Starship Asterisk*

In Green Company: Aurora over Norway

Explanation: Raise your arms if you see an aurora. With those instructions, two nights went by with, well, clouds -- mostly. On the third night of returning to same peaks, though, the sky not only cleared up but lit up with a spectacular auroral display. Arms went high in the air, patience and experience paid off, and the amazing featured image was captured. The setting is a summit of the Austnesfjorden fjord close to the town of Svolvear on the Lofoten islands in northern Norway. The time was early March. Our Sun has been producing an abundance of picturesque aurora of late as it is near the time of its maximum surface activity in its 11-year magnetic cycle.

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Amazing picture, I wonder how he got up there?

I was wondering the same thing. I can't tell if it's all snow or if it's hardened into a more icy substance. I think it is hard ice and I also think I see marks on the left side of the precipice where boots or a tool punctured the ice to allow the climber up.

daddyo wrote:Amazing picture, I wonder how he got up there?

Photoshop

Mactavish wrote:

daddyo wrote:Amazing picture, I wonder how he got up there?

Photoshop

The photographer has taken numerous photos of himself in precarious locations. He did mention using 3 different exposures (here) for this one, but there's no reason to think he wasn't on the mountain.

Mactavish wrote:

daddyo wrote:Amazing picture, I wonder how he got up there?

Photoshop

Nah it's gotta be a plastic figure!

Hmmm, I can't pick the stars, the mountain peaks, nor the aspect. It's not easy being green.

Awesome....a rather BRISK climb to say the least....but worth it...

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daddyo wrote:Amazing picture, I wonder how he got up there?

On the left side of the mountain...you can see climbing prints....one determined dude...

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Boomer12k wrote:On the left side of the mountain...you can see climbing prints....one determined dude...

Perfect slope there, but I see no sign of the toboggan for the return ride.

A beautiful, compelling image! So I really want to know more about this. In the Flickr discussion, the poster Max R writes a bit about the photography: "The aurora was very active for about 25 sec and moved from the right to the left. I had noise reduction set to off in order to keep shoot without having to wait for 10 seconds to let the camera process the photo. In photoshop I used all 3 photos and used each of them (manually) for one part of the shot. You could compare it when a rainbow is partly visible but during 20 seconds you can see it from right to left (though I have never done this ''trick'' with a rainbow though). When using only 1 shot without merging the other 2 it doesn’t look any good in combination with the mountain."

But I can't find exactly where the peak is, nor where the camera was, and really want to know what kind of climb it was, etc. There is a lot of photoshop metadata visible if you unhide the EXIF section, but no coordinates, and the author hasn't responded to a query on Flikr. The "Date and Time (Digitized)" is 2014:03:20 22:54:36+01:00 but I'm guessing that refers to producing the Photoshop rendered image, not the originals. And I'd love to see the original images.

Does anyone know any more?

Fantastic shot Max, thank you.

geckzilla wrote:

Mactavish wrote:

daddyo wrote:Amazing picture, I wonder how he got up there?

Photoshop

The photographer has taken numerous photos of himself in precarious locations. He did mention using 3 different exposures (here) for this one, but there's no reason to think he wasn't on the mountain.

Plus the fact that the photographer used a 14mm lens - not [usually] for the faint of heart.
Great image!

A spectacular shot. It looks like a wizard on the mountain conjuring a frightful fireworks display. If I am understanding the caption correctly, the photographer actually had to climb that peak 3 days in a row to get it?

So I guess he just set the timer on the camera and ran up there. Why didn't he wait for his girlfriend to join him? Is that a beer in his left hand?

This is LUCY IN THE SKY WITH DIAMONDS!!!! I discovered this website by accident a few weeks ago. Amazing! My thanks to all the wonderful folks who contribute these fantastic views of the universe. Onward and Upward!