Seeing The Northern Lights Over Purdue

Last night I was winding down for the night with no intention of going out to make any photos. Then the northern lights were visible outside of our house. I had a camera bag already in my car so I took a handful of lenses and ran out to it. As I was leaving our neighborhood I was deciding where to go. I could have gone out in the country and probably seen them very vividly. They were already looking good so I went to campus to make some photos. I thought some familiar landmarks in the foreground could look cool.

Getting Rewarded

When I started my trip I had all kinds of expectations for what I could make. Of course when I parked and walked to my first location the aurora had dimmed. I couldn’t even see it. I will admit that I was kind of bummed. I did put warm clothes on though and I was on campus so I decided to walk further in to make some night images. At least I would get something out of it. I was lining this photo up when I saw the aurora start to build a little. With a little color in the sky I was happy with how it turned out. I don’t photograph the northern lights very often so I don’t really know what to expect. I learned last night that they can come back at any time.

Almost Home

At one point I had seen some great light for quite a while. The green light of the aurora was all that was left, and I felt that I had done all that I could with that. I had decided to call it a night and get some sleep. I had two jobs the next day so I needed to get some rest. Of course when I got up to the Armstrong statue the light decided to pop off again. I had a little fun trying to balance the light here. The area around the Neil Armstrong statue is very well lit. It took a little compromising to make this work, but it is one of my favorite images from the night.

A Little Luck

I had the idea to make this photo of the Purdue portion of the arch with the aurora behind it. It was really dancing around and I knew that I could capture a couple of colors behind it. The lucky part of the photo is that a car pulled up on the side street next to where I was. The long exposure here allowed the light from the brake lights to reflect off of the arch a little adding some extra red light into the frame. This photo turned out much better than I expected when I started to make it.

No Balancing Here

Earlier I talked about balancing the light. The aurora was constantly moving. When I made this photo it was not as bright as it was at other times. I loved the person on the fountain. There was no way to capture all of the light correctly in this photo. The fountain is pretty well known around here so I let it wash out a bit. It still has its shape, but I let the aurora shine by doing that.

Welcome To Mackey

I really wanted a photo of the aurora with Mackey Arena in the frame. I was just not working for me. I then had the idea to play frogger and cross the road to try something with the front of the building. I love this entrance, but I just have not found the good angle on it. Here I think that I finally found that good angle, but with the bonus of the aurora right over the entrance.

More Photos From A Fun Night

This was a fun night out seeing something that I don’t often see. Below are a few bonus photos from a fun night out making photos. As always with any photo of campus you can click on it to see it bigger, or it you like it you can purchase it as well.