aurora borealis

How To Photograph The Northern Lights

One of nature’s most incredible phenomena are the aurora borealis, more commonly known as the Northern Lights. We’ve been photographing them in Iceland and we’re going to show you how to shoot them yourself. What are they? The Northern Lights are a natural light display in the sky, predominantly seen in Arctic regions. Geomagnetic storms…

Tech News Chris Brinlee Jr Oct 15

The Time Iceland Almost Killed Me

They say that if you don’t like the weather in Iceland, wait five minutes and it’ll change. Multiply that by mountains, glaciers and volcanoes and you’ve got a recipe for adventure. Or a close encounter of the near death kind. “Winter is coming,” they said. “They” being every local we spoke to in Iceland. “We’re…

Tech News Chris Brinlee Jr Oct 4

Seeing the Aurora Borealis in real time is better than any time lapse

We’ve seen so many beautiful time lapses of the Aurora Borealis (not that I’m complaining!) that it’s pretty refreshing to see how ethereal it can be in real time too. I guess that means I should really see it in real life. The video was filmed by O Chul Kwon in Yellowknife, Canada. If I…

Sploid Casey Chan Sep 18

Aurora Borealis Stuns Over Minnesota

A powerful G2 class geomagnetic storm passed through Minnesota’s sky early Sunday morning and created the natural lightshow. It was captured on video, which you can see at the link. [NY Daily News]

io9 Katharine Trendacosta Jun 10

Watch an X-Class Solar Flare Ignite the Skies Over Iceland

On February 25th, the Sun let loose an X4.9-class solar flare. It was our parent star’s most violent outburst of the year. When the debris from the ensuing coronal mass ejection collided with Earth’s atmosphere, it produced one of the most colorful auroral displays in recent memory. It was a spectacle to which Henry Jun…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez Apr 3

Aurora Borealis during a solar flare is the very best kind of madness

This may be the most amazing shot of the northern lights, yet. Check out the way they’re moving — that’s no timelapse, this video was shot in realtime. So, why are the northern lights moving so quickly in this shot? It has to do with an increase in activity on the sun. Phil Plait over…

io9 Ria Misra Feb 20

Aurorae ignite the skies over Fairbanks, AK

This remarkable sequence of images was photographed last month by photographer LeRoy Zimmerman. The images were captured last month over the (surprisingly long) course of thirty minutes, and depict roughly 500 kilometers of aurora unfurling across a 150-degree vertical stretch of subarctic firmament. Sez Zimmerman: “I have never seen an active aurora stay in one…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez Jan 4

You never know what you’ll see outside your plane window

Do you know why a million people take a billion photos of the view from their airplane window? Because sometimes when the Sun hits just right or when the clouds start cotton candying so deliciously or when the grid of city lights shine the perfect shade you get something unbelievably beautiful. But no matter how…

Sploid Casey Chan Dec 11

New Plan: Let’s All Move to Iceland

Green aurorae unfurl above Vatnajökull, Iceland’s largest glacier, in this spellbinding photo by French photographer Stéphane Vetter. Photo featured by kind permission of Stéphane Vetter Via NASA APOD points out a few more of the phenomena visible in this photo: On the far right is a long and unusual lenticular cloud tinged with green light…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez Nov 18

Lose yourself in this vibrant video of the Northern Lights

Not quite ready for the weekend to end? Take a deep breath and enjoy this stunning time-lapse video of the Aurora Borealis, filmed in Iceland by Enrique Pacheco. [via Kuriositas]

io9 Lauren Davis Sep 8

Gorgeous Footage of Last Weekend’s Surprise Aurora Borealis

Last week, an undetected solar storm sent a wave of charged particles hurtling toward Earth. On the night of May 31st, those particles crashed into our planet’s magnetic field and rattled the upper atmosphere, igniting the sky in an unanticipated burst of purple, pink and green. Astrophotographer Brad Goldpaint was lucky enough to be shooting…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez Jun 7

Watch four hours of Aurora Borealis compressed into three stunning minutes

Photographer Göran Strand used 2464 raw images taken with his all-sky camera to create this gorgeous time-lapse video. The swirling crystal ball images show the view from Östersund, Sweden, when a when a Coronal Mass Ejection hit Earth’s magnetic field. Sunspot AR1692 produced a M1-class solar flare and on March 17th, the resulting CME hit…

io9 Lauren Davis Mar 24

This stunning underwater scene is made of wax, jelly beans, and toothpaste

Matthew Albanese specializes in photo trickery, sculpting detailed dioramas out of everything from garbage bags to jelly beans and lighting them in such a way that they look like natural landscapes. He’s built the surface of Mars from charcoal and paprika, turned ostrich feathers into weeping willows, and captured a fake Aurora Borealis against a…

io9 Lauren Davis Sep 9

Views of the Northern Lights don’t get much better than this

Feast your eyes on this mind boggling view of the Northern Lights, captured in the pre-dawn hours of July 15th by photographer Brad Goldpaint. Goldpaint told io9 in an email that he photographed this particular display over Sparks Lake in Central Oregon. At latitudes that far south, it can be hard to spot aurorae this…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez Jul 17

Breathtaking Photo of a Pink Aurora from this Weekend’s Solar Storm

Earth’s magnetic field was pummeled by a double coronal mass ejection (CME) over the weekend, giving rise to more than 24 hours of geomagnetic storms and exceptionally beautiful northern lights. Here, astrophotographer Brad Goldpaint has captured a rare sight: a stunning pink aurora borealis. Goldpaint snapped this photograph [click here for more views] from the…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez Jun 19

A huge coronal mass ejection slammed into Earth today

On Tuesday night, the surface of the Sun erupted in an violent solar flare, blasting a massive wave of charged particles in the direction of Earth. And early this morning, those particles smashed into our planet’s atmosphere. The coronal mass ejection (CME) arrived this morning at approximately 5:45 EST. In the picture up top you…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez Mar 8

When NASA shot a rocket into the Northern Lights to study mysterious waves

This is a fisheye view of a NASA-funded rocket being shot into the Aurora Borealis in Alaska. In a move applauded nationwide, NASA has declared war on the sky. Obviously there’s a lot of (metaphorical) ground to cover, but NASA, as well as scientists from a number of universities, started with the mysterious Alfven Wave.…

io9 Esther Inglis-Arkell Feb 22

This is what the northern lights would look like from the Little Prince’s asteroid

You’re all familiar with Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s The Little Prince, right? If not, drop what you’re doing. Go read it. Then come back. Now — have you ever wondered what the northern lights might look like from the little prince’s perspective? Neither had I; but when I saw this picture [click here for hi-res] of…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez Jan 30

A breathtaking aurora from Earth’s largest geomagnetic storm in almost 10 years

Late last Sunday, the Sun unleashed an M9-class solar flare, showering Earth with subatomic particles that gave rise to one of the biggest geomagnetic storms in recent history. The resulting aurorae, which were even brighter than usual in the planet’s northernmost latitudes, were an absolute marvel to behold. https://gizmodo.com/a-massive-solar-eruption-may-lead-to-the-strongest-radi-5878525 Shown here is a video shot…

io9 Robbie Gonzalez Jan 27

We’re 99% certain this is the most beautiful footage of Earth’s auroras yet recorded

Boy howdy, this video definitely confirms that if you’re going to gaze at our planet, the International Space Station is the best seat in the house. This video was shot during Expeditions 28 and 29 aboard the ISS from August-October of this year. Time to pretend you’re an alien fleet joy-riding through the Milky Way.…

io9 Cyriaque Lamar Nov 13

How To Photograph The Northern Lights

The Time Iceland Almost Killed Me

Seeing the Aurora Borealis in real time is better than any time lapse

Aurora Borealis Stuns Over Minnesota

Watch an X-Class Solar Flare Ignite the Skies Over Iceland

Aurora Borealis during a solar flare is the very best kind of madness

Aurorae ignite the skies over Fairbanks, AK

You never know what you’ll see outside your plane window

New Plan: Let’s All Move to Iceland

Lose yourself in this vibrant video of the Northern Lights

Gorgeous Footage of Last Weekend’s Surprise Aurora Borealis

Watch four hours of Aurora Borealis compressed into three stunning minutes

This stunning underwater scene is made of wax, jelly beans, and toothpaste

Views of the Northern Lights don’t get much better than this

Breathtaking Photo of a Pink Aurora from this Weekend’s Solar Storm

A huge coronal mass ejection slammed into Earth today

When NASA shot a rocket into the Northern Lights to study mysterious waves

This is what the northern lights would look like from the Little Prince’s asteroid

A breathtaking aurora from Earth’s largest geomagnetic storm in almost 10 years

We’re 99% certain this is the most beautiful footage of Earth’s auroras yet recorded

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