Nature Show: 'Lightning'

[2SHOES]

After some searching, I could not find a thread specifically for lightning, I found storms, clouds, everything else, but I'm learning to capture photos of lightning with my Olympus EM-1 MK3, and 2 nights ago I set the camera for timelapse of 1 second photos with 1 second between, and I know I missed a lot that night, but I had these two that really turned out pretty nice. I missed some of the bolts in the sky, and in the future I would try a different location with a better foreground but for now I'm just learning this new side of photography.

Can you show us your favorite lightning photos, and give some advice on how to get those incredible shots?

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[Charzes44]

Best advice I can remember is to mount camera on tripod, set aperture and film speed, open shutter, and hope for the best! Trial and error is the way to go. This is for night time only, I believe.

 

[2SHOES]

Best advice I can remember is to mount camera on tripod, set aperture and film speed, open shutter, and hope for the best! Trial and error is the way to go. This is for night time only, I believe.

That's sort of what I did, I followed some advice from a YouTube Video, it mentioned lowest aperture, 1 second shutter speed, and set on a tripod at 200 ISO for the Olympus Cameras, 100 ISO for full frame. I think next time I'll set up in a better location and try to use the Composite modes but getting these two were a huge learning experience.

 

[Toddster]

This was 19 seconds at f9

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[rayvonn]

This was 19 seconds at f9
View attachment 389205

Exciting times for that ship right next to the third main thunderbolt to the right ( ) which I can just about see.

 

[John King]

Lightning at Cape Marengo. Just awesome power!

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[bdbits]

I've used the long exposure method, but you can get lightning triggers. I've read they actually work pretty well but do cost a bit. Might take the fun and challenge out of the experience, too.

 

[Andrewmap]

I found this DIY Camera Lightning Trigger | Adam Romanowicz looks interesting.

 

[2SHOES]

Something interesting I've figured out, some of my photos from the other night, had no visible bolts until I turned down the Highlights to -100, and then also turned down the whites to -100 as well. Here is another I thought was really interesting. It brings some light to my thoughts on capturing strikes. I want to try f/4 or even f/8 with longer shutter speeds next time I do a time lapse to try and capture more bolts.

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