Dr Ian Griffin, a professional astronomer, captured the aurora in a series of photographs taken from Hoopers Inlet on the Otago Peninsula.
The Aurora Australis, also known as the Southern Lights, is caused when the Earth's magnetic field interacts with a flow of highly charged particles from the sun.
The different colours come from the various elements in the earth's atmosphere - the green is from oxygen and the red from nitrogen. The display lasted until dawn.
