It's not every day that Upstate New York gets lucky enough to see the Northern Lights. Rochester did get one wild night.

We were lucky to end February 2023 with these beautiful photos thanks to Montanus Photography:

Montanus Photography
Montanus Photography
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The caption on Facebook reads: "Wild night of northern lights in Rochester last night! It went on all night non-stop. I pulled another all-nighter, rushing out to grab the sunrise now."

Montanus Photography
Montanus Photography
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Here’s how the photos were taken:

"I live on the shore of Lake Ontario so I have a natural advantage when it comes to shooting the northern lights. You need a place that is dark - and also with a view to the horizon preferably. I seriously lucked out last night when I just happened to open up twitter to see that 'aurora' was trending. After a little more poking around, I realized I had better get out there and quick. And of course, it didn't disappoint. Usually, the northern lights are very faint at our latitude, sometimes difficult to see with the naked eye. But not last night, you could see them clearly. It does take a while after you get outside for your eyes to adjust to the dark. But the real trick is to have the camera on a tripod and do a long exposure, sometimes as long as 30 seconds , in order to pick up the true glory of the auroras, with all the beautiful detail and color. But an iPhone can work too, believe it or not. The image will come out kind of grainy, but you can still grab an image that shows the color.”

Montanus Photography
Montanus Photography
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Montanus Photography is made up of Neil Montanus and Jim Montanus.

Montanus Photography
Montanus Photography
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Neil Montanus is a legendary photographer who has worked with Kodak, and many big names in the business:

His resume includes the ‘best portrait ever’ of Walt Disney (still in use today), the official presidential portrait of Gerald Ford - and a fellowship with the American Society of Photographers, one of only 27 photographers in the world to hold that distinction when he was awarded it in 1977. He earned the Master of Photography from the Professional Photographers of America in 1961. And he won several international photography awards."

He's also worked with Play Boy and famous ad campaigns of Kodak.

Jim Montanus was born in Rochester and is the son of Neil. Jim has been around photography his entire life, but wasn't always the biggest fan of it:

Ironically, Jim hated photography as a child. His Dad was constantly - and irritatingly - shooting pictures of everyone and everything. He was relentless. Jim and his siblings had to stop and pose constantly. From Christmas morning - where his Dad would be waiting with movie lights set up along side a 16mm movie camera - to family picnics, vacations and just about everything else, his Dad never stopped shooting."

You can read more on the pair online here.

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