Lightning

[Gary Bagshawe]

Well here goes, 1st picture posting here so will see if it works.

http://www.gbcproductions.co.uk/photography/forum/lightning.jpg

[CT]

Great! I keep meaning to try some of that. What sort of shutter speed do you typically use for those shots?

[lolyton]

Nice! To answer CT's question from my point of view, i would suggest that the longer the better, reason being you are more likely to capture the lightning (bloody hard work trying to snap it at 1/100th lol). Try to get the best exposure for the background/landscape and the lightning will be added bonus and will also expose itself correctly because it has the same characteristics as flash. Just a quickie, and only the way i try in my few attempts to capture it.

I would like to be enlightened by the lightning experts too though.

[Gary Bagshawe]

lolyton, you are bang on correct, For this shot I stopped the lens down and exposed for the scene, 22 seconds. The effects are much more dramatic if you can get more than 1 strike during exposure. It is much harder during the ay and to get the long shutter speeds required it is usefull to use polarising filters etc. You can buy lightning triggers which trip the shutter when a strike is detected but I think that these are rather expensive.

[lolyton]

Never knew that about lightning triggers. May have a look into them.... hmmm, wonder if you could develop a flash sensor to do the same trick!

[Pink Fairy]

Beautifully captured. I can't think of anything more dramatic than a lightning strike, everyones heart races a little when it happens... so even more plaudits to those who can keep calm and take the shots when it's happening.
Thanks for the tips, it also something that i've always wanted to capture... along with fireworks.

cheers,
Andy

[lolyton]

Knew i had one somewhere, not as impressive on the lightning front as yours. Has good memories attached to it though. Was a brilliant night atop Sugarloaf mountain in Rio, Brazil. Got loads of lightning that night and have images of the lightning coming out of the top of the cloud too. Absolutely fantastic night. This image doesn't look as impressive at this size though. Works much better at about when it is large, i have made the file size 60MB (obviously not the one shown here) without any loss of image quality and it looks great IMO (bit biased though).
http://www.thephotographyforums.com/albums/album36/Rio_Lightning.jpg

[IanC_UK]

Both shots are really good !

I have never really tried taking pics at night, guess i should have a go ! :)

[lolyton]

You should definately have a go, i love shooting images at night, things have a completely different look to them!

[Gary Bagshawe]

Thanks for all the feedback, here is another one from the same storm.

http://www.gbcproductions.co.uk/photography/forum/lightning2.jpg