polarspirits

Conveying the grandeur of the Aurora Borealis is a serious challenge for a photographer. How are you supposed to capture the splendor of the event, give it a sense of scale, and somehow imbue that photograph with the emotion involved in actually witnessing the polar spirits for yourself?

There probably isn't a magical mixture of ingredients that will yield the ideal northern lights photograph, but the image above by photographer Max Rive is one of the closest we've seen, and he was kind enough to share the details behind it with us.

Time-lapse photographer Ole C. Salomonsen specializes in the northern lights. But before you skip over this post because you've seen about a billion more aurora time-lapses this month, we suggest you click play and give Ole's work a shot.

Photographer Ole C. Salomonsen loves shooting the northern lights or, as he calls them, the polar spirits. And for his most recent film he went all out by putting together time-lapse photography of the aurora above cities, in front of starry backgrounds and above gorgeous fjords with a couple of mind-blowing video captures thrown in for good measure.