Caption
We are in the remote Westfjords of Iceland. Normally difficult to reach in winter, in March 2023 we were lucky enough to be able to spend a few days (and nights!) in this breathtaking landscape. And we were lucky: at an icy -15°C and a clear sky, we were able to admire and photograph the natural spectacle of the dancing northern lights for several hours.
The goal that night was to photograph a spherical 360° image and capture the earth's rotation as a so-called startrail panorama using a long exposure. To do this, I first photographed an ordinary 360° panorama of the scene and then captured the sky as a time-lapse. The camera ran for about an hour and a half for this shot and took a total of 829 pictures. The mounted 8mm fisheye has covered almost the entire 180° image circle in full format and thus completely captured the movements of the stars and northern lights in the sky. All these photos were later stacked and stitched with the individual images of the previously photographed panorama to form a spherical 360° image.
During the one and a half hour exposure, we had plenty of time to enjoy the magic in the night sky. The Aurora were constantly changing shape, brightness and color. Not only green, but also violet and even red polar lights danced over our heads.