After an extremely long day of hiking and photographing in the mountain backcountry, the last thing I wanted to do is stay out late photographing the night sky in the bitter cold. My warm bed was calling my name, yet the realization that I missed the aurora the previous night and the solar forecast was calling for an even better display for this night was just too hard to resist. I re-packed my gear, grabbed the dog, and off we went. As I left my house, I could already see the show was going to be a good one. Even under a veil of city lights, the aurora came to life and danced across the sky. By the time I left the city, I became awestruck with the magnificent display of green waves of light overhead. Tired and exhausted, I only stayed out for an hour. In that time, I’ll admit, I had a struggle to find something to make for a compelling image. These barns aren’t too far from my house and I always wanted to shoot them during the aurora. It was a struggle on site to pull off a compelling image as the barns are further away than I previously thought. With the pasture gated off, I had to get creative and instead of showing the entire night sky and having tiny awkward little barns, I decided to zoom in and go for a more intricate scene. I feel like this image does justice for what I saw that night, even if it’s just a small segment of the night sky.
Towering above the high desert plains of Central Oregon, Smith Rock State Park takes a commanding presence over the surrounding terrain. A photograph just can’t justify how epic the cliffs are as the Crooked River snakes its way through the basalt and tuff rock formations.
Every time I am on Vancouver Island, I make a point to stop here because I’ve always loved the look of this place. Unfortunately, I never seem to time things right and the coast always has a blanket of fog roll in as the evening sets. After at least 5 years of trying for this shot, I finally made it happen this year. It’s nice to tick some of these off the list. Now off to the next one.
