The Full Moon and Frösö Church Photo

Last week during the full Moon of November I had planned to take a photo of the full Moon rising behind the 800 year old Frösö church. I got this idea in May this year when I was wandering about on Andersön, a nature reserve located on an island 5 km Southwest of Frösön. Back in May I did notice that Frösö church was clearly visible and that it would make a nice foreground against a full Moon.

Frösö Church as seen from Andersön in May 2018.

When I returned home I started planning my shot and look through different software to see when the Moon should rise behind the church. The first date that popped up was November 22nd 2018.

So after waiting for 6 months, the time had finally come, now it was all down to the weather, and this time I was lucky to see clear skies with pretty good atmospheric conditions. This is the final photo.

Final photo of the full Moon behind Frösö church.

The still photo was taken using my Nikon D850 on my Nikon AF-S 600mm f/4 D IF-ED II lens. The real time footage of the Moon rising was shot using my Nikon D500 and Nikon AF-S 300mm f/2.8 D IF-ED with a Nikon AF-S TC-20E III teleconverter.

Here's a film from the 22nd of  November showing how I took the photo.



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Astronomy Picture Of the Day at NASA

Today I'm featured as Astronomy Picture of the Day (APOD) at NASA with my photo of a lunar flyby.

The photo of a Gibbous Moon flyby was taken on the 29th of October in 2018 and was taken in the mountain area of Jämtland, Sweden

Just as I had set the camera for the correct exposure of the Moon and the mountain, this plane passed by. I quickly snapped a couple of shots and this is one of them. The photo was taken using my Nikon D850 with the Nikon AF-S 300mm f/4E PF ED VR lens.

This is APOD number 17 for me and it's always such an honor to be featured by NASA.

You can buy this photo as a print here - https://shop.astrofotografen.se/p661802438/ebc175045

Lunar flyby over the mountains in Jämtland, Sweden

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Rare colorful clouds

Yesterday, one hour before sunset, I did see some colorful clouds in the opposite direction of the Sun (At the Anti solar point). I never seen colored clouds there before so I had a hard time figuring out if they were polar stratospheric clouds or iridescent clouds. The colored clouds slowly faded away as the sun set so I thought it might be iridescent clouds, but I never seen them opposite of the Sun before.

When I returned home I contacted Les Cowley at OPOD (http://www.atoptics.co.uk) to get his opinion of these clouds and he guessed that it's tropospheric iridescent clouds. He's never seen them opposite the sun before so this is probably very rare.

Always exciting to see a new phenomena, perfect ending for 2017.

Happy new year everyone!

Standing on the edge to the universe

Here's a mosaic image I've made from six shots taken on the 26th of September this year. With this projection of the sky I like the depth in the image and how the Milky Way with its reflections forms a complete circle in the image. The autumn is high season for shooting the Milky Way here in the northern hemisphere, so hopefully we'll get som more clear dark night ahead for more shots of the Milky Way.

Nikon D850 with Nikon AF-S 14-24mm
NiSi Natural Night Filter

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Nikon Fisheye 8-15mm F3.5-4.5E ED Review

A couple of weeks ago I received my review sample of the new Nikon Fisheye 8-15mm F3.5-4.5E ED. Since I'm a huge fan and user of fisheye lenses, this type lens has been high on my wish list ever since Canon released their Canon EF 8-15mm f/4L lens back in 2010. A friend of mine has been using the Canon lens for years and he is very happy with it.

When taking pictures of the night sky, my two most used lenses is the Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8 and the Sigma 8mm f/3.5 fisheye lens. Since the sky is so big you need a wide lens to cover as much as possible.

In this review, I will compare my Nikon review sample with my Sigma 8mm F3.5 EX DG Circular Fisheye lens and my Nikon 14-24mm f/2.8. I will also test the Nikon 8-15mm on both FX and DX cameras.

Here are the primary features of the new Nikon lens listed by Nikon:

• Enables shooting at an angle of view of 180° vertical and horizontal (circular fisheye) when zoomed all the way out, and 180° diagonal (full-frame fisheye) when zoomed close to all the way in with shooting in FX format
• A full-frame fisheye effect with a diagonal angle of view of up to 180° can be achieved in the range that begins at the DX mark* on the lens and ends at the maximum telephoto position with shooting in DX format
• Realizes very sharp and clear rendering from maximum aperture throughout the zoom range
• A minimum focus distance of 0.16 m (0.5 ft.) and a maximum reproduction ratio of 0.34x enable sharp and clear rendering, even with shooting at close distances
• Adoption of three ED glass elements provides effective compensation for lateral chromatic aberration, minimizing color bleed at the edges of the frame
• Nano Crystal Coat adopted to effectively reduce ghost and flare for sharp, clear images
• Adopted a dust- and drip-resistant structure with all moving parts of the lens barrel
• Highly durable fluorine coat that effectively repels dust, water, grease, and dirt applied to the outer surfaces of the two lens elements at either end (front and rear) of the lens

*The mark on the focal length scale that enables diagonal fisheye shooting in DX format is approximate.

Before I begin my review it’s important to note that the lens I’m reviewing is a sample and not a final product, so things can change.

Making the invisible visible

Today I did an experiment with some infra red photography. I wanted to capture a scene in IR-light and then colorize it with normal colors. First I took a normal photo of the scene, then an IR photo of the same scene and then by using the colors from the first shot I colorized the IR photo.

The end result looks quite interesting and it's exciting to think that it contain details that we actually can't see :-)

IR photo colorized

IR photo

Normal photo

Solar halo

Today I've been hanging out with a beautiful reflected solar halo, the first halo for this summer season. It varied in strength throughout the day but I could never see any trace of the 46° halo or arcs. These 22° halos are quite common but for them to reflect in water they need to bee quite strong as it was today. Read more about halos at Atmospheric Optics.

Green sky as seen from inside of a green

Here's a photo I took back in October this year. It's a sky filled with bright Northern Lights as seen from inside of a golf hole on a green. A green sky as seen from inside of a green.

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Hiking for the full moon

Today I went hiking with my family in a beautiful mountain area here in Jämtland, Sweden. We had a great time and the views got was really amazing now when the mountain tops are snow covered.

Later during the afternoon it was time for the full moon to rise. My wife and my two kids got to model while watching the moon rise above the horizon. I planned the shot during the day and everything look great for the evening. Just an hour before the Moon was about to rise, the clouds started to move in from west and the sky was quickly covered.

I was a bit worried that we wouldn't be able to do the shot but as you can see the sky was clear to the east just enough for the full moon to be visible. The moon is somewhat deformed in the lower half, that's due to atmospheric refraction.

The size of the Andromeda Galaxy

It was quite some time since I photographed the Andromeda galaxy so last night I had another go at it. For this photo I used a total exposure time of 75 minutes to bring out the details in the galaxy.

It is the nearest major galaxy to the Milky Way with a distance of 2.5 million light-years. Just stop and think for that a minute, the light has traveled 2.5 million years before it arrived to Earth. Since the speed of light is ~300 000 km per second, we can quite easily come to the conclusion that the Andromeda galaxy is extremely far away.

But, since it at the same time is extremely big, its size in the sky is as big as 6 full moons placed next to each other.

In this photo I took last night I've included the size of the Moon as it appears in the sky, just so that you can get an idea on how big the Andromeda galaxy really is in the sky. Since the light from the galaxy also is very faint due to the long distance, we can just barley see the galaxy with the naked eye. But if we could see it in its full glory, this is how big it would look compared to the Moon. Quite a view.

Nikon D810A, Nikon AF-S 300mm/f2.8, 75 minute exposure, ISO 1600

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Aurora road

The aurora season continues to deliver amazing auroras. A few nights ago we had another fantastic show with lots of activity both along the horizon and with a beautiful corona. Here is one shot taken when the aurora was very active and colorful.

Beneath the Milky Way

This weekend I was visiting one of my neighbors at their summer house. It's located in a really remote location with a wonderful dark sky. During the weekend I captured this image of their house beneath the Milky Way.

It's quite amazing to think that this little house is circling around in a giant galaxy filled with billions of stars.

Nikon D810A, ISO 6400, 30 sec. 14 mm f/2.8

Astronomical nights arrives

Last night we experienced the first astronomical night here in Östersund, Sweden. Astronomical night is defined as when the geometric center of the sun is 18º or more below the horizon. Astronomical nights is something we astrophotographers want since then we can do really long exposures without the catching any light from the Sun.

September and October is also the high season for shooting the Milky Way. It's high in the sky and stretches over the entire sky from south west to north east around midnight.

Here's a shot I took a week ago when the sky still wasn't completely black. What you're seeing is our own galaxy The Milky Way rising from the horizon, filled with billion of stars, nebula's and interstellar dust blocking the light from distant stars creating these darker areas you're seeing.

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Planning and shooting the full moon of August

So, did you see it? Last night's full moon? It was as beautiful as always to see the full moon slowly rise above the horizon. I never get tired of seeing the Moon and Sun rise and set. These events are always a joy to watch and you never know what will happen regarding the light and other optical phenomena. Last night was no exception.

So, this time I had planned a location in forehand to get a shot with the moon above a big residential building called Fagerskrapan about 3 km away. According to my calculations the full moon should be visible around 20:12 - 20:15 Swedish summer time and at 20:14 it popped up right about where I expected it to, about three degrees to the left of Fagerskrapan.

Nikon D800E 1/180 sec, ISO 200, 600mm f/4.0

Then just three minutes later the Moon was closing in on the building and I noticed I had to move a bit to get it closer to the roof of the building. When doing these final adjustments you don't need to move much. Perhaps I moved about 20-30 meters away from my original spot.

Nikon D800E 1/180 sec, ISO 200, 600mm f/4.0

As the Moon got even closer to the building I went from 600 mm to 1,000 mm in focal length to get a more dramatic perspective of the scene.

Nikon D800E 1/90 sec, ISO 400, 1,000mm f/6.7

Now it was all about waiting for the right moment and and keep shooting. At a focal length of 1,000 mm the Moon moves pretty fast over the sky.

Nikon D800E 1/180 sec, ISO 400, 1,000mm f/6.7

One minute later I took this shot when the Moon was connected to Fagerskrapan by the big antenna on the roof. I shot it in portrait mode and have then cropped it to a square format. I like the fact that this antenna are connecting the two objects.

So in all it took the Moon about 6 minutes to make the trip from horizon and to the top of the building. That's not much so if you try to capture a moon or sunrise you need good preparations and planing in forehand.

Finally I realized that I might get a photo of a clock and the Moon exactly when it was at 100% which occurred at 20:38 Swedish summer time. This wasn't something I've planned but I realized it in the last few minutes and I soon realized that from my current location I wasn't able to get that shot, but it would be close.

Nikon D800E 1/125 sec, ISO 400, 1,000mm f/6.7

So this last photo was taken at 20:29 so 9 minutes to early. Had I waited for another 9 minutes the Moon had been long gone from that church tower, close but no cigar. The good side of the is that now I got another shot to do at another full moon :-)


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One year in Östersund

During the recent year I've been taking photos over Östersund on a regular basis from the exact same location. This is my biggest and longest project so far. My plan was to take an image every week to get a smooth animation but I didn't quite manage that. The animation consists of 36 photos. During some periods the landscape didn't change much so I've excluded some images to get a better flow of the changes in the landscape. Hope you like it.



Music - "Virtues Inherited Vices Passed On" by Chris Zabriskie

Planning and shooting a sunset

I never get tired of watching a sunrise, sunset, moonrise or moonset. All these events are always beautiful to watch and it's also very exciting because you never know what might happen regarding light and atmospheric phenomena.

Last Sunday the weather was looking good for the evening and I had looked up a location that would give me a nice foreground, in this case a large building. I think planning your shot is half the fun and that's something I really enjoy doing. When planning my shot I usually use Google Maps and tools like The Photographer's Ephemeris. Other useful tools are planetarium software like Stellarium 

Always be careful when shooting the Sun since its so bright, you could damage your eyes. Never look straight into the Sun through your camera. Regarding filters, this sunset was quite cloudy so I didn't need any filters, otherwise you could use a ND-filter to dim the Sun.

As soon as I arrive on the location I've planned, I start by checking the surroundings to see what I can work with regarding foregrounds etc. I also double check that I'm in a spot where the Sun or the Moon will pass behind the planed distant object. Then I usually start off by taking some wide angle shots while the Sun is above the horizon and I got some really nice a warm light.

Here's a shot showing lake Storsjön and you can see the building to the right of the Sun. Above the Sun you can see a faint Sun pillar.

Nikon D810A, 1/250 sec. ISO 200, 70 mm f/8

As the Sun gets closer to the horizon I switch to a longer focal length to really get up close with the Sun. In this case I was shooting at a focal length of 1,200 mm. Quite extreme but in that way you get a much more dramatic scene. The building was located 13 km away from me at the time.

Nikon D810A, 1/2000 sec. ISO 400, 1200 mm f/11

In the shot above you can see two sunspots on the solar disc. Both these sunspots are about the same size as the Earth's diameter. As you can see the clouds can sometimes work with you adding a lot of drama to the scene. The sky above the Sun looks much better with this thin layer of clouds that it would have done without them. But I would have preferred not having the lower thicker clouds to get a cleaner solar disc, but they also adds a bit of drama.

Later on the Sun passed behind the building as planned.

Nikon D810A, 1/500 sec. ISO 400, 1200 mm f/11

The image above is a panoramic image of three shots. I did that to get the reflections of the Sun in the water. You should always be alert to whats happening in the scene regarding light, reflections or shadows. For just a brief moment there could be something that you don't want to miss.

So, how close will you get with a focal length of 1,200 mm? Here's a 100% crop from a photo I took later on.

Nikon D810A, 1/500 sec. ISO 400, 1200 mm f/8

As you can see a really long focal length can create some dramatic shots but it's also really hard to get sharp shots. When you enlarge a scene using a longer focal length, you also enlarge all the errors. So if you have lots of turbulence in the air you will have a hard time getting a sharp image. In this case I was shooting over water and that usually gives a much sharper image due to stable air.

So, keep shooting those sunsets, it's not cliche, it's so much fun and excitement.

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Nikon D810A Review

Nikon just got star struck with the new D810A. As a long time Nikon photographer working as a professional photographer with a passion for astrophotography, I was really excited when this new camera was announced in February this year. Could it be the answer to all my dreams?

Recently I’ve been testing the new Nikon D810A camera, Nikon's first DSLR dedicated to long-exposure deep-sky astrophotography. I was contacted by Nikon Nordic and asked if I could test the new camera and give my thoughts on it.

The new D810A has a specialized image sensor that is four times more sensitive to H-alpha red tones than an ordinary DSLR. Due to this sensitivity in red light, Nikon says it’s not suitable for general photography since this could give you some reddish looking photos. When doing astrophotography you want this sensitivity in H-alpha so you can capture more data/colors in nebula.

Nikon D810A

Chasing Aurora

If read my last post Dreaming of Aurora you can read about the story behind this movie. This is my first try with real time aurora filming and I learnt a lot during the late hours of this cold night. It was almost pitch black so I'm very impressed that the camera manages to pick up so much data in the aurora. You can find some still photos in the end of the movie that was shot while filming.

The Hidden City

Last night there were a very thick fog covering the city of Östersund. In this photo you can see the fog lit up from beneath by the city lights. It's very interesting to see all the different colors from different type of light sources.

One of the most known landmarks of Östersund is Rådhuset (City hall) and you can see the tower/spire of that building sticking up through the fog in center of the photo.

The guardian angel of the Moon

This is a photo I took back in November of 2014. I was out to capture the sunset and on my way home I found this rather unique composition. The statue is placed at Frösö kyrka and this night the crescent Moon was perfectly aligned for the angel to very gently pick it up with.