Arctic Aurora Photography Workshop

New Brochure/Itinerary Available! CLICK HERE to download the pdf.

For many, seeing and photographing the northern lights or aurora borealis is a life goal… and it should be!

If you are serious about seeing the lights, you need to dedicate more than a day to it. Multi-day trips like these Arctic Aurora Photography Workshops will carry you to the heart of Alaska’s Arctic Brooks Range and are the best way to maximize your odds of seeing the aurora. For five days and four nights we will immerse ourselves in the arctic landscape, chasing lights at night, and compositions of the mountains and wildlife during the day.

While there are never guarantees when it comes to finding the northern lights, previous Arctic Aurora Workshops have had great success with participants typically seeing and photographing the aurora borealis on multiple (sometimes every night) of the trip.

Scheduled Workshops

2024

Trip Overview

(The 2025 Trip will start with a night in Fairbanks followed by 3 in Wiseman.)

Wiseman, Alaska lies in the southern Brooks Range, approximately 250 road miles north of Fairbanks, and 70 miles north of the Arctic Circle. The wild, rugged landscape would be a photographer’s playground even if the area wasn’t home to some of the most consistent and dramatic northern lights displays in the world.

Our home will be at the Boreal Lodge where we will stay in warm, cozy, and well-equipped cabins. From the cabin porch, you can walk the short distance to the frozen Koyukuk River where the mountains of the Brooks Range dominate in every direction. Daily, we will venture out further afield to look for daytime wildlife and landscapes and chase down the best compositions and views of the northern lights at night.

This photo workshop is an opportunity to spend five days and four nights receiving one-on-one photography instruction and feedback from professional photographer David W. Shaw. On the workshop, you’ll take your image-making to a new level with creative photo exercises, technical assistance, and post-processing demonstrations.

When it comes to the aurora borealis, there is no better photo tour!

For proof, just look at these images made by some past participants.

Itinerary

Day 1

We will spend our first night in the Fairbanks area. We will meet for dinner, and then head out for an aurora shoot in the hills and forests surrounding Fairbanks. This is a perfect opportunity to get your equipment dialed in and ready for our trip the following day to the Brooks Range. Fairbanks is an incredible aurora destination with dark skies, and a road system that will allow us to quickly get away from city lights and into the surrounding wilderness.

Day 2

At about 9am we will depart Fairbanks and start the drive north. It’s a six hour drive from Fairbanks to Wiseman when the weather is good and though a hefty day on the road, we will stop often when photography opportunities present themselves, and to have lunch on the shore of the mighty Yukon River.

Most of the day we will be driving on the famous Dalton Highway (or “Haul Road” as the locals know it) as it winds through the boreal forest and up and down steep hills as we approach the mountains of the Brooks Range. Several times we rise above the tree line opening up sweeping views of the Yukon River basin and mountains to the north.

We will arrive in Wiseman, Alaska around mid-afternoon where we will have a few hours to relax and have dinner before we venture out for our first evening chasing the northern lights.

Day 3-4

The inevitably late nights photographing the aurora mean we have relaxing mornings of sleeping in, or sipping coffee in our comfortable, Alaskan accommodations. After a late breakfast we may spend the day photographing the historic cabins and mining equipment around Wiseman, explore the local trails and frozen river on foot or snowshoes, or venture out in the vehicle to look for wildlife and photograph the winter Brooks Range landscapes.

At least once, during the trip, we will make the drive to the top of Atigun Pass, where the continental divide runs along the spine of the Brooks Range. From there we can admire the rugged mountains, and peer north toward the vast open space of the Arctic Coastal Plain.

Daily, you will have to opportunity to participate in creative photo exercises, post-processing workshops, and group image critiques.

Day 5

We’ll make a fairly early departure from Wiseman. After a quick stop for gas and coffee at the truck stop in Coldfoot, we will head south back down the Haul Road toward civilization. We will arrive in Fairbanks by about 5pm, in time for dinner.

PDF Itinerary