Light Strike Above Donner Lake This Evening
Got one! The lightning was going off this afternoon, so I grabbed the gear to see if I could capture a strike. I was a bit underdressed and by the time I called it an evening, I was completely soaked and cold, lol. No complaints though, it was fun to be out there in the weather.
Last year, I bought a Strike Finder unit, which fires the camera when it senses a lightning strike. Until now, every time I go out and set up with it, the lightning stops and I end up with a failed photoshoot. But today, it worked great!
Shot with a Canon R5 MarkII and a 24-105mm lens. The ISO was 50, the lens aperture was f/8, and it was 1/10 of a second long exposure. On a tripod, the Strike Finder was used, no lens filters were used. Oh, and an umbrella was used! lol.
Thank you for looking, and I hope you all had a great day!
Scott Thompson
Scott Shots Photography
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Love that the Strike Finder finally delivered after the earlier misses. ISO 50 at 1/10 on the R5 II is a nice way to keep things clean while letting the bolt pop. Sounds like the umbrella did half the work and still filed a complaint. Do you tweak the sensitivity on the unit much, or just leave it on default when storms roll in?
There is no sensitivity adjustment on the Strike Finder, so yes, it was the default. Fortunately, it worked great!
Good to know it doesn’t need tweaking. Did you get many false triggers from distant flashes or was it mostly spot on? Also curious if bright ambient light or the R5 II’s shutter lag made any difference to timing.
I did indeed get quite a few false triggers. But I'm okay with that. Much better of a problem than missing flashes. I was shooting while it was still fairly light out, and I had the pre-shoot selected on the R5II. The batteries drained fairly fast but it was worth it, so I didn't miss any shots.
False triggers are the price of catching the good bolts, totally worth it. Pre shoot chews batteries fast. You can stretch the run by turning off image review, using EVF only, lowering screen brightness, and airplane mode, or even powering over USB C with a PD power bank if the rain plays nice. Sounds like you have the combo dialed now.
Yay, great shot.
Thank you!