Shooting the Northern Lights old style

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juno

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Dan 'Saul' Knight
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Hi,

I'll soon be taking a trip to Iceland to hopefully take some photos of the Aurora. I'll be taking a digital camera as well, but I've just come into an old Rolleiflex SL 35 E, which from what I can gather isn't a terrible camera - I remember seeing them in camera shops years ago for higher prices than I was paying for OM gear.

So I was thinking as I've got the winder, a Rolleiflex 21mm f4 and a Zeiss 25mm f2.8 lens, and as my GF1 takes 45 seconds to process a 45 second exposure I might as well take the Rollei and have a bash at some old school photography, might help keep me warm and occupied for those 45 seconds I'm waiting!!

My main question is what film should I be taking to use with the two lenses I mentioned above? Should I go for a 400 ISO slide or negative? Or do i need to go faster or slower?

Any help greatly appreciated, 20 years since I did my A level photography, think I've forgotten most of it.

thanks,
 
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I think Arthur would have a better idea than me, but I would be looking at ISO 1600 I think, the format only matters depending on what you plan on doing with the shots, if their going straight on disc at processing then whatever you have to hand.
 
Id go for a low ISO film myself and do a long exposure. Not sure what film to suggest though.
 
Another vote for a long exposure and 100 ISO film - purely for the vivid colours I'd be tempted to go for Fuji Slide film (Velvia??) - though do read up on reciprocity failure for calculating exposure times, as I believe it's not a particularly linear film.
 
doesn't the aurora move ? flit about a bit ?

if so, how does that work with long exposures ?

I dunno - I've never seen it in real life
 
It does move, so it'll be just like taking a nightshot with headlights, only not so bright.

It can move at different speeds as well. When I saw it in Norway last year, it was very gentle. I'd like to see a vivid display, so am planning to go to Iceland in December.
 
TheBigYin said:
Another vote for a long exposure and 100 ISO film - purely for the vivid colours I'd be tempted to go for Fuji Slide film (Velvia??) - though do read up on reciprocity failure for calculating exposure times, as I believe it's not a particularly linear film.
Click to expand...

Velvia is apparently quite poor for long exposures, nasty colour casts etc after only a few seconds. I looked that up recently to see about doing some star trail shots with it.

Could be totally wrong though...:LOL:
 
Amp34 said:
Velvia is apparently quite poor for long exposures, nasty colour casts etc after only a few seconds. I looked that up recently to see about doing some star trail shots with it.

Could be totally wrong though...:LOL:
Click to expand...

I'll own up - I meant Provia (100F) :bonk: Must have confuzzled myself because i'd just taken a couple of rolls of velvia out of the freezer :LOL:
 
I'd shoot with 400 and vary shutter speeds between 25 to 45 seconds aperture virtually wide open and focused on or near infinity.

It's so varied in nature moving about the sky and varying in brightness and hue so it real is a little hit and hope.....

4378870146_51de0da680.jpg
 
Actually Velvia 100 can be used for quite long exposures, without any corrective filters it can be exposed up to 1min and with a 2.5M magenta filter up to 8mins with 1/3 stop being added on for 2mins, 1/2 for 4 mins and 2/3 for 8mins.

I found that Velvia 50 does actually work quite well for star trails as the dark of the night complements the slightly noticable green colour cast quite well. A 50min exposure at f4 seemed to work quite well with it.
 
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Thanks for all the replies - some good stuff to think about.

My intention is to get the film processed and scanned, no prints, so I was thinking slide film.

So maybe I should take a roll or 2 of Provia 400 and shoot one of those first with the slower wide lenses I have, and maybe a couple of rolls of Velvia 100 for daytime shooting and to use if there's time after and if the lights show. I've already got the 50mm f1.4 Planar and there's a good chance I'll be able to borrow the 35mm f1.4 Distagon and the 85mm f1.4 Planar to take with me for some extra fun so ISO 100 might be handy.

Only downer is the price - from ringing around 3 films, processing and scanning at a pro lab is going to cost just under £100.....almost makes me want to splash out a bit extra and get a film scanner.
 
Where did you get those prices from???

If you want the 'best' quality then I would get it done at Peak Imaging but their develop and scan prices are quite high for a comparatively small scan resolution. Apparently this place, Transpacolour, is supposed to be quite good and offer a similar image quality to Peak according to reviews although I have yet to try them.

http://www.transpacolor.co.uk/digi_proscan.html

For them, 36 exposure E-6 film costs £4.20 to dev + £11.39 for a scan size thats suitable for printing up to 16"x12" (says 15mb uncompressed) as a jpeg. However if you send 3 ore more rolls in you get a 5% discount.

The film itself will only be about £15 if you get it from 7dayshop or a similar place
 
:shrug: 3 lots of £4.20 + £11.39 + £15 is just under £100 in my head :shrug:
 
3 x (4.20 + 11.39) = £46.77

£46.77 + £15 = £61.00 in total

A bit less than £100!

There is always the other way of doing it, get them scanned at the lower resolution option and any ones that you really like, get scanned by a service like scanitall.co.uk, at a much higher resolution (4000dpi)

https://www.scanitall.co.uk/ScanItAll/eshop?page=shop.browse&category_id=2

I find they do excellent scans and are my prefered company
 
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s162216 said:
3 x (4.20 + 11.39) = £46.77

£46.77 + £15 = £61.00 in total

A bit less than £100!
Click to expand...

that's clearer . ta. Not £15 for each film then (y)

much less than £100
 
Peak Imaging and CCImaging were recommended to me by someone. They were both quoting around £28-30 per film for process and scans suitable for 12x8 prints.

Transpacolor and scanitall sound better, I'll give them a try and post back with results.

Yep £61 is much less, more money in the lens fund!!

thanks for that
 
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