The first big storm of the season arrived over Bangkok this evening and I managed to grab a few frames after what was a rather delicious home-made curry. But I digress. I tried a slightly different approach tonight and it seems to have paid off. Previously I would have used the lowest ISO setting on my camera to give the longest shutter speeds but I hiked the ISO up to 400, which has the result of rendering the lightning strikes more clearly. So, for those of you who’d like to try this for yourselves, here’s the set-up:
Camera on a tripod with a remote release attached. ISO 400 on bulb setting with a polariser attached to extend the shutter speeds and an aperture of f/22. Shutter speeds vary from 11 to 67 seconds over this sequence. I locked the shutter open with the remote release and finished each exposure after a seeing a lightning strike. The exposures varied quite a bit and some frames were brighter than others so I tweaked them in Lightroom to produce a similar look in all. Finished in Lightroom by straightening the images a fraction, boosting the Clarity and adjusting the tone curve to give more contrast. Voila!
very cool results!
I’ve always wanted to shoot lightning, but every time it happens I get too scared to go outside :\
Maybe next one!
Happy shooting~
Excellent captures….and thanks for the methodology.
Wow, they look great! I have never shot lightning before. Thanks for the hot tips and someday when the kids don’t need me to cuddle them through it, I can try this. Take care
Hi Gavin, you are unbelievable!! and thanx for the clear explanation
“Cool!…How does he take a photo of that??” courtesy of the G kids
Therein lies the $1M question!