butler_son

15 mins ago tops here in Eastern Dorset.

Quick and dirty from out the bedroom window here in Verwood, Dorset from about 15 mins ago tops (about the time it took to get the pic processed). Thought it might be appreciated.

They are close. Frequent rumblings, just saw a strike and another flash as I type this. Can't be bothered to go out with the camera now...

Wind has just picked up out of nowhere. Just been outside with the camera and got sod all, the flashes were too far away to make any impact. But there are flashes. May try and head out again when I hear thunder.

Just seen some big old cloud coming from the south, seen a couple of faint flashes and a small growl.

Auto WB is fine, ISO sounds a bit high for the time of year, a lower ISO is less sensitive to light and you don't want to have pictures that are blindingly white, and a lightning strike will be hard to miss. You may be better off at 200. Make sure that it doesn't auto ISO anyway though, my D3000 used to love doing that before I figured out how to stop it. Also f5.6 sounds too wide for 2 reasons - firstly the wider the aperture (lower number = wider), the more light you'll let in and won't be able to see the strike and secondly you'll have a shallower depth of field. Assuming you've got a kit lens have it at 18mm I'd say so you've got more chance of catching something. 20s exposure sounds great. Of course, this is all assuming you'll be shooting at night! Anyhow, still warm and sunny in Eastern Dorset but looks like from what everyone is posting we stand a good chance of something over the next 2 days.

Hope they come at night! My plans are shoot in manual (on a tripod), ISO 100, aperture quite narrow (that way I should have a large depth of field) so f/11+, exposure time of around 20 sec and adjust from there if it needs more/less light. A lightning strike should definitely show up whatever, just all about how much contrast you want. Don't think you'll get anything meaningful shooting on burst mode. Will be my first time doing this too so hoping for something I can get, got an ND filter at the ready for anything in daytime. Good luck! Btw this I've found on another forum has the data on the settings used on Flickr (under additional info) so something to use as a guide. http://www.flickr.com/photos/mrdespair/9323662711/in/photostream/

I nearly choked on my morning waffle. As an east Dorset resident that is crazy! That's getting closer to the record temperature recorded locally at Hurn (34 degrees) so let's hope this keeps coming (though it is a Saturday and I'll be playing cricket so there would be a good chance of dying in the field if it's 31).

Does anyone here do much "street photography"? It's something I'm interested in getting into after a little experimentation to date: The first lot were taken at Caen market, the last 3 were taken in Bournemouth. I'd be interested to know people's opinions.

I'll see about that when I'm (hopefully) up in September!

Well for me it's got to be the home town and best example of a "city" beach we have in this country, 7 miles or so of golden sand centred on Bournemouth. There's honestly no beach I'd rather go to. I'm not a huge fan of all the covey sorts of beaches, would rather have a long expanse of sand attached to a decent sized town. I'd love Tampa, San Diego or Miami for example. Also got a bit of fondness for Eastbourne as I used to live there, but the stones are an issue.

Well it's clear enough out in Verwood to see *SUPERMOON* ®

Shame it's a bit quiet for storms. However, the nice clouds make for nice sunsets.

Yep. I seem to get a bit of that with long exposures at certain angles.

Lens flare I think.

Clouds over Verwood aren't *that* threatening. I took a picture to prove it.

That first site - just had a browse of the forums and found some photos one of the forums contributors took of that. Scroll down to post #485, it's a post by kristopoff. Thread here: http://forums.infoclimat.fr/topic/82221-suivi-du-temps-en-le-de-france/page-25

Ahhh morning does make a little more sense. I was just a bit incredulous that it would have been in the last hour or so.

Something about this makes me feel like it's not real or recent. The sun would have set a while ago in Paris, and it looks like the sun is low and in...the South East? I'm just a little sceptical...

Mmmmm nice, that had better come our way. Or that cell from Caen. I wanna try and photograph some lightning but the first thunderstorm I've had this summer happened when I didn't have my camera on me. Obligatory current conditions in Verwood - blue sky and high cloud, something a little darker out the window to the SW.

My brother's stuck in Nassau in the Bahamas at the moment! Will try and relay anything I hear from him on the ground there at the moment as Sandy passes through.

Normally I wouldn't want to strike down someone's hopes but on this occasion... Wassup folks? How're we all getting on in here? Weirdly looking forward to feeling a bit of a chill in the air this winter, though I'll probably get tired of it soon enough!

I'll leave this here:

http://www.news12.com/articleDetail.jsp?regionId=2&articleId=229134&position=1&news_type=news&rand=90879558&ionId=2&ion_name=NJ&autoplay News stream from New Jersey.