Taking lightnings

Punk

Punk

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Staff member
Hello,

I would like to know how to take good pictures of lightning. Tonight there is one so any help would be greatly appreciated. My camera is D40 (you all know that already :P) and I have two lens, a 18-55mm and 70-300mm (that too :D).

What settings should I change?
 
I'm no expert (actually I've never done it before.) But I just finished reading "Understanding Exposure" (It's a great book, you should read it) and it had some great tips for nighttime photography. First, you'll obviously need a tripod. You'll then need to set a very slow shutter speed (the slower the speed, the more lightning you get.) In the book the author says he uses ISO 100 for everything including nighttime photography (you can experiment though.) As far as aperture goes set it to around f/8 or f/11... that should do it... once again, you can be inventive. Oh, yeah, make sure you use Matrix mode too. :) Hope that helps!

EDIT: Oh, yeah, try both lenses and see what you like best as I have absolutely NO experience with lenses... my cam is Fixed Lens. :P
 
Yeah I though that I should have my shutter for a maximum of time so that it gets all the light from the lightning.

Thanks :)
 
right i havnt actuall read the other reply im too lazy soo if its been said then whatever

camera on a tripod go on to manual mode id say you want the apeture on about F11
so you don't get too much ambient light but experiment it depends what your facing

also you will want the camera exposure on bulb so when you press the shutter button the shutter will stay open till you let go of the button so that way you can press the button and hold it till a bolt goes of and then let go or let a few blots go of its up to you

dont hold it to long or you will overexpose the rest of the image but im sure you will find that out

set the ISO lower so you get less grain and less tungsten glow (if your facing a town/city)

good luck and finaly dont stand under at tree or on top of a hill :cool:

and last but most certainly not least don't get your camera wet its not covered my the warranty trust me on that one :o
 
well you can use slow shutter like they said, however you still will get eather too much light from the bolt or streeks. i would say even though this would be a pain but take a picture using the sport mode or rapid shot. you may end up takeing a lot but in the end you will not get the cloud streek or excess light.

never tried it but that is what i would try
 
4ngu$ has it right, not surprisingly :)

leaving a really low shutter speed and just letting it open in the hope of eventually catching something will eventually over expose.

It can take sodding ages to get lightning shots and can be really infuriating, takes a lot of patience. As 4NGU$ says, set it so that when you press the button it opens until you let go.

Then you need to try and guess an approximate time when the lightning will strike, watch it for a while and try and work out the average time between strikes, then you can press just before you think then next strike will happen and hopefully capture one.

Patience is undoubtedly the key here.......
 
Yep,

I had done it with my old D-camera, in sports mode but ISO was too high and I couldn't set it up :P

So all I need is to find that B-mode (I think that's how they call it) to keep the shutter open until I let go.

Thanks for the help :)
 
The storm is here, but it's daylight so I can't take them, it will get overexposed...

RRR
 
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