos/38420795@N04/16527294977/in/dateposted/

In reply to Brian:

Of course, the settings above were a basic guide. Having an understanding of exposure generally will help.

In reply to Beardyman: I would recommend getting out in the dark with the camera and shoot some starscapes to get used to working in the dark - especially learning to focus manually.

In reply to Beardyman:
Yeah I do quite a lot of this,

The best apature is around large, off centre ie f/4 to f/8 depending on the lens you are using. A lot of middling lenses have soft edges and drop off in the corners and you will find that A. This get worse towards the extremes of the large apatures and B. The event is normally bigger than your field of view so you want the full extent of you lens. I shoot with both a Nikkor 16 mm f/2.8 full frame fish eye MF and a 24 mm f/2.8 on a D800 and the 24 is not always wide enough. This means that cheap to middling glass can ruin your result quite easily if you are pushing the wide end.

You shutter speed is determined in part by the max ISO that your camera will take a good photo with, I'm happy around 640 but I don't know about your rig, the time of night the show happens and or the moon cycle (ie how dark is the sky?) and the rule of 600 or what ever applies to your sensor size. Many a good photo has been ruined by stars that are almost moving......

The best shots I have are always foreground inclusive so it helps to know the ground before the event. "Normally" UK events happen in complete darkness but sometime they are early ie the night of the 20th Dec which had a gibbous moon allowing for fore ground illumination and an azure sky with stars.

Have fun and wish her luck hunting.