Last few days of July MAY offer up a chase day or two locally… nothing terribly high-end, but close enough to home to where it could certainly get me on the road. I had today on the radar, and while it still sits there, the probabilities are definitely toward the bottom. Overnight showers and a couple thunder rumbles lingered into the morning, and as we approach lunch, the overcast conditions are holding strong here in northern Colorado, greatly reducing any storm potential here. Out east, a little better, but you’re now talking 2-3 hour drive to get out that way for what is a lower end setup. The instability that was progged is definitely going to be lower, so as a whole, unless something breaks locally, I don’t anticipate much opportunity today.
Tomorrow and Wednesday hold my attention, again both lower-end setups, but could have some locally significant impacts, particularly in the wind department. Tuesday could be a Front Range to Out-East play, with Wednesday following up in eastern Wyoming into the Nebraska Panhandle. Both days looks predominately damaging winds; perhaps some low-end severe hail. Of course, cannot rule out landspouts, but even those look very low chance with these setups. Regardless, I have my eyes on both days, so we’ll see how things unfold over the next 24 hours.
Beyond Wednesday, will keep tabs on the northern Plains and upper Midwest for ring-of-fire severe. Otherwise the pattern doesn’t change much minus some minor shifts.
Added another tick mark to my tropical adventures… a forgettable one… was mostly mop-up work in Texas on what I assume was the very remote off-chance SOMETHING would have happened after its unspectacular landfall in Louisiana. Nothing I personally would’ve even given a second thought, but sometimes the nature of the job calls. That being said, it was everything we knew it would be, and by everything, I mean literally nothing. I’ve seen bigger downpours in my shower. But alas, I was there, it’s another name off the list, nothing bad happened, and it was quick and painless. I’m home, just in time for another round of heat, with only Midwest ‘Ring of Fire’ type severe chances offering up anything of real interest in the nearterm. Looks like it’ll continue to be quiet for me through the last few days of what is usually my slowest warm-season month for chasing weather.
Monsoon returned to northern Colorado this evening and I brought out my lightning trigger and cashed the hell in on it! The shot above was one of several strikes caught on my Nikon this evening on a very impromptu outing about a third of the way through the Rockies game. At home with a car in my lap, watching storms fire along the Front Range on radar when they finally started sparking. I set up north of Johnstown and got some good shots looking west (speaking of composite images haha). But the shot of the night was a window hand-held capture when the lightning trigger nabbed this very vivid bolt, perfectly focused and exposed and stead, despite bracing it against the window frame.
Tried a second round from closer to home as the storms slide north, but rain overtook me and put an end to the shoot. I’m covered in dust and need a shower as the outflow from the storm sent a large part of the field all over me as I hurried to toss in my camera and tripod ahead of the storm. Another delightful set of images, a solid wall-hanger, and all on a seven-mile round trip effort!
Shooting lightning, as I’ve mentioned only about a bajillion times in the past, is my favorite aspect of storm chasing. For me, this was REALLY where I got my start as my first couple summers in Colorado gave me many opportunities to capture lightning as I was still in the infancy of my severe weather career. Back in the late 90s and early 2000s, all my shooting was done on film cameras, namely a Canon AE-1. I don’t know exactly when digital SLRs came into the public grasp, but it would be many years before I would get my hands on my first DSLR.
Of the many lessons and tricks I learned in those early years, one was a key aspect of film lightning photography; long-exposures. With a good camera and film, you could essentially leave the shutter open for many minutes, easily 10 minutes or more. While I didn’t experiment too much with this in my AE-1 years, my first monsoon trip to Arizona in 2007 offered me a legit chance to do this as I purchased a ‘modern’, albeit lower end Nikon N80 film camera to take with me on that trip so I could do just that along side my single-exposure Nikon D40X digital (my first camera body in the DSLR era). Back then, I didn’t know how to ‘stack’ images, nor did I really understand the concept. It was a more advanced photo editing technique that I was not terribly familiar with, although I knew it existed. Because digital cameras, particularly early on, didn’t do super-long exposures well, this was a growing technique used by photographers to achieve similar results as long exposures on film cameras. One of the digital issues was noise, the longer you left the shutter open, the more susceptible to noise on the images you were. And again, early photoshop days didn’t have the noise reduction post-processing abilities we see in modern versions of the software. Even the cameras, while many featured some noise-reduction, it didn’t allow for super long exposures.
When I made my monsoon trip in 2007, I wanted long-exposure shots, many bolts on one image. So a few weeks prior to that trip, I bought a used Nikon N80 film camera and a 28-80mm lens on Ebay with the sole purpose being to take long-exposure film shots along side my digital shots. The investment was mostly worth while; the idea proved to be true in concept, although the images were slightly out-of-focus and ultimately not the crisp shots I had intended. But the idea was there, and it was solid, but it would be a few years later when I would finally grasp the concept of stacking images, using short exposures with the same settings and zoom to achieve the same visual look in post.
In 2015, with a newer Nikon D5100, I had finally acquired the software and the skills to achieve this visual style I wanted so much. The process if relatively simple; set up your shots and zoom with the settings you want, get the camera pointed where you want, and go to town, taking short exposures all in a row, for as long as the conditions warrant. When you’re done, import all those photos and start selecting the shots, layer them in Photoshop, and begin the process. Once all the images were stacked in their respective layers, merge them together, do your touch-ups to the now single image, and you now had a crisp, clean image that essentially works like a single long exposure.
I have added this as a usual way to shoot lightning, particularly in recent years as I now have multiple camera bodies in my arsenal, with one usually being dedicated to shooting for stacks. Even as cameras have advanced, multi-minute exposures generally aren’t the most proficient way to go about this look due to noise, battery, etc. In the digital age, post-processing has become a significant part of the photography process. And this stirs a debate, whether this is true photography. For stacking, it does get some boos from the peanut galleries on social media. A recent comment on one of my photos said ; “Instead of a stack-up– if this was truly a 1-shot hit, “money”. But…” Obviously he wasn’t a fan; but clearly did not understand the process involved. But I get it, and while I respect your opinion, I don’t think it makes a shot any less money. In fact, I would argue that simply stacking the image (no other post-processing) verses a multi-minute exposure of the same shot would’ve looked better than the long-exposure on digital. Actually, it is something I could theoretically do, with or without lightning, taking a single-long exposure verses a series of short ones in the same time span. May be worth a test?
But the argument is valid… I can see where purists go against it. I, however, do not. In fact, I think completely opposite because I set up to shoot this way. Again, with multiple bodies at my disposal, I often dedicate one for stacking; setting it up on a wider zoom, and letting it go to town. I have done stacks that includes images separated by as much as 20 minutes, using exposures ranging from 5-to-30 seconds in length, depending on the ambient lighting. I go into the shoot with one goal in mind, creating multi-bolt images that show off a long amount of time, all the while shooting individual frames on other cameras to capture other scenes.
While there are caveats to this method of shooting, this offers several advantages. Obviously because the shots are separate, you have single images that can be great all on their own. Obviously you also get the ability to pick and choose your images to stack, meaning you can set up the composite however you wish with whatever shots suit your taste. This is where you get into that grey area, one I am not against in any way, because you can then skip certain images if they don’t work. In some cases, shots are blown out, which when stacked into a composite shot, can wash out bolts; removing said shot from the sequence cleans this up. You’re not adding any fake elements, just removing frames that don’t fit your shot. I don’t see this as a problem, in fact, I love that I can do this. I recall one image in my 2007 Arizona trip where I was exposed for the distant lightning, but a very close, very bright flash, hit and totally blew out the shot. Having a series of multiple exposures means that in the particular frame that occurred, I could simply omit it from the stack, saving the image composite. I also could remove frames that may over-crowd, blow out, or otherwise degrade the overall piece. Yes, it’s selective, but I think that’s part of the process. When you go fishing, you don’t keep EVERY single fish, some get thrown back for various reasons. For composite shooting, some frames get thrown back.
It’s a process that took a while to get into, but when I did, I immediately adapted it into my shooting, so much so that it lead me to purchasing a second camera body so I could dedicate one camera specifically for that. And I think nothing less of the process. I’m pretty open, overall, to digital editing, so long it isn’t abused or passed off as something else. Obviously fabricating shots, AI, those types of things, can degrade an image, and if that’s your style, by all means, but show it off as it is, not pretend it to be something else entirely. When I post composite shots, I say they are; technically to me, they are the digital equivalent to long-exposures that today’s digital cameras just cannot do like they were done in the film days. Just because it wasn’t captured that way in one frame in-camera doesn’t take anything away from it. That’s my opinion, and the end results speak for themselves. When done right, and done well, the shots look as good if not better than old-school long-exposures, and are done with more control.
My thoughts are simple; do whatever the hell you want. It’s your art. Just be honest about it; don’t pass it off as something it is not. Very simple.. my tastes may not match yours, and that’s fine. In the end, I shoot for me, and there are plenty of folks out there who enjoy very much what I do. But none of them more than me; so I will make my art in the way I want to, and I am happy with what comes out of the processes I go through 🙂
The heat of July continues, the doldrums, as we like to call them, and aside from the lightning/hail venture on the first day of the month, there has been ZERO to chase, and I’m not all too upset by it. The time off has been nice, and I can gradually feel the itch starting to return, but it doesn’t look as if Ma-Nature’s itch to get me out is on the same level. So…
I figured I would look back on the first half of the year and offer up my awards to this point. I will include the July 1 venture, even as it technically falls in the second-half of the year, but seeing as it’s been a couple weeks since and with nothing on the horizon, I will include it..
2026 TORNADO CHASE OF THE YEAR (so far).. APRIL 13, 2026
I went back and forth between this and June 25 in Oklahoma; and while Oklahoma did ‘save the season’, I have to give it to Minnesota on April 13. It gets the edge because this was my first real good tornado in the state, and it happened VERY early in the year, basically knocking the monkey off the back to get that first real legit tornado. Any other year, I would imagine this wouldn’t get this award, but given the lack of quality tornado intercepts this year, I had to give it this time around. Oklahoma offered some incredible structure and a couple nice tornadoes, but they probably sat just below Minnesota in terms of photogenic. I also fully documented the Minnesota chase, which worked out real nice and made for a good vlog.
2026 TORNADO/STRUCTURE COMBO OF THE YEAR (so far)… June 25, 2026
With that said, I will give a different award to acknowledge June 25. I would also give it the Season Achievement Award for saving 2026 for me. The issue being, the tornado part of this chase was so brief, less than 20 minutes; so one could argue this to be an overall chase that happened to include a great tornado. But this would certainly also win structure of the year, and probably a career-award for tornado/structure for me. A lot happened on this chase OUTSIDE the tornado, too, so while it was a tornado chase, the limited time window prevented this from otherwise taking that tornado chase of the year for me.
This will probably hold as one of the top 3 hail chases of my career, hence the lack of ‘so far’ in the title. I cannot imagine this chase being topped for hail, even with a couple months of the Colorado season remaining. But state-record hail, documented/measured 5″+, and the AMOUNT of it just blows away most of my previous hail chases. I actively gave up the tornado to document this hail, which I was able to go live with moments after it cleared out. Not to mention the time of year (early March) and WHERE it fell (northern Illinois), makes this all a slam-dunk for hail chase of the year. Easiest award ever!
2026 LIGHTNING CHASE OF THE YEAR (so far).. JULY 1, 2026
Another no-doubter for an award… up until this evening, I was clamoring for a good lightning outing, and I got that and then some late on the first day of July about an hour north of my home. This was the evening I had wanted all year, and easily was among my best in the last few years. What started out pretty slow and meh turned into the show of the year for lightning. I had two windows of shooting, both offering up some terrific shots. Once midnight hit and the calendar turned over, it became an overnight hail chase, but the lightning on the front side of it was what I wanted most, and it’s exactly what I got! This gave me some of my favorite lightning images taken in the last few years. Hopefully, this wasn’t an all-in-one thing, and a few more opportunities await. But even if those do not get up to the level this did, I will be VERY happy with this night.
2026 BEST NON-TORNADO CHASE OF THE YEAR (so far).. JUNE 13, 2026
One of those rare opportunities where I had some friends along for the ride, and it made for one of the more enjoyable chases of the season for me! Not to mention the storm we chased (or chased us) was hamming it up well for the cameras from start to finish. We were among the first ones on the storm, and because it was moving so slow, we were able to make multiple long stops along the way to take in the sights. Many thanks to Lindsey and Erin for being along for this, as they were a joy to chase with and we had a great time following this highly-dramatic storm across northeast Kansas. We got the hurricane treatment on the back end as the line overtook us near Kansas City, but none-the-less, easily one of the most fun chases of the season.
2026 MOST INTENSE CHASE OF THE YEAR (so far).. JUNE 22, 2026
This day had a little bit of everything, but a whole lot of intensity. Easily the most intense storm of the season for me, including multiple high-end hail intercepts, some of the most intense supercell wind I had seen in years, plus structure that dropped your jaw. This day started up near Kimball with a storm that dumped the first round of large hail, then followed it into Colorado where smaller, but more wind-driven hail came down outside Brush, then the hurricane of wind on my drive into Akron where they measured 113mph gusts moments after I got ahead of the storm, so it’s not a stretch to say I was in 100mph+ winds for part of that drive. Once I got ahead of the storm (FINALLY), it was structure-fest all the way to Cope before I finally called it a day. Easily the most intense storm I encountered during the year. And yes, I did catch a glimpse of a brief tornado outside Akron, which was nothing more than a stat-padder, but just adds another point to this day.
2026 SURPRISE CHASE OF THE YEAR (so far).. MAY 9, 2026
This marginal risk day in eastern Colorado takes the award for biggest surprise of the season so far. I had VERY little expectations for this day, and basically left the house with the thought this would be nothing more than a low-end day with some scenic skies. Turns out, it was a pretty beefy day with plentiful opportunities to document an amazing storm in northeast Colorado. Got into some low-end severe hail, awesome structure, and some decent daytime lightning. It was a very casual, low-end, low-stress chase that I very much enjoyed. Was easily among the VERY few highlights from a very slow May.
2026 BUST CHASE OF THE YEAR (so far).. APRIL 23, 2026
This day I think set the tone for most of the season for me… one of the few opportunities at a solid chase that was absolutely thrown away. We made the fatal mistake of splitting two target areas, and managed to leave too late and leave too early all at the same time. We played with the north storms in Kansas, were patient with them until we weren’t, and they would produce a series of landspouts we missed by about 30 minutes. At the same time, we didn’t leave soon enough to get into northern Oklahoma, missing big tornadoes near Braman and Enid. Not much to show for our efforts, in fact, so little that aside from the picture above, I haven’t even put the file folder on my main drive from this day. May 18 in northeast Kansas would get the runner-up, and was the day all the chaser traffic peaked, and we missed a couple birdfarts due to not being able to navigate terribly freely. Ultimately we got a good windbag intercept down near I-70, but that day still felt like a knuckleball to the nuts. June 24 in Colorado took third in this category, but I think mainly cause by this point in the season, I was pretty well over the whole year haha
2026 SONG OF THE YEAR.. DEATH COMES AT MIDNIGHT by MIDNIGHT DANGER
A pandora find on a channel I have that isn’t terribly hard in terms of music, but this snuck in and turned me on to Synthwave, and it made the rotation just about all year. I could argue it wasn’t the luckiest song to listen to, but it didn’t keep me from enjoying the hell out of it.
So those are my mid-season awards to this point… I expect most the rest of July to slide past without much fanfare, hoping the monsoon offers a couple lightning photo opportunities, and I am flirting with the idea of a southwest monsoon trip, albeit not sure the logistics will work out for me, but we’ll see. My car has been in and out of shops for the last week and change, so hopefully upon its return today, she is up to speed and ready to go. I have about a week left in my time off before I return to work, and while there are a few bigger stories going on Nationally, I don’t imagine any of them will involve any kind of travel for me at this point, but we’ll see what comes about. Monday, unfortunately, is a hard off for me, meaning I cannot move that day, so I won’t free up til Tuesday the 21st. Nothing in the longer-range points to any chasing, minus some northwest flow in the Midwest, but I don’t know how much interest myself or any relevant parties have in that. We shall see… til then, I will continue to enjoy the intermission and see what awaits me at the end of it.
