Sometimes in life the things that seem to be the hardest turn out to be the easiest. It’s ironic but that’s how it is. An example of this are the pictures of lightning and storms. Many amateur and beginner photographers find it so difficult to achieve that they don’t even consider it. Many ask the question “How the hell can I photograph lightning, it’s so fast?”
Taking advantage of the fact that winter and the season of storms are just around the corner, in today’s exercise I am going to teach you how to catch thunderstorm lightning with great ease, without the slightest effort and following 12 very easy steps.
How to photograph thunderstorm lightning in 12 steps
- Fully charge your camera battery.
- Mount a wide-angle lens on your camera and set it to a focal length of 18mm or less.
- Put your camera in manual mode (M).
- Select an aperture of an f/ value between 11 and 16.
- Select a shutter speed of 30 seconds or more.
- Turn off the flash.
- Choose a “remote trigger” shooting mode. If you don’t have a remote trigger, use the 2 second delay trigger for example.
- Find and frame a good landscape. Take care of the composition.
- Put your camera on a sturdy tripod and make sure it doesn’t move.
- Wait for a generous lightning moment.
- As soon as you start seeing lightning, shoot. It doesn’t matter if there are no lightning strikes at the precise moment of the shot, it doesn’t matter, your camera will be recording the photo for at least 30 seconds, during which time there will be at least 1 or 2 lightning strikes.
- While that long photo is being captured, make sure you don’t touch the camera or let it vibrate. Yes, the photo will be fascinating but please contain your joy, if you jump for joy you may accidentally hit the camera, and you will be left without a photo, and without a camera.
Nothing more, this is it. You see how easy it is. If you want, you can also boast of some magnificent photos portraying the force of nature, lightning.
Did you like today’s tutorial? Well, now comes the time when I ask you two favors:
- The first, that you write yourself a note in which you put “PENDING TO PHOTOGRAPH STORM LIGHTNING” and that you hang it in your room, somewhere visible and that you do not remove it until you have done it.
- The second, that you help me spread this article: give it a vote below recommending it on Google+, Facebook or Twitter, so other readers will benefit.