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I shot these as a thunderstorm rolled by about 1:00am this morning.
They're a little blurry cause I couldn't find the quick release tripod mount for my camera, so I had to hold the camera in my hands.. not too bad for a 15 second shutter.. LOL.
The second photo is actually just ONE strike.. I barely even saw it through my own eyes, and when the camera was done processing the image I was amazed at what I saw!
-------------------- "If I share all my wisdom I won't have any left for myself."
Mike Pipes stickerpimp.com Lake Havasu, AZ mike@stickerpimp.com Posts: 8746 | From: Lake Havasu, AZ USA | Registered: Jun 2000
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With storms like that out there I hope you have a good surge protector! Between your lighting storms and the black widow spiders you posted earlier, no wonder you're not sleeping at 1am!
-------------------- Alan Dearborn Dearborn Graphics Hampton, NH USA Posts: 271 | From: NH USA | Registered: Mar 2000
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Mike, Nice photos! Any chance you could give a couple of tips on camera settings for lightning shots like those? I have always wondered but not got around to trying it.
Gotta love the contrast nature throws into things.
Thanks, Tony
-------------------- --If you don't care where you are, you ain't lost.
Tony Potter Blind Mice and Company 3001 Bever Ave. SE Cedar Rapids, IA 52403 (319) 573-9001 www.blindmiceandcompany.com tonypotter@yahoo.com Posts: 209 | From: Cedar Rapids, IA | Registered: Nov 1999
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I don't rely on surge protectors, I have a few but everything gets unplugged when the storms start rollin' in.
Monday night we had an absolute wicked electrical storm here.. lightning was firing off every couple seconds, every one of them big bright bolts streaking to the ground. I could have gotten some *really* awesome shots but it was also raining.. I can brave walking right up to black widows, and snapping pics of lightning from a distance, but I have enough sense not to stand in a puddle in the middle of an intense electrical storm.
Tony,
Sure! I use a digital camera so it's considerably easier to get these shots but these are the settings I used:
Shutter Speed: 15 seconds Aperature: 2.5
I use an ISO setting of 50 in all my photographs, regardless of the light levels present. This is because in a digital camera, an ISO of 50 produces the cleanest image. It's kinda like film where the higher the ISO rating of the film, the grainier it gets, but with a digital camera it results in "noise". My particular camera does a pretty good job of keeping the noise at a minimum but the ISO 50 is still the best quality!
-------------------- "If I share all my wisdom I won't have any left for myself."
Mike Pipes stickerpimp.com Lake Havasu, AZ mike@stickerpimp.com Posts: 8746 | From: Lake Havasu, AZ USA | Registered: Jun 2000
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Cool pics Mike. We were treated to quite the show in Unity at Pat's meet. I've heard lightning is supposed to go up from the ground to the sky - Your pics support that theory if you look at the thickest part of the lightning and yet they branch off as if they are coming downward - anyone know the reasoning here? I'm going to have to give photographing it a try next time there is a storm. I never though of using a 15 sec shutter speed.
[ July 31, 2003, 04:37 PM: Message edited by: Kelly Thorson ]
-------------------- “Did you ever stop to think, and forget to start again?” -Winnie the Pooh & A.A. Milne
Kelly Thorson Kel-T-Grafix 801 Main St. Holdfast, SK S0G 2H0 ktg@sasktel.net Posts: 5496 | From: Penzance, Saskatchewan | Registered: May 2002
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Ever try to "catch" a lightning bolt with a camera? That's why I use a 15 second shutter. Just aim, open the shutter and wait. I get a lot of black images that way too when I miss the lightning but hey, it's digital so I'm not paying to develop images that aren't there.
I *would* use a 30 second shutter but 15 is my camera's max.
Here's how lightning works (I minored in electrical engineering, and a spark is a spark is a spark.)
You see the purple branches? That's not lightning, it's plasma which is gas (air - nitrogen and oxygen) that has been highly charged/ionized which makes the air into a conductor.
What happens is the sky and the earth are statically charged by wind or other turbulence, like raindrops, just like how you can charge yourself by rubbing on the carpet.
When conditions are just right and the charges between the ground and sky are great enough, the plasma forms. It goes from the ground towards the sky AND from the sky towards the ground. Think about the static charge you feel when you seperate the liner from a piece of vinyl.. the static charge pulls the vinyl to the nearest thing, or the air on your arms stands up. In this case the charge cannot pull the clouds and earth together but it's great enough to move the air (which is carrying a charge and is a conductor).
When these two plasma conductors meet somewhere, that's when the lightning strikes. The lightning itself travels from the ground towards the sky.
-------------------- "If I share all my wisdom I won't have any left for myself."
Mike Pipes stickerpimp.com Lake Havasu, AZ mike@stickerpimp.com Posts: 8746 | From: Lake Havasu, AZ USA | Registered: Jun 2000
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You should come down here. The local weather on TV has a lighting counter that works in cohoots with dopler radar. Yesterday there were over 100,000 strikes in the afternoon just in the north central area of Florida, between Gainesville and Orlando.Been doin that every day for awhile. These are just the scattered daily thunder showers we get this time of year...the one's where you get rain, then sun, then more rain. Kinda like a steam bath at times.
Nice photos. Looks like you could scan 'em and cut them for some neat lightning mask for a paint job somewhere.
-------------------- Jeff Ogden 8727 NE 68 Terr. Gainesville FL, 32609 Posts: 2138 | From: 8827 NE 68 Terr Gainesville Fl 32609 | Registered: Aug 2002
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