Where's A Good Place To Learn About Lightning Photography?

[Saul Trabal]

I own a Canon EOS 630. I'm not like you folks who live where the Big Bad Whirlwinds are at but I would like to read some pointers on how to take pics of lightning. New Jersey has its share of summer thunderstorms.

[Latka Gravas]Tank you veddy much.[/Latka Gravas]

 

[Greg Campbell]

Saul, here are a few guides from my bookmark file.

A good place to start.
http://www.lightninghunter.com/howto.html

Some of these have more specific instructions.

http://www.uscoles.com/howtolightn.htm
http://www.cimms.ou.edu/~doswell/ltgph.html
http://www.weather-photography.com/techniques.php

Good luck!

-Greg

 

[John Diel]

Saul,

There's not a thing wrong with that EOS 630. I used one for quite a few years after I jumped from the AE-1 to the EOS line. It's a tank and a darn good camera!

Just a couple of quick tips.

Tripod - Gotta have one.

Remote Shutter release - Not a "Gotta have" but very useful.

Bulb Setting - Use it! Time your exposures at night. A few seconds if you get one in the frame right off to several minutes depending on the lightning amounts.

F Stop - F5.6 to F8 is usually pretty good.

Film - I used a lot of the Fuji Pro films and occasionally the OTC stuff. ISO 200 to ISO 400 works out well. You can use slides but they get rather expensive (see next statement).

Develop only the negative and view them before getting prints. Save yourself some money there because you will go through lots of blank frames.

Be safe! Have fun!

 

[Blake Michaleski]

Id rather slide film anyday over print film. The color saturation is worth the price.

I use 100spd Fugi Sensia.

That is 5/16/02 near Guymon, OK. (Scott Weberpal's taillights if i remember :wink: )

It wasnt quite dark yet either but it shows the color you get. if it were a completely dark shot i'd say it would have had some even crazier colors.