Jan 26 – Northern Lights over Tintagel Island, Cornwall
There were a number of occasions last year when solar flares produced northern lights (Aurora Borealis) even as far south as here in Cornwall, and yet every time, it was cloudy! Last night though, there was a reasonably good solar storm (a G3 category, following an X-class solar flare and coronal mass ejection (CME) on Monday), with geomagnetic field variations of about 800nT (nanoTesla) – typical field variations are less than 50nT. The sun is close to a solar maximum at the moment, which means a greater intensity of CMEs and solar storms, over an 11-year cycle.
The actual colours depend on whether the emitted plasma of electrons and protons hits the nitrogen or the oxygen in the sky, and at what altitude. Green is the most common in proper northern climes, as plasma hits oxygen atoms at 100-250km, but the colours here last night were definitely red, with a yellow-green glow beneath it.
Anyway, this shot was the best one, taken at about 9.30pm looking directly north across Tintagel Island from Glebe Cliff, just by St Materiana’s Church. It was mostly clear skies, though there was one block of dark cloud in the shot. You can see The Plough asterism (in the Ursa Major constellation) to the right, with its top leg pointing towards Polaris (the North Star), which is in the middle of the frame, right at the very top.
I used my Z 14-30mm f/4 S lens at 16mm with f/4, ISO 1600 and a 30s exposure – this is an EV of -5. With the naked eye, all you could see was a faint brightness, but the camera’s sensor clearly picks up way more light and colour. You then also have to use a fair amount of further adjustments in Lightroom to make the image really stand out!
Jan 26 – The Wonderful Aoraki/Mount Cook, New Zealand
Last time we were in New Zealand in 2019, we didn’t really see Aoraki/Mount Cook at all, as it was bathed in the clouds nearly continuously. This time though, we saw it in all its 3,724m glory, mainly all on the same day!
This first wider shot was taken coming back from the Hooker Glacier in mid-afternoon, using 39mm, f/11, 1/125s and ISO 64. You can see the front peak and the higher rear peak is just about visible in the clouds. The second image is zoomed in at 73mm a few hours later at 5pm, as we passed the Mueller Glacier lake. The highest peak is now clearly visible. This was taken at f/9, 1/125s and ISO 100.
Finally, the best photo though was from our hotel at 7am the following morning, with a clear frosty start, no clouds and fantastic light on the snowy peaks. Over around 20 minutes, the light on the mountain tops went from red to orange to yellow. This image was the orange phase taken using 120mm, f/8, 1/100s and ISO 200. The natural WB was higher here at 8,000K and I only held the sky back by 0.5 stops. Then, besides my typical adjustments in Lightroom, I didn’t need to modify the colours much at all – it was exactly like that!
Jan 26 – Hooker Lake and Glacier, and Mount Cook, New Zealand
This was the trek that my hip went for first time – turned out it had become arthritic very quickly and after 2 hours walking, it was done for. Problem was the 2 hour hike back! So, I didn’t get as many shots around the Hooker Lake and Glacier that I had wanted, and Mount Cook was hidden in the clouds right up until we left. The Māori name for New Zealand is, of course, Aotearoa – “Land of the Long White Cloud”.
It was around midday when we got there and surprisingly busy with walkers – it took a while to remove them in Photoshop from my better images! Occasionally, I don’t mind the odd person to give some scale, but in general, I always remove people, as otherwise you start needing to get model releases for any images that you put on sale on Alamy. This shot is looking up the lake towards the 11km long Hooker Glacier, with its blue-green ice front covered in dark rock debris. Mount Cook/Aoraki is in the background with its peak at 3,724m just behind the top of those white clouds.
There were proper icebergs in the milky green waters of the terminal lake and the side moraine height shows how much the glacier has been retreating.
This shot was taken at 35mm on my Z 24-120mm f/4 S lens using f/13, 1/125s and ISO 64. The WB was best at 6,250K and I held the sky back by 0.9 stops. Fortunately, I got some better shots of Mount Cook a bit later – see my next blog!
Jan 26 – Mueller Lake and Glacier, New Zealand
On our walk up to the Hooker Lake and Glacier, where we got a great view of Aoraki/Mount Cook, we passed the beautiful Mueller Lake and Glacier. The 13km long Mueller Glacier is tucked up at the top of the lake and, like the lower sections of the Tasman Glacier, is covered in dark rock debris.
It was a stormy sort of day again, but with great shafts of sunlight poking their way through the dark skies – all very dramatic. The first autumn snows on the peaks added wonderfully to the whole scene.
The first shot was taken on my Z 24-120mm f/4 S lens at 24mm, f/10, 1/125s and ISO 80, with the glacier up on the far left corner of the milky green lake. The lake then forms the start of the Hooker River, which is flowing out on the bottom right corner of the image – this feeds in to the Tasman River, and on to Lake Pukaki.
The second photo is a panorama of five images across the lake, with the bluer aquamarine waters of Lake Pukaki on the far left, our hotel in the Mount Cook village also on the left, and the bottom of the Mueller Glacier on the far right. This merged photograph used a 24mm focal length, f/10, 1/125s and ISO 125. In addition to my usual Lightroom adjustments, I used a WB around here of 6,500K and held the sky back by one-stop to heighten the moody clouds.
On the full-size images, you can see the fine details of the blue ice on the mountain slopes above the glacier – not quite as visible on these much smaller resolution files used on my website!
Jan 26 – Tasman Lake and Glacier, New Zealand
It stayed pretty wet and overcast all day, making the view over the Tasman Lake rather dull, but spectacular nevertheless. The Tasman Glacier to the left of the lake is the longest in New Zealand at around 24km. You can see the white icy top of the glacier further up the valley, while lower down by the lake, it is covered in dark rock debris.
This whole area is in the Mount Cook (Aoraki) National Park – Mount Cook itself (NZ’s highest peak at 3,724m) is behind the clouds to the left of both images. Fortunately, I got better pictures of that snowy peak a day later. The glacier feeds in to the Tasman Lake, which then flows down the valley as the Tasman River, before flowing in to the wonderful Lake Pukaki. At the higher levels, the waters are filled with glacial rock flour, which gives this very milky appearance. Lower down the valley as the flour settles, the waters become the greener turquoise or the bluer aquamarine, which is exactly what makes Lake Pukaki so spectacular.
This first image is a panorama of five shots taken on my Z 24-120mm f/4 S lens at 24mm, f/9, 1/100s and ISO 100, giving a final picture that is 18,100 by 4,900 pixels, ie 89MP. The first snows of autumn had happened overnight, which significantly improved the image, although much was lost in the low cloud. I was expecting the glacier to have retreated a lot since our last visit in 2019, but in comparing my photos, I couldn’t really see any huge difference. I believe the ice front has been quite stable for a few years now, whereas it was retreating by around 600m per year back in 2015.
The second photo is zoomed in to the glacier front using 120mm, f/10, 1/100s and ISO 100. The blue ice is now very apparent on the glacier wall, as are a small number of icebergs in the milky waters of the terminal lake.
Both pictures used a WB of 6,500K, together my usual range of adjustments in Lightroom, particularly to enhance the colours a tad more, and to dehaze the low cloud areas.
Jan 26 – First Autumn Snow, Tasman River Valley, New Zealand
I have done very little photography since we were in New Zealand last spring, as my hip had gone arthritic very quickly and it took a good few months to get a hip replacement, which then took quite a few months longer to recover. The net result being that for the last 6-9 months, I couldn’t either walk far or sit at my desk for long to do any post-processing. Anyway, I’m just now finishing off the images around the mountains and glaciers of Mount Cook.
These two photos were taken in the Mount Cook area, as we walked up to the Tasman Glacier and Lake. It was very wet and stormy, and the first snow fall of the autumn had occurred overnight on the higher peaks around the Tasman valley. Both were taken on my full-frame mirrorless camera, the Nikon Z 7II, using the very versatile Z 24-120mm f/4 S lens, which is great for travel and landscape photography.
The first photo was at about 10am looking up towards the snowy mountain peaks at 35mm, using f/9, 1/125s and ISO 125. Surprisingly, even though it was very cloudy and overcast, the light was unusually bright at around EV 13, which is only two stops down from a sunny day. I love the contrast between the moody sky, the snowy mountains and the bright yellow autumnal grasses.
The second shot is a panorama looking back down the glaciated Tasman River and valley. This was formed from two 24mm images merged in Photoshop, and both taken using f/9, 1/100s and ISO 125. The beauty of this next generation of mirrorless lenses is that they maintain their sharpness throughout their zoom ranges, which was not always true of the F-mount DSLR lenses.
