The northern light blog: Green coast, northern lights from Tromsø island

With the autumn equinox, areas above the Polar Arctic Circle start getting ready for the polar night. Up in northern Norway, there is a really cool tradition, where they make cream-filled buns with a chocolate frosting, called Mørketidsboller (dark period buns).

Mørketid is more than the polar night, you can feel it in the air. People start wearing down jackets already, although we are still above freezing temperatures, the smell of the chimneys fill the streets in the evenings, and we start getting into the race towards the darkness. Some of us spend our summer longing for the polar night, because for us is not the "dark period". Just the opposite, it is the "light period", where we can get our northern lights dose.

There is a family of aurora chasers called Aurora Addicts Anonymous (read their blog and follow their facebook page, they are great!) who, in my opinion, hit the nail with that name. We are just aurora addicts, warm summers and sunny beaches are nothing compared to the northern lights!
And also, we are addicts to the rest of the people: I have found myself asking over the phone:

"Do you have any green? Should I go to your place?"

Yes. As bad as it sounds, I have said it several times. I once got very weird looks from people around, as I was in a bus, on a Saturday night, going towards the city center (where I was going to meet other aurora addicts), but it took me some time to realize why was that old lady on the corner looking at me as if I was doing something wrong.

Of course, the equinox is a good excuse to get out and photograph (any excuse is good, but we have to find a reason to have sleepless nights and then go to our normal jobs...), and last night it payed off. We were heading towards Kvaløya, the island to the west of Tromsø, to escape from the light pollution and have a clear view towards the open sea. Sadly, the bridge was under construction, and after a very (very, very) long wait, we decided to stay into the island and try to find something interesting to photograph.

We knew that light pollution would be there all the time, and we would have to cope with it, but it payed off. The show was great, and got some nice shots. Due to the challenge of the light pollution, I had to play with composition, find interesting foregrounds, and this photo is the result.

I shot a square composition, what do you think about it? Let me know in a comment, e-mail or drop me a line in my facebook page!