You have to be here to believe
Can you really see Milky Way with the naked eye? Or experience Northern Lights in Denmark? Unfortunately, we often hear that people simply cannot experience any of these fascinating night sky phenomena here in the area. But it’s far from being the truth!
To get the best experience of the night sky it is important going to a place, where no streetlamps can disturb your night vision. Moreover, looking towards a dark horizon is also important, since light pollution can significantly reduce the number of visible stars. There can be found different webpages, where it is possible to see a light pollution map of the area in order to find a dark spot – and we even have made a guide with 8 fascinating Dark Sky spots by the Limfjord. If you will follow these two steps, you will get closer to getting an unforgettable dark sky experience.
Your night vision plays the most important role in how much light you can see in the dark environment. Give your eyes at least 10 minutes and you will see the bright cloud of the Milky Way, striking through the sky. If you lie down and look up, in about half an hour you will no longer be able to tell what is dominating – is it darkness or stars?
When it comes to Aurora, it is the brightness and type of the phenomenon that define its clarity to the naked eye. Since Denmark is located relatively far from the general activity of Northern Lights, there must be a solar storm in order to experience it here. If you’d like to see Aurora in full colors, imagine this: you are out in the countryside in total darkness, the stars are shining and far out on the horizon there are some streetlamps. You cannot see the colors of trees nor the landscape, but you clearly can see that streetlamps are yellow – how could it be? And the answer is far from being rocket science that it requires an object to emit a certain amount of light, so the human eye could see it in colors. Typically, here in Denmark we see Northern Lights as a bright white cloud, but when strongly charged particles of the solar wind get captured in the atmosphere, will you clearly see pinkish pillars of light. Thankfully, the new solar cycle has just started, meaning that our Sun is very active and when its activity is aimed towards our planet – we can see Aurora in Denmark!
Among other things, with the help of long exposure your camera can imitate ability of the human eye to see better in a dark environment. And it is exactly at this point, where you can get a true WOW experience. By using a camera or a smartphone with an exposure time of a couple of seconds, you will quickly be amazed how many details and colors are hiding up in the night sky. It is not a secret that a camera sensor can be several thousand times more sensitive to light than our eyes, and with the help of long exposure you have an opportunity to see the “invisible”.
And it’s far from being it. So, go on an adventure by the Limfjord under the night sky and explore secrets of the stars despite you have a camera with you or not!
You have to be here to believe
Down below you can see our representation of how the night sky looks like with the naked eye versus the same scene photographed with long exposure. Please notice that scenes presented here are from the island of Mors, meaning that you will see night sky differently based on the amount of light pollution in the area. At the same time, the representation of the naked-eye scene was digitally created on a digital screen, which projects images in different ways, because brightess and colors can be adjusted.
Photo:Ruslan Merzlyakov
Photo:Ruslan Merzlyakov