This was not going to be passed up. My daughter is the one who brought this potential phenomenon to my attention and that we should go out in the middle of the night to experience it.
Armed with a camera, a tripod, some jackets, some odd kids' snacks later discovered in her van, and our wit, my son, my daughter, and myself ventured out to find the night sky free of clouds. We eventually made it to what she so eloquently described as "*#!&@ nowhere" at a lake she renamed "murder lake" (because no one else was around). In reality, and described with less magniloquence than her description, we were at Tyrell Lake, no more than 30 minutes outside of Lethbridge.
We were able to capture some amazing skies. This had the shape and depth of a full skirt to our perspective. This wide-angle lens could not get it all in. It spanned the entire prairie sky and went well over our heads and down the other half.
Once we got enough images of the sky, we started to play a bit. We tried flash, but with the breeze, the 15-30 second exposures for the sky, the colour shifting, with enough ambient brightness that it was hard not to get movement even with flash, we opted for silhouettes instead. (We still had to stand like a statue for 15 seconds for those - but the wind got to our hair.)
I will remember those hours sitting with two of my kiddos on a remote country dirt road, next to Murder Lake, in the middle of the night, with our eyes to the sky in awe.
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