Introduction: How to Take Really Spectacular Lightning Photos

By labphoto.tumblr.com/

In this tutorial I will show how can You make really nice pictures in a storm by a cheapo DSLR or a small compact camera and with a little trick(:

Step 1: You Will Need:

1: a camera (DSLR, point n shoot, bridge, doesn't matter -just not a Canon:) what has manual mode and inter-viral timer shooting.

2: a storm

3: a lot space on your memory card

4: some luck

5: a tripod

6: a place what is protected from the rain

Step 2: How to Take the Pictures

First, you need to get a bad weather, then you have to measure the light with a relative large aperture (maximum f/5.6), if you will use smaller aperture e.g.: f/22 then the lightning won't be seen on the picture.

So swich your camera to A mode (aperture priority), set it to f4 or f5 or maybe f5.6 and let it work. If you got it, then remember what was the time what the camera said and set this time in the M mode.

-additional info: shoot at night to use long 10-15-30sec exposures for your pictures.

Set the camera to take 200 pictures with 1sec delay and wait.

-additional info no. 2: if the camera is not a "pro" in reducing the noise of the pictures, then it is good to turn off the noise reduction, because it could take a long time.

-additional info no. 3: use a tripod, and don't move the camera, every picture should be taken from one place.

If everything is done this way then you should get a few pictures from single lightnings.

Step 3: How to Make "THE" Adorable Picture

You will need Photoshop for this step.

There is a really simple way to merge all the layers and get an awesome picture at the end:

-You just need to open all the good pictures (what contains lightnings).
-Copy them to one file (every picture a new layer).
-Set the blending of the layers (all layer except the background) to lighten.

With this effect the lightnings will be seen from every pictures with the same background (if you used a tripod and took all the pictures from the same place).

Good luck and post your results!

Here is one other from me.

-Kristof

For my other pictures visit my lab photography blog:
http://labphoto.tumblr.com/