When I awakened Sunday morning, some of the hi-rez models indicated potential for post-sunset storms. Nothing significant, but enough where shooting some lightning was in the back of my mind. Having spent most of the day out and about in Littleton, missing an earlier round of severe storms up near Greeley, the drive home had lots of flashing, but nothing I would consider photo-worthy. Upon getting home and unloading, another solid round was developing, and it was all pretty well positioned near my house, so I decided to take one camera out with me and head up the street, about five miles north to Jackrabbit Strip Airfield off CO-257 and CR-54 north of downtown Johnstown. This gave me a very good, elevated overlook to the west, with potential to follow the storms north and northeast should it go that long.
So I got setup, sitting in the car for a bit looking out the window as the clouds flashed, but nothing looked particularly appealing. But the flashes were getting a bit brighter, and I decided at the very least to set up the camera and let it go a few shots, just in case something snuck out. Two shots in, and some bolts FINALLY popped off in the distant southwest, in frame, but not overly crazy.
A few more 10-second shots went by with little fanfare, then I got a nice little surprise, a full frame capture of a pretty decent bolt.
I’m not sure why that was a bit out of focus, but it looked good on the small screen on the back of the camera. Enough where I patted myself on the back for capturing one good shot. Imagine the disappointment I would’ve felt when I got home and pulled this up on the computer to see it slightly out of focus. A couple more low-contrast bolts were captured, but again, I didn’t have full focus.
Bolts were getting more frequent as the storm moved up from Boulder, hugging the foothills, and keeping me at a pretty long zoom… still, didn’t notice the slightly out of focus for a few more bolts that came out.
At this point, I was taking 10-second exposures, with a 1-second gap between. 10 frames, 20 frames, nothing… then, it happened…
10 second exposure ended, biggest bolt of the night hits, literally fills the entire second between shots, and ends just as the next picture snapped. My heart sank… ugh, that was the best shot of the night. It was WAY closer than anything I had seen, much more vivid, and lasted a bit. I was super annoyed, but thought to myself, maybe she got a few more of those in her. I knew, even had I got that one, that I would’ve been zoomed so much that I would’ve only caught the bottom half. But it did what it had to do, made me reset, pull the zoom back from the full 120mm to about 90mm, and THANK GOD, adjusted my focus again… cause if it weren’t for that missed bolt…
Nearly in the exact same spot, a bright HOLY SHIT bolt! I immediately checked the picture after to see this shot! And yes, still not aware of my earlier focus snafu, but this already blew all those other shots of out the water… I was elated, but perhaps over-exposed? LOL It’s always something. I tweaked the f/stop from f/6.3 up to about f/8, then back down to f7.1. These bolts were MUCH closer, and MUCH brighter, many of them having multiple flashes along the same channel, so I had to trim it back. I also dialed back the zoom again, moving down to 60mm as the bolts were close enough that they were filling the view finder. I snagged a couple other terrific bolts, but bumped the camera making the tweaks to the settings. The bolts were great, the foreground was moved…
I finally got my shit together, got my settings where I wanted, and did NOT touch the camera again! And guess what, it worked!
It was getting pretty out-of-hand… while it wasn’t a shot-after-shot, every bolt that did come out was captured! I didn’t miss a single one after that initial, and aside from a couple camera bumps screwing up foreground, everything was crisp, everything was well framed. I had backed the zoom again to 30mm as the storm, which was sliding north/northeast, had gotten closer as the crow flies, so the bolts were even taller in the shot. Then, the shot of the night happened… I didn’t noticed the further back bolts, but two that flashed across my view sent me into a near freak-out. I KNEW I had nailed the shot… it was literally halfway into the 10-second exposure, and I imagine in my momentary celebration, I missed what had happened in the background. But when the shot cleared, I stopped the auto-shoot and immediately looked. There it was, my shot of 2026…
No motion blur, no out-of-focus, 4-5 perfectly captured strikes, great depth, great detail! It was the one!
The storm was moving further away, and despite this finale, it got quiet real quick. Not gonna lie, it’s entirely possible a bolt or two came out that I managed to miss, but everything quickly faded. I gave it a handful of shots before I packed it in. I was MORE than satisfied!
You truly never know what you’re gonna get on camera when you venture out, and these backyard evenings are ALWAYS the best. And this started out so benign, but having made the morning note to myself, I had it in my brain to go out and shoot should the opportunity arise. And despite blowing the first few shots of the night, I got it together when it counted and got the BEST shots of the year, and arguably one of the best shots I’ve taken in years! What a wonderful 45 minutes that was!
