So, what's the secret in taking pictures of lightinings?
It's been lightning for about the past 3 days were I live and I just can't get a picture. It's obviously either too fast of simply it doesn't show up..?
Doesn't make sense to me, but it might to some of you guys that have taken beautiful pictures of lightning..
Help an amateur!
Use long exposure. Time when the lightning shows up (how many seconds after the thunder). Right before you think it's going to hit, click the shutter (I used the self timer to eliminate shake). I used f11.
edit to add: here's the picture I got
I'm sure there are much better on here, but this was my first attempt.
I did that and it didn't show up in the picture..
I thought it was odd and thought that maybe since lightning is so fast, and the exposure was long [at the time] it wouldn't capture it or something..
Use long exposure. Time when the lightning shows up (how many seconds after the thunder).
The problem with this technique is, light travels faster (186,000 miles/second) than sound (5 seconds/mile), so you hear the thunder after the lightning stoke which causes it.
A lot of the time, it's dumb luck and timing. And as kdsprog said, you also have to use a long shutter time. That way, you not only get the lightning strike, but some of the background as well. If you had the shutter open when the lightning struck, it would have been captured. Your shutter was probably not open when the strike happened. Here's my best lightning shot that I took one night. It took nearly 100 tries to get a shot like this one, and it's still not nearly perfect.
Edit: Oh and of course, as kdsprog also said, use a tripod. It is not optional in this case.
Try going a little longer if you can. I did 30 seconds. Also, this might seem like a weird question, but are you in the dark? I was on a completely dark porch. Don't use flash (of course). I can't think of any other reasons other than maybe you are just missing it somehow.
... and as per SamDoe1, it took me about 2 hours to capture that shot! In between I got either nothing of just bits and pieces depending on which way the camera was pointed.
Thanks..
My camera only goes till 15 second, but I will keep trying next time since it already stopped lightning.. but as I said, thanks for the advice.
Beautiful Pictures, too! From both of you.
Nitten's owns my image...what an awesome shot. 15 seconds might not even be necessary. It all depends on the surroundings, mine was only 5 seconds because it was in the middle of downtown Milwaukee.
