Aurora australis photos: Stunning light show captured on Aussie coastline

Photographer Lachlan Manley's night-long sky watch paid off on Sunday night with spectacular images of the aurora australis, or southern lights, in the sky over Queenscliff.

While most Victorians snoozed, Mr Manley was up until 4am capturing the colours from the interaction of particles from the sun with the earth's magnetic field.

The first image was taken from the beach behind Queenscliff ferry terminal at 10.30pm on Sunday, and a second, taking in Point Lonsdale lighthouse, was snapped at 2am on Monday.

Mr Manley, from Point Lonsdale, exposed each shot for up to 25 seconds, using a high-ISO (sensitivity) reading on his Canon 6D camera to get as much light in as possible.

"I just love night photography," he said. "I'm a carer for my wife, who has got MS, and I've got a two-year-old, so they go to bed and I get some free time to get out. It's just relaxation, and it looks magical."

Perry Vlahos, vice-president of the Astronomical Society of Victoria, said aurora australis lights are particles from a coronal mass ejection on the sun that interact with the earth's magnetosphere.

He said such vivid shots as Mr Manley's were only perceptible through an SLR camera, using a long exposure time of 20 to 30 seconds, "to pick up enough of these photons for them to become visible".

"If you are just looking at it with your eyes, you're not likely to see much, if anything," Mr Vlahos said. "The eye is not as sensitive to the colours displayed there. It would be just a greyish light, more likely, or very light hints of colour."