Pulse

Photographer

Mark Gray

Category

Nature Photography - Seascape

Company

Mark Gray Gallery

Submission Group

Professional

Year

2026

Country / Region:

Australia

It was a privilege to spend 4 weeks in the beautiful Arctic during Winter of 2024. I conducted photography tours in Iceland and Norway then spent some time scouting and shooting for myself in the Lofoten Islands and Senja regions. It was a tough start to the year for Northern Lights activity despite being in Solar Maximum. We had a couple of small shows on our photography tours and then, finally after 3 solid weeks of chasing the lights we experienced an amazing show in Senja. We'd been driving around for a few hours trying to find clear sky when we pulled into the Bergsbotn Platform lookout and I screamed 'Aurora' as I saw a large band of Green spanning right across the sky to the north. We jumped out of the car and setup our gear as quickly as possible. After capturing a few shots from the lookout we decided it was time to shoot some more interesting compositions. We headed down to Tungeneset and climbed down onto the slippery rocks. It's never easy navigating in the dark on slippery ocean rocks with patches of snow, ice and water. I'd seen this rockpool earlier in the day and knew it would offer awesome reflections if the Aurora improved so made my way down there and waited patiently. It didn't take long for the Northern Lights to start intensifying and dancing across the sky. As the Aurora peaked, I captured this stunning photo with the iconic Okshornan mountain range in the distance. What an incredible experience!

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