Lightning.. you either love it or you hate it. If you are like me the second it kicks up you are out the door camera in hand without a second thought about whether your tripod is going to act as a conductor ... as long as it's not TOO close !



I'm lucky to live an area prone to heat lightning, when those storms hit the lightning is fast and frequent and usually pretty spectacular which makes my job a lot easier.

You have to be prepared to sit and wait and spend a few hours and a lot of card space and battery power in the hopes of one or two good shots.

A tripod is a must if you are serious about capturing good lightning shots it is virtually impossible .. but not totally.. to do it without one. A tripod will definitely make life easier for you. I usually set my camera to about 2-4 seconds when photographing lightning, most of the pocket digitals have some control over shutter speed.. so check your manual and see if yours does. There is no way you can handhold your camera steady for that length of time manually, so if you have no tripod try finding a solid spot to sit it and use the timer or a remote release cable.


I'm lucky enough to have a camera that does continuous mode, which means I can take 8 or so pictures one straight after the other without waiting for it to write to the card.


This really helps with subjects like lightning and fireworks. If your camera doesn't have that feature... it's just a case of press and pray.



I sit for a while and see how the storm seems to be performing.. and what area it's most prevalent and then set up and get going. This helps a lot but won't stop you missing the spectacular burst.. behind you! If I am lucky I will get about 10-25% success rate for shots with lightning in them...with maybe a 5% rate of shots that are good enough to show.


Fireworks have a better success rate as they are generally set off in big bursts and you can see them go up. Lightning is more hit and miss but worth it when you nail that shot. With Fireworks it depends entirely what kind of shot you are taking .. you have to experiment a little with shutter speeds.

2-4 seconds will get you a quick burst with one or two in the frame, slightly longer exposure will perhaps give you more, but be careful you don't get TOO much and too much movement blur.

I'd stick with the 2 -4 second mark in most situations, specially if you have a pocket cam that does'nt have strong zoom features for closeups.

Shorter exposure times will give you clearer pictures but may not pass enough light to the plate to give you the colors you desire... only you know what you want and what your equipment is capable of ... just know ahead of time where all of your adjustment buttons are located :)

Keep checking the gallery, I hope that is one section that grows rapidly as I love taking lightning shots... it's almost monsoon season again so fingers crossed for some nice big heat lightning storms heading this way :)

Don't forget ..safety comes first... great pics are no good to dead photographers !! Never take unnecessary risks, always use common sense.. and if you don't have any.. STAY HOME !