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Mirrie Dancers March April 5th

I had noted early in the day the possibility of an aurora event so when we were preparing for bed last night I asked Mr L to take a look as he put the dogs out. He said that there was some light to be seen, and so I grabbed my camera.

Sitting on the northern horizon was a hemisphere of pale green light. Above was a dark sky with a clear view of stars and some interesting drifting cloud. Behind us was a crescent moon. There was no wind and it was mild.

I upped the ISO and took a couple of 2 second hand-held shots, just to see if there was anything worth working harder at. It is not always easy to tell what the camera might see when all the human eye can perceive is a general auroral glow.

A glance at the LCD screen convinced me to go indoors for the tripod.

I was thrilled at what I saw. It was the first time ever that I had captured anything at the violet end of the spectrum.

There was the usual light pollution from the school, sad to say.

Unfortunately angling upwards actually makes the images less interesting.

The colours changed rapidly from a blue-violet to a red-violet and thence to red, as the sky also clouded over. I was not out long but it was worth it.

More aurora images here.