Hunting Aurora at Steetley Pier

The skies were forecast clear and the internet in my part of the world was buzzing with chat about possible Aurora Borealis activity. So it was a no brainer that I needed to take a road trip to somewhere suitably iconic as foreground interest for when the skies erupt with colour.

My chosen location was Steetley Pier on the north east coast of England. It's a 2 hour drive for me so I set off in plenty of time with batteries fully charged and a bag full of optimism.

Steetley Pier is a disused and abandoned industrial pier once used for carrying quarry products direct to moored up ships. It's been abandoned for years but it makes an iconic subject for photography.

I arrived just as blue hour was starting and I made my way down to the beach:

If Heineken did Selfies....

While I was waiting for the skies to go fully dark, I decided to take advantage of the blue hour. This was quick and easy to set up with a flash gun behind and me wearing a head torch.

There was enough vapour in the air to create some background separation which is always good.

Shot using my Sony 14mm G Master, my favourite lens.

I also created a vertical version, it's always hard to choose between them:

Gimme the moonlight

As it was getting dark, I wandered around the pier looking for compositions. The moon was about 50% waxing but still quite bright. Here I've used no lighting at all, just moonlight.

The Pier

I wandered over to this side of the pier and struggled a bit with no real foreground interest.

Behind the scenes

Whilst waiting for my camera to finish a star trail timelapse, I set up my iPhone on a tripod and shot this 30 second exposure image. I was curious to see what the quality was like. My conclusion is that phones still can't compete....yet!

Faint Aurora Borealis

I was disappointed not to see Aurora Borealis despite many test shots trying to spot the colours. I set about shooting a star trail sequence with 120 images of 30 seconds each.

As the sequence finished, I reviewed the images on the back of the camera and I was surprised to see I'd actually caught the Aurora!

This definitely wasn't visible to the naked eye but I'll take it nonetheless!

About me:

I usually specialise in shooting lightpainting images but occasionally dabble in landscape, urbex and artistic model photography. I like to collaborate with other photographers and occasionally shoot outside my comfort zone.

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