We were out photographing the night sky and had little hope of seeing any aurora on this night, but while taking a test shot, we noticed a red glow, then things got fun! This was only a KP4 but somehow managed to get down low enough to be visible on the horizon in Yellowstone.
Specific Feedback Requested
Is it really an interesting image, or am I just disillusioned because it was cool to experience it in person?
We noticed that Jennifer’s Z7II rendered the lower part of the aurora almost a neon green, whereas the Canon was yellowish green. I’m not sure which is technically correct and why they appear to be so different.
Technical Details
Canon R5 with Rokinon 24mm, ISO 6400, 12 seconds, f/2.8, took a pano to capture more of the sky and foreground.
I used a Kenko PRO1D Prosofton Clear filter to give the brighter stars some glow, love this filter.
Ran this through DxO Pure Raw 2 before stitching, and the results were phenomenal. I was able to pull the shadows from the foreground with almost no noise, this software blows my mind!
Aurora looks great… not sure about the halos around the stars and the mottling in the sky from the filter or possibly just too much color enhancement creating it.
Having never before seen an aroura in person, I can understand how you probably felt witnessing this and I bet you were beside yourself after shooting this. I know I would have been. The foreground looks terrific and you chose an area that could reflect some of the aroura colors and the stars. Well planned out. I’m not sure about the blue halos around those brighter stars. Maybe if you could reduce the blue a bit then the glow would look more natural but I’m not really liking the blue tones around just some of the stars. Otherwise, I’m really enjoying this image a lot.
Interesting about the different colors from the two cameras. I’d guess it is due to the different profiles. Were they processed in LR first, then run through DxO Pure Raw? The mottling is pretty characteristic of pushing the signal and I’ve seen it with various sensors. I haven’t done careful comparisons but have seen it at its worst with the 1DX2. It could also be influenced by the profile. I should dig out one and try a linear profile on it, and compare Canon DPP and the newest LR profiles. I’m sure there is good information on that issue somewhere.
There is still some banding in the sky… jpegs are not much to work with but simply desaturating this a bit and taking some green out enhances the Aurora and is more natural to my eyes.
I think this is a cool image. Very unique experience for sure. As far as the colors, I think your original post is superior to the rework posted. Yep, DXO Pure Raw is a fantastic piece of software!
The aurora pictures I’ve seen are often green and – sometimes red? I don’t think I’ve ever seen yellow. Others could comment with much more experience.
They are. This doesn’t look like a typical Aurora at all but I would have to see the Raw image.
It is way too oversaturated to tell and the filter does not help.
It looks like a sunrise.
Hi David, That is a really cool experience, and a beautiful image!
Just curious, between the two cameras, What was your white balance set to when actually shooting? My auroras were coming out quite yellow/green and I think then we specifically changed it to 3200.
Hey David, I do think this is an interesting image. Even if I didn’t, it would still hold a special place in your memory, so it would be an interesting image to you and that’s all that matters. Compositionally speaking, I think the foreground, aurora, and pinpoint stars make it interesting and compelling. As for the colors… you obviously need to switch to Sony.
Since I’ve never seen an aurora firsthand I always find them fascinating. I never even knew that there were red ones.
The horizon is far away and I find the unevenness from the trees is distracting.
I think a tighter crop would show more details in the trees and be a more interesting element in image.
It also brings more focus on the sky which is the number one focal point for me.
The crop also eliminates the drop off of trees on the left.
I darkened the sides of the foreground to bring more focus on the reflections.
Love the vibrant colours.
Thank you all for the feedback, it’s much appreciated! This proved to be quite the challenge and the first time I’ve actually had color issues with a Canon. I have posted the rework in the original post.
I ended up picking out a different single exposure that had better pillars and did not use the filter. The filter caused a little bit of a color shift, but it was not the problem, I just didn’t like the stars in the non-pano version since I couldn’t see all of the Big Dipper.
Ultimately I used the neutral camera profile from https://www.colorfidelity.com and used the RGB tone curve to correct the colors, temp of 3750, along with some small tweaks using the color balance tool on the yellows and greens in Photoshop. I think the ‘mottling’ some of you mentioned is actually layers of aurora since we’re looking at it from an angle at this latitude and they just show up a bit weird in the longer exposure.
@Keith_Bauer I have to thank you for the recommendation on DxO PureRaw from when you posted a small review here some time back!
For reference, here’s what the raw file looked like with only an adjustment to the white balance, the sky is perfectly black, but the green aurora is quite yellow. Something to watch out for if using the R5 with aurora I guess.
Hi David. I live in Michigan and try to get out aurora hunting when they cooperate. I could be incorrect, but it seems like there is more likely to be a range of color in the aurora when shot from a lower latitude. Don’t know if that is the fact that we see them more from the side rather than directly overhead. I see lots of reds and yellows in shots that are local here as opposed to shots from say Norway. And for what it’s worth I like the first image best. Like how the filters enhanced the Big Dipper.
