Your Best Lightning Shot to date...

[Olivier Staiger]

speaking about blurry horizon from handheld shot, but sharp focused lightning :

of course it would have been even nicer with a steady tripod... but sometimes there's no time for tripod, or too much precipitation or wind, or too much close lightning.... so I say, even handheld lightning photos can be rewarding... especially with wider angle lenses where the handshake is not as strong as with a tele.

 

[Paul Hadfield]

At night with my Canon XSi, I autofocus on a distant streetlight to set it at infinity, then switch to manual focus. I've never had to lock the mirror aside from the times I used the 1300mm telephoto. I always do a spot check on the LCD to check the focus with the first few shots. Every once in a great while the autofocus will be slightly off, better to find out early on than to shoot an entire storm with it off. Live view hasn't been a reliable way to focus in my experience.

In situations without a distant light to go by, I've used headlights or a flashlight to illuminate foreground objects so the sensor has something to pick up, flipped the lens to manual, turned off the lights, half depressed the button to reset the exposure (illuminated foreground will set a shorter exposure in A/V mode vs. total dark), then fired.

 

[Steven Howell]

excellent shots everyone, some very nice stuff. its been a lightning drought here in Austin...hoping to head into the plains soon and get some new material!

 

[Mike Thompson]

Hi I am a newbie at this so this is my first shot. I followed the instructions that Dan Robinson posted above, from his blog, last fall and it worked!
I cant wait to try some more, looks like mabye we will get some thunder this weekend up here, so mabye i will get some better ones!

 

[kane_hardie]

Amazing ohotos everyone! I have a recent shot to add to the thread. This was taken after a 3 hour wait for the perfect shot, on the 28'th of September 2010 from the Coffs Harbour Jetty. I've got heaps of other shots on my deviantart in my sig

 

[Jeremy Gilchrist]

Here is mine from 4/9/2011 as video at 210 frames per second:

Watch video >

 

[Kris Harmon]

For some reason, I have to visit this thread three or four times a week whether there have been new additions or not. Simply amazing pics gang!!!

K. Harmon

 

[Mike Moore]

Amazing ohotos everyone! I have a recent shot to add to the thread. This was taken after a 3 hour wait for the perfect shot, on the 28'th of September 2010 from the Coffs Harbour Jetty. I've got heaps of other shots on my deviantart in my sig

Now that is a nice shot... it was worth the 3 hour wait. I love the bolt, the clear storm structure and the foreground. Well done.

 

[LucasMarcomini]

Not even close to the pictures posted here, but these are my favorites

 

[Andrew Stevens]

I continue to improve, 2 days ago I grabbed this one just outside of Wichita.

 

[Jarrod Barnett]

My favorite so far in this thread!!!!

Hella props! Killer shot!

 

[Joe Hawks]

Some of my favorites

 

[Tim Vasquez]

It's not in the same league as some of the great shots above, especially since lighting photography is not my forte, but this is the shot I think of.

I took it May 28, 1997 near Levelland TX, on Fuji Velvia and a basic Pentax K1000 SLR. It would be even better if I had a decent slide scanner.

I have yet to even try lightning shots on digital cameras, especially since I have not made the jump to DSLR yet... though I do have an amazingly good Pentax pocket digital camera which does a fantastic job in the daytime.

Tim

 

[Michael Gavan]

These two are from the same storm...Now this one is my favorite,

But this one is a fan favorite,

Both of these are from Paradise Valley, Montana. Taken close two sunset, Both are taken using the 'darken things as much as you can and hold the shutter open' method. The first one is the entire image, while the second is cropped a bit. Other than that...sharpness adjustments, noise reduction and a saturation boost on both.

 

[Mike Deep]