A clear night in April 2018 on the North Wales coast and my wife Liz and I have gone aurora hunting.
Our chosen spot was looking northwards (of course!) from the beach at Llanddulas, towards the turbines of the offshore Gwynt-y-Môr windfarm out into Colwyn Bay.
It was a beautiful night, with stars wheeling overhead and the anti-collision beacons of the wind turbines glowing brightly against the dark waters of the Irish Sea.
I had my camera set up on its tripod, taking 15 second exposures at a very high ISO, in order to capture the faint light of the stars and any possible glow from the northern lights.
Liz and I kept a close watch on the sky, but after over an hour of staring at the horizon we couldn't see any of the typical aurora colours with our naked eyes so, reluctantly, we decided to call it a night and head home.
It was only later on, when I was processing the RAW files I'd captured that night, that I realised that the colours of the aurora were present in the sky over the wind turbines and, in fact, were getting stronger and more vibrant just at the point when we decided to pack it in because we couldn't see anything happening!
Hey Ho! Lesson learnt - and next time we won't be so willing to stop filming just because we can't see anything with our own eyes.
The low light capabilities of modern DSLRs are just amazing!
Filename - llanddulas night timelapse 01
Camera - Canon EOS 6D
Lens - 24-105mm zoom @ 24mm
Exposure (start of sequence) - 15 secs @ f/4, ISO6400
Exposure (end of sequence) - 15 secs @ f/4, ISO6400
Filters - None.
Shooting interval - 15 seconds
Music - Glacier - Patrick Patrikios.
Location - Llanddulas beach, North Wales
This clip - HD 720p, 30fps (4K and 1080p HD formats also available)
Clip duration - 9 seconds
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