First Attempt at Lightning

I wasn't really sure what I was doing last night - but we had a fairly spectacular light show for about 30 minutes. Once I figured out the settings and shutter times I got some interesting results, purely by accident...Comments welcome, checks and cash even more so..

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Both a soft, the second worse. Cool that you are lucky to get lightnings thought.

P.S.- Check is in the mail.

That was the first thing I noticed as well - out of focus shots. As an astrophotographer and fellow lightning photographer, I've had lots of practice getting the focus right at night as well as ending up with lots of fuzzy shots.... First, I try to use a lens that has the focus indications on it (my favorite night-time lens is a Sigma 24mm f/1.8 which has infinity clearly marked). I'll look around to see if there is something bright enough to focus on (like the Moon or city lights) that are at infinity. Alternatively, I'll focus in the daytime and check and see where infinity focuses on the lens and carefully set the lens focus there at night (also, always rotating the focus from the same direction to avoid backlash issues). Shooting stopped down a little (to f/5.6 or so) also helps with the focus a little.

As you've probably learned, night-time lightning shots are not all that hard to come by - using a long enough exposure and pointing at the center of a distant lightning storm makes the task quite easy. The hard part is adjusting the f-stop and ISO speed of your digital camera to get a well exposed bolt. Then the length of the exposure controls the number of bolts and the exposure of the scenery.

One other thing - try to get the horizon straight. And practice, practice practice - you'll get lots of cool lightning shots!

Jim.

Good first try on the shots. Everything that Jim said I would have that would help you get some other great shots.

When I take shots of lightning, I put it on ISO 100, manual mode, F/3.5 to 8 and shutter speed of about 15 to 25 seconds depending on the frequency of the strikes. If you have a tripod, a shutter release cable and 'bulb' setting would be better so you can control the shutter speed. On your next try, focus on the city lights on your horizon....that's what I do.

Here is my gallery of lightning shots if you want to take a peek.

Mouse over the picture and click on the i to get the EXIF info to see shutter and F stop settings.

i was out trying as well with no luck though... hard to find a dry place with an open sky and i was pretty oblivious as to what settings to use.