Lightning Photography

Lightning Photography - Using your cameras full manual settings to capture lightning strikes is often the most effective way to come out with some great lightning photographs. It takes a bit of practice at first but once you become familiar with your cameras manual settings, such as ISO value, F-stop (aperture) and shutter speeds it gives you much greater control over your exposures.

ISO settings:

Lightning Photography - I almost always use to lowest ISO setting possible on my camera when photographing lightning/storms, most cameras will have a minimum ISO setting of 50 to 100 ISO. The lower the ISO is, the less the noise! These settings also apply to both day time and night time lightning photography.

Aperture settings (f-stop) is like an ‘iris’ on your camera/lens, the wider the lens is open, the smaller the number, for example, f2.8 will let in a lot of light very quickly with a large opening where as f22 will let light in much slower through a tighter opening and take much longer to expose a photograph to the equivalent lighting. Remember, the wider the hole, the smaller the ‘f’ number.
Aperture settings should be watched and changed quite regularly if needed with changing light and the distance/intensity of the light for better results, this will also help prevent over exposing your photos. The closer the lightning strikes the tighter the aperture should be! Example, f2.8 or f4 will be great to expose more the distant lightning strikes (say 50km away or further) but if the strikes a really bright and of a close range (say 10-20km) then stopping down the aperture to around f8, and maybe even further is recommended, depending on the situation. Another interesting note to mention with aperture settings is that the wider open your aperture is, the shallower your depth of field will become to varying degrees depending on the lens, focal length and focusing distance you use.

Shutter Speeds:

Lightning Photography - Shutter speeds are readily adjustable in your cameras full manual settings, and will also vary greatly depending on ambient light and brightness/intensity of light within the frame. As a general rule during the day shutter speeds are usually very fast to expose an image, especially when it is sunny, where as shutter speeds for night time photography will normally need a much longer time to expose an image.

Equipment:

There is some highly recommended equipment to be mentioned that will become quite essential for achieving the best results.

1. A sturdy tripod – rigidity and stability which eliminates camera shake while the shutter opens.

2. A remote shutter release cable (available for most DSLRs – see your manufacturer for compatibility) – This will allow you to prevent touching the camera body which also eliminates camera shake, wobble and blur.

3. An optional Lightning trigger can also be used for day time lightning but are not really necessary, especially during the night where shutter speed can be slowed right down.

4. A high quality, fast aperture lens. This is not really necessity, but is highly recommended as fast aperture lenses are normally of a solid, sturdy build and produce far superior image quality and sharpness to kit lenses. Both ultra wide lenses, wide-zooms, and wide prime lenses are ideal, long length telephoto lenses (e.g. 300mm+) are generally unnecessary for capturing lightning and thunderstorms as these subjects cover quite a large area.

What do I look for in a storm?

Lightning Photography - Learning about meteorology, thunderstorm structure, anatomy and behavior will improve your chances even further in capturing a great photo.
This will give you a much better idea of where to point the camera and help you to pick up on where the strongest or weakest areas are during thunderstorms.
To simplify this into a long story short, let’s just say for example there is a cluster of multiple thunderstorm updrafts (cloud towers) right next to each other over a particular area, the updrafts you want to look out for are the thick, tall and punchy (‘bubbly’) ones, which usually appear clean and crisp often with ‘knuckle’ looking tops. This is a good indicator of a healthy maturing cell with good chances of producing lightning.
If a cell appears wispy, fluffy and rather ‘messy’ in the upper levels this is a good indicator of a weak cell or one which has passed its prime, these cells will generally be less reliable for lightning.

Thunderstorm Safety:

Most importantly with regards to lightning photography and storm chasing is use common sense and seek shelter if conditions deteriorate. If thunder sounds ‘boomy’ and/or quite loud then you are at risk.
Positively charged cloud-to-ground lightning strikes (+CG), which starts within the ‘anvil’ or upper regions of a thunderstorm, are capable of leaping a considerable distance away from a storm, often hitting somewhere you would think was ‘safe’. These strikes are known as the infamous ‘Bolts from the Blue’ and are responsible for most lightning related injury or death. No photograph in the world is worth losing your life over!
For an in-depth guide to thunderstorm safety and FAQs please visit the Australian Governments’ Bureau of Meteorology (BoM) website.

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