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FramedByNature — Lightning Photography Tutorial
Published: 2012-06-08 19:20:41 +0000 UTC; Views: 12056; Favourites: 298; Downloads: 156
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Description
For more photography, visit Framed By Nature .NETCapturing lightning can seem like a daunting task, but if you know the basics, it's really quite simple! Tried to make this tutorial as comprehensive as possible to answer any questions and issues that may arise when attempting to shoot lightning. If you have any additional questions, feel free to comment
Don't be discouraged if you don't have a DSLR and a tripod! I took the 3 shots below with my point-and-shoot.
The only lightning-related thing this really doesn't cover is stacking, which I'll write a separate tutorial for. Figured I'd leave it out of this one since this focuses more on shooting than processing
Happy shooting!
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Comments: 99
What kind of program would you advice for raw photos? With the normal program they cannot be opened
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Awesome and really helpful!! Unfortunately I don't think my parents would allow me to go to a 'thunderstorm shoot'...
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Very helpful and informative, thank you so much for creating and sharing this.
Cheers!!
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Hope it comes in handy, glad to help!
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Nice tutorial for the starting photog, very handy. If I might make a couple of suggestions, 1st - Rain Protection. To keep my camera dry I have used a one gallon freezer bag. Put a piece of cardboard in the bag. Then you need something just smaller then your primary lens diameter (quite commonly a 58mm dia. for many Canon lenses) Look for a jar lid in your kitchen, or maybe a large pill bottle cap. It only need to be a couple of mm smaller. Trace the outline on the side of the bag next to the bottom. This way when the camera lens is pointed through the hole the bag top opening is slanted. down. You can stop here, poke the lens through the hole, slap a little gaffers tape around the lens filter to secure the bag and you're done. I got fancy and picked up a multi-prism filter, popped the prism out, then sandwiched the bag between the ring and a clear glass filter. A lens hood will also help keep the lens dry. #2 A quick rule of thumb: the human eye takes in about the same field of view as an 80-85 mm lens. So the so-called "stock" or "standard" 50-55 mm lens is actually a smidge wide-angle. Something to keep in mind when selecting a lens to use.
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That's an awesome idea! I've just been using a rag or grocery bag. Reinforcing/shaping it with cardboard is something I have yet to try though.
80-85mm seems way too tight to cover the field of view of the human eye. When I hold my 50mm on a FF body up to my eye the magnification is nearly the same. 85mm would be much tighter. Maybe accurate for what the eye can focus on at one time, since that's a much more narrow area, but in terms of field of view I would think it's a lot wider (considering including your periphery vision, you can see nearly 180 degrees left to right with both eyes open).
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I guess you could call it the "apparent" field of view. There was an article about this in a photo mag years ago (I come from a long line of photographers, going back to the thirties) that measured what people "see" vs what a camera with different lenses take in. 65mm was on the very low end, with 80mm being very common. A bit tighter brings in the glasses-wearers. As I recall, the author suggested a zoom lenses in the 60/80 to 200mm range as being a good "standard" lense to keep on the camera normally.
Anyway, it is a bit subjective, the looker tends to mask out any non-important details that become glaringly obvious in the actual photo. You know, like things growing out of people's heads, that sort of thing. Even serious pros make mistakes like that from time to time.
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My problem is not really knowing what button does what on my camera.
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Lots of manuals and Youtube tutorials to help with that, just look up your camera model!
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This is awesome. Thanks so much for posting this! I think my biggest problem before was aperture. Now that's solved, and I didn't know about using the fluorescent or tungsten white balance settings. This will help me immensely.
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Happy to help!
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OTL When I first glanced at the title, I thought it was how to shoot lighting from your hands or something
Nice tutorial by the way!
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LOL! Yeah, I'll work on that
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Just wanted to let you know, your art has been featured here: [link]
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Nice work there, always try to get a good shot of lightning, but oh so unlucky I am most of time. Living in middle of city doesn't help either
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Yeah it's a lot tougher in the city. Not as much sky to work with
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Nice tutorial! 
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Thanks! And best of luck
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o A o; wow.. hope this will be one of our assignments in photography class. > ^ <
and hopefully.. you'll have a tutorial of exposing the stars.
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Stars/star trails! That should be my next one *nod*
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Tried to make the tutorial as comprehensive as possible, since shooting lightning encompasses all sorts of different situations
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Lol. Yeah. Well, if I can understand it everyone can. Lol. XD
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I need a new camera. You ever heard of a nikon coolpix?
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Yeah I have. I've never used a Nikon though lol
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haha I have a Nikon Colpix camera and it stopped charging after a few months of having it. The same thing happened to 2 of my friends.
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Thanks so much for the tips! Some of the stuff I knew, but the more precision details were what I was looking for, and you were a big help on that. I'll have you to thank when I get better shots!
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Haha no problem! Good luck with the shots, looking forward to it
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Brilliantly informational my friend I'm sure you've received many thanks for this in depth look into how its done I miss my Minolta sigh...
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Yeah, this thing really took off faster than I expected 
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I've always been thinking about this!
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Yeah, in the south you've always got those slow convective storms going on
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Excellent tutorial, just what I've been looking for. Thanks for putting this together.
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My pleasure. Happy to help, and looking forward to your future work!
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Great tutorial - wish i'd seen something like this sooner. First time I tried to shoot lightning, all shots were over/underexposed and blurred. I only figured out what to do by the time the storm was finished. Hope this helps lots of people, a good lighning shot is really satisfying
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Indeed, always satisfying to capture something that's never replicated again!
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omg thankyou this is much apreciated...i tried shooting some lightening with a mate of mine before..hes awesome at it..im just starting and he was too courght up i got one but very dull so thankyou and your photos are amazing
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No problem! Happy to help
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Thanks for the great tutorial
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No problem! I'm afraid I can't give you more storms, if I had that power I'd make some for myself right about now
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