When lightning strikes

[TobyMac]

Got some great shots last night while a storm passed by


_MG_8678.1 by Tobias Weber, on Flickr


_MG_8691.1 by Tobias Weber, on Flickr


_MG_8694.1 by Tobias Weber, on Flickr

[Shadowman]

Good capture.

[Ahmed Shahat]

Very good shots. You are so clever and lucky to be able to catch these sparkles.

I guess it is summer now in South Africa, isn't it? On the top side of your continent Africa (Egypt) it is now autumn.

Ahmed

[Bobobird]

Wonderful shots. Slight preference for pic 2 which appears a bit more dramatic. But great lightning shots are hard to get so being able to capture any is really great.

[dje]

Got some great shots last night while a storm passed by

You did indeed Tobias

Dave

[TobyMac]

Thanks guys, my favorite is Nr.1 personally, I think Nr.2 turned out a bit to bright because it was a fairly long exposure.

[epmi314]

Great shots Tobias. Could you provide some insight on your set up?

[SloMo]

Wow Toby.
I was sitting up with my camera all of last night trying to get a shot of the same storm but my exposures were always off so I ended up with white or black screens.
Good work.

[TobyMac]

Hey there, yeah iv been practicing this for a long time. Basically I set up my camera on a tripod, I set my ISO to about 200 so the pictures stay fairly dark and the lightning stands out. The key to actually catching the Lightning though is to shoot in full manual mode so both the aperture and shutter speed can be adjusted. I set the shutter speed to "bulb" mode so that I can keep the shutter open for as long as I want, but depending how dark it is they are usually between 1-2 minutes. My aperture is set to either 11 or 13. I also use a cable release so I don't disturb the camera at all. I then sit and release the shutter and leave it open for a while and watch the area Iv focused the camera on, usually I can somewhat see if I catch a fairly good bolt of lightning. All of these were during the night though, I haven't managed to get any great shots during the day, they always end up way to bright and the lightning doesn't stand out so I don't even bother with that anymore. It is a very time consuming art though, I sit for at least an hour or two, depending on how long the storm lasts, and in that time I take about 100-150 photos and of those only a handful are actually great, although it doers also depend on the storm a bit, this one wasn't particularly energetic so I only got very few great bolts.

Hope that explains it more or less glad to answer any more questions though

[jambin]

Well done indeed. How do you know where it's going to strike?

[TobyMac]

Haha I don't, I set my lens as wide as I can and then hope for the best

[KHarmon]

Very nice shots. With any luck I will be able to ride the lightning this week. We have chances of thunderstorms for the next four days and I'm not leaving home without my camera. I have missed lightning this year with the lack of storms, or rain of any kind, in west texas this year.

[Kris V]

Very nice shots. With any luck I will be able to ride the lightning this week. We have chances of thunderstorms for the next four days and I'm not leaving home without my camera. I have missed lightning this year with the lack of storms, or rain of any kind, in west texas this year.

Waiting for serious bad weather! (Never thought I was going to say this, but I'm sick and tired of "Nice weather".) I live outside Houston, and it's currently "nice, sunny, not a cloud in the sky" and 86 degrees. AArgh!

[Maritimer1]

Your patience paid off. Those are marvelous shots! The first one, with the strike coming out of the clouds and getting brighter as it approaches ground, is the key shot for me.

[Sahil]

A nice set of images, Tobias.
Did you try stacking these images?
If, through PP, you could make the foreground more pronounce, and stack the images with bolts, it would become more dramatic.
Just to give you a clue.

[TobyMac]

Hey Sahil
I'v heard of this technique before but I don't actually know how to do it, maybe i'll find a tutorial and then post what I come up with.

[Sahil]

I can share with you, what I did. Might prove to be of some help to you.

I selected a few images which had nice bolts & at various locations. Opened one of the image in ACR & did most of the required processing on that particular image. And then it was opened in CS5.
Next step was to open all other images, individually, in ACR and I made li'l adjustments in those & then opened those in CS5. I stacked all images on top of the first image & aligned them. Then individually chose the blending mode to "Lighten"

Hope this helps a bit.

[TobyMac]

Cool I'm going to try that right now

[TobyMac]

Hows this for a first attempt


_MG_8701.12 by Tobias Weber, on Flickr

[Sahil]

What do YOU think?
I feel it HAS become more dynamic now.
Just that the layers didn't get aligned that well. But great going