Storm Photography

[BigJake93]

Hello!! I'm in an weather group in Oklahoma and we do a lot of storm chasing of all kinds. I have a canon t3i for my own personal buisness and use but would also like to use it for this group. We mainly take lightning pics from a distince so rain isnt realy an isue. But i was wondering if you could help me with lens, settings and even a little (just in case that storm desides to drop some sprinkles on me) preventive idieas? As far as a budget id say really from around $100-$300 as this isnt a main part of what i do. Right now i have a kit lens of 18-55mm and a 50mm 1.8 lens. Perlonaly I don't think the 1.8 would be ideal for this buuut I've ben wrong before. Any help would be greatly appretiated. 

[ebiggs1]

The T3i and the kit lens (18-55mm) will work.  Neither is weather proof!  Be warned!!  Rain will destroy your gear. You can buy a rain coat for the rig or you can fashion one out of plastic or a trash bag.  Use what works, right?

I use a tripod and very long exposures.  You really need to bracket your shots to get the correct exposure.  If these are night time shots you can use really long shutters.  Sit it up and point it where you suspect the lightning to be.  If you are successful you will get shots of natures fireworks that the eye can not see.  Impressive, awesome and beautiful.

[BigJake93]

thank you ebiggs1 thats a big help. would you recomend then that i set it on shutter priorety or even appeture priorety?

[ebiggs1]

You will need to use Tv or better yet, full M (manual).  I think 30 sec is the longest shutter you have.  That may not be long enough or it may be.  All situations are different so you must bracket.  Fix the lens at f8 for starters.  Use a tripod.

[TCampbell]

If you don't already know about this, you'll want to learn about the "exposure triangle"... how ISO, Aperture, and Shutter speed all contribute to the total exposure.

To buy time (keep the shutter open longer to improve the odds of capturing some amazing lightning strikes) you'll want to reduce the ISO setting and also reduce the aperture opening (this one can be confusing at first... high aperture values (aka "f-stops") means the aperture opening size is small and the camera doesn't allow much light through the lens.  Low aperture values means the physical apeture size is larger and more light is allowed through the lens.)

Each "full" f-stop cuts the amount of light in half.  But the "order" is odd... that order is:  f/1.0 -> 1.4 -> 2 -> 2.8 -> 4 -> 5.6 -> 8 -> 11 -> 16 -> 22 -> 32 (and not all lenses go to f/32).  e.g. f/16 collects only half as much light as f/11 and 1/4 of the light as f/8, etc.

This may still be too much light.  You can further cut down the amount of light gathered (which allows you to leave the shutter open longer) by using something called a "neutral density" filter.  This is sort of like sunglasses for your lens... it cuts the amount of light by a known amount.   Each "stop" cuts the amount of light by half.  A 3-stop filter means it cuts light to 1/2 of 1/2 of 1/2 (or 1/8th).