Ring of Fire
The atmosphere unloaded with fury this night near Flasher, North Dakota. This long tracked supercell thunderstorm churned across the plains spitting out basebal...
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The atmosphere unloaded with fury this night near Flasher, North Dakota. This long tracked supercell thunderstorm churned across the plains spitting out baseball size hail and crazy lightning.
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Aug, 2016Views
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Same photographer See allBehind The Lens
Behind The Lens
Location
This ended up being a photo opportunity of a lifetime, and I initially just wanted to wander down a country North Dakota road for a chance at a few lightning bolts. My journey led me to an area just outside of a small town named Flasher, North Dakota.Time
This is probably my favorite photograph I've ever taken. I took quite a few pictures of this storm as it changed in appearance through the late night of 6/16/2016 and early morning hours of 6/16/2016. I chased this breathtaking supercell thunderstorm from about midnight to 3 am central daylight time.Lighting
Lighting is always a challenge when shooting night-time thunderstorms that contain quite a bit of lightning. Another challenge on this night was the near full moon (but also made the storm that much more dramatic), so it didn't take much exposure to blow an image out. However, the storm was rotating fairly rapidly so it didn't take much exposure to achieve the blur effect of the clouds I was aiming for. I found that keeping my aperture at around f/9 with a 10-15 second exposure maximized the look I was trying to achieve. It's also important to keep your ISO low. There were a few brighter bolts that blew out the photo, but most worked out very well.Equipment
I was using a Nikon d610, a Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 ultra wide lens, and a tripod. Another very important piece of equipment was weather radar software with GPS overlay on my phone. Radarscope is my favorite.Inspiration
I had just gotten off of work (my main area of work is as a meteorologist) and was aware of the storms approaching central North Dakota from the western part of the state. At this point, the storms were just a line and not very strong, but they were producing quite a bit of lightning. I hadn't photographed lightning in a while, so I decided to set out. As I approached the storms, the line broke up into extremely strong supercell thunderstorms (thunderstorms that rotate). I storm chase when I can, so I was overjoyed at this opportunity to photograph the amazing visual structure of the supercell on a dramatic night with clear skies outside of the storm, a near full moon, and a grand lightning display. This storm ended up producing baseball size hail eventually in Bismarck, ND.Editing
Basically, I nudged up the clarity to sharpen the lightning and shadows to bring out the foreground a bit more. I also tempered down the highlights and exposure to mute the bright lightning and moon slightly. Finally, I increased the vibrance.In my camera bag
I usually carry my Nikon d610 with the Nikkor 28-300mm lens. I find this to be a fantastic all purpose lens for most every day types of shots and portraits. I also carry my Nikkor 14-24mm f/2.8 ultra wide (I actually use this lens the most as I am primarily a landscape and storm photographer). I always keep various lens filters (circular polarizer, neutral density filter, etc...), lens cleaning materials, extra batteries, and a wireless remote. I also keep a portable tripod in the bag in case my main tripod breaks, which has happened before. Finally, I also keep a mid range Sony video handycam in my bag for catching extra footage while storm chasing.Feedback
The biggest advice would be to have patience. When chasing storms, especially at night, you never know what's going to happen. Will there be enough lightning to bring out features of the storm's structure? Will the lightning be only cloud to cloud? Will the heavy rain from the storm hide the lightning bolts? You will never know the answers to these questions until you go out and observe and experiment. I never expected to have such an epic storm to photograph for almost three straight hours that night. I was just hoping for a few mediocre/decent lightning shots. On the other hand, I've gone out to shoot storms expecting incredible weather, only to fail miserably. Storm chasing and storm photography takes patience and experimentation. Trying to find an interesting foreground is also a must, but challenging when you cannot control where the storm is. If all else fails, just find an empty road like I did in the image above. An empty road always adds character and intrigue, and conveys a certain type of lonely emotion. I would like to say a word of caution when it comes to storm chasing in general, especially at night. Be very careful if you do not have much experience reading the sky and reading radar. Make sure you always have an escape plan and never risk your safety for a shot. There will always be other storms.
