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My luck in photographing lightning seems to be improving.

While in Moscow, Oksana and I hooked up with Vika, an old friend of hers who used to be a fellow Russian exchange/international student in Juneau. She and her boyfriend, Vanya, took us out to a restaurant on the 22nd floor of a university building. As the sun set, all of Moscow was laid out before us.

Just before dinner arrived, at Vanya’s insistence, I attempted to capture a lightning strike from a fast-approaching thunderstorm. Only three shots into my attempt, Oksana called me back to the table; dinner had been served. “Last one,” I called, just before a bolt shot down.

During dinner, the storm built in intensity. As soon as I finished my meal, I excused myself for another attempt. The very next photo, the one pictured above with two almost-simultaneous strikes, was the result. Seconds later, the wind and rain chased us inside.

By the time we settled the check and made it downstairs, a good-sized pond had formed in the building’s courtyard and doorway. Vanya and Andrey bravely sacrificed their aridity (but not their shoes) in a mad dash out to the car for the umbrellas stashed within.

Canon Digital Rebel XT
Date: 15 July 2006
Focal Length: 18mm
Shutter: 25 seconds
Aperture: F/20
Photoshop: Minor color correction, minor cropping
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To me, this photograph represents patience. As a thunderstorm brewed around us on the beach in Nags Head, NC, I sat on the porch and snapped photo after photo, trying to capture a bolt of lightning. I took seventy photos in all, each one exposed for 30-seconds. This was lucky number 57.

I didn’t have a tripod (I used the railing on the porch), and the strong gusts of wind meant that I had to hold the camera down with my hand. That, or the multiple flashes of lightning, must have been what caused some strange blurry artifacts along the right-hand edge of the house. They were easy to Photoshop away, though, plus it gave me an excuse to remove some telephone lines on the left and level the horizon while I was at it.

After looking at all the other pictures, most of which have nothing but black clouds, I find it amazing that this lightning bolt struck so perfectly in the frame. And to think I almost gave up and went inside around picture #45…

Canon Digital Rebel XT
Date: 29 June 2006
Focal Length: 18mm
Shutter: 30 seconds
Aperture: F/3.5
Photoshop: some cloning, wire removal, minor rotation and crop

Just for fun, two more variations can be seen after the jump.
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