Tips on Photographing Summer Storms

It was extremely hot in the Netherlands in June. We are breaking heat record after heat record these weeks, and it is not just here. Large parts of Europe are baking too. People that know me know I really do not like heat. But there is one thing about this extreme heat that I do like: all that warm, unstable air builds up, and it often ends the day in spectacular fashion with (thunder)storms, dramatic cloud formations and the chance to photograph lightning.

In this article I want to give you some inspiration and a handful of practical tips for shooting summer storms. Let me be upfront about one thing: I do not consider myself an expert storm chaser or weather expert at all. So I will keep things simple and approachable. The nice part is that here in the Netherlands we have a big and very knowledgeable community of people who make absolutely amazing storm and weather photos, and many of them understand the meteorology far better than I do.

So before I share my own tips, let’s start where most good photography starts: with a bit of inspiration.

Inspiration

Here are a few photographers from the Netherlands whose storm and weather work I really admire. Give them a follow and check out their images if you want to see some great work from the Netherlands:

• Rick Bekker - a landscape photographer and storm chaser who hunts severe weather all across Northwest Europe

• Gijs de Reijke - geography teacher and weather photographer.

• Paul Begijn - a forest ranger and landscape photographer.

• Wouter van Bernebeek - storm chaser since 2007 and a meteorologist by profession, so he knows the weather inside out.

  
  

What I love about studying other people’s work is that it trains your eye for what is possible. You start to recognise the kinds of conditions that produce great shots, and that makes you quicker and sharper when it actually happens.

Now, on to the tips.

Tips on photographing unique weather and storms

1. Always keep an eye on the weather, make it a habit

This is the foundation of everything. Good weather photography starts long before you pick up the camera. Make checking the weather a daily habit. The day before, look at the radar forecast and your “local weather picture” for the next day. You can already learn a lot from that: where instability is building, which way systems are moving, and roughly when things might kick off. The more often you do this, the more naturally you start to feel when a day has potential. Just start with your local weather channel and read what they say on their website about the coming days.

Strong winds on the coast combined with spring tide made the perfect setup for this shot, a windmill standing right beside the coastline. Note, this storm wasn't in summer though, it was a winter one :) - Sony A7R V · 16-35mm f/2.8 GM II @ 20mm · f/7.1 · 1/800s · ISO 400

2. On the day itself, read the better models

On the day itself you can observe much more detailed radar and forecast data. Which tools you use depends a bit on your region, but in Europe and the Netherlands we often lean on high resolution convective models.

A few worth knowing:

• HARMONIE-AROME (the KNMI high resolution model, great for the Netherlands)

• ICON-D2 (the German DWD high resolution model, excellent for Central Europe)

• AROME (the Meteo-France high resolution model)

• ECMWF and GFS for the bigger picture and the overall setup

• Handy platforms to view several of these at once: Windy, Pivotal Weather and Weathermodels

• For live lightning, the Blitzortung network and LightningMaps.org are great for tracking where strikes are actually happening

These more advanced models let you analyse the atmosphere in detail. Look at things like instability and where storms are expected to fire. With a bit of practice you will get noticeably better at estimating when and where a storm will develop.

3. Know your locations

Here in the Netherlands we are lucky to have a lot of locations relatively close to each other. We may get less extreme storms than, say, the US (no Tornado Alley here), but we do have an enormous amount of landmarks that you can combine with dramatic weather. That combination is where the magic happens.

My advice: build your own list of locations in your region, so you can switch quickly the moment interesting conditions show up. I simply do this in Google Maps. Pin your spots, note which direction they face, and you are ready to move fast.

You are welcome to use all of my own locations in the Netherlands. I put them together in a map in collaboration with my friend Marijn Alons.

Windmills and churches, or both. At this location the windmill is lit up all night, which makes it a great subject for night lightning photography. Sony A7R VI · 16-35mm f/2.8 GM II @ 32mm · f/7.1 · 4s · ISO 100

4. The shot itself: always add something extra

When you are actually composing the photo, try to always work “something extra” into the frame. A rainbow or a thunderstorm is beautiful on its own, but it becomes a real photograph when you add a foreground element (see the previous tip). That can be a landmark, but it can just as easily be a simple leading line, like the curve of a wave, a path or a row of trees pointing into the scene.

Do not overthink it. Simple things often work perfectly. Keep looking for leading lines and strong foregrounds, and let the sky do the rest of the work :).

5. Technique: know your camera

The weather does not wait, so you often have to act fast. That is why you need to know your camera inside out. When you are dealing with a shelf cloud, for example, you can shoot a panorama to capture the entire structure, but you have to do it quickly because that cloud is moving fast.

Personally, I usually prefer more intimate shots, where composition matters more to me than capturing the whole cloud. I would rather chase beautiful light, or a bolt of lightning in exactly the right spot, than fit everything in. And that is also why I often fail :D. Whatever your style, the key is the same: you need to be able to operate your camera quickly and confidently to shoot weather effectively.

For this one I quickly set up the camera while the storm was already close. Shot at 12mm, the lightning struck quite near. I had to run back to the car right afterwards. Sony A7R V · 12-24mm f/2.8 GM @ 12mm · f/22 · 0.8s · ISO 50

6. Use timelapses

I used a time-lapse for this shot: every 5 seconds a 4 second exposure. This frame caught two bolts at once. Sony A7R VI · 16-35mm f/2.8 GM II @ 22mm · f/7.1 · 4s · ISO 100

Once you have found a composition you like, put the camera in interval mode. This is one of the easiest ways to catch lightning or even other weather photos. I often shoot a few seconds per frame and just let the camera keep firing non-stop. That way I keep capturing the scene continuously, and with a bit of luck I catch the strikes as they happen. Lightning is unpredictable, so the more frames you take, the better your odds. Unless…

7. Use a lightning trigger

Building on that previous tip: a lightning trigger is a small device that connects to your camera with a cable and fires the shutter at the exact moment lightning strikes. It works with a sensor that reacts to the sudden burst of light (or the electromagnetic pulse) far faster than any human could. By the time you would react and press the shutter, the bolt is long gone, but the trigger catches it.

This is especially useful in daylight, when you cannot just leave the shutter open on a long exposure the way you can at night. At night you can simply do long exposures and catch the bolts that way, but during the day a trigger is the tool that makes it possible. A well known example is the Strikefinder, and there are others like MIOPS, Pluto Trigger and Lightning Bug.

8. Positioning

In the end, the art of the perfect weather photo comes down to combining everything: the right weather, a good location, and being in exactly the right place at exactly the right time. You will fail at this a lot, especially in the beginning. I still do. But you will see, it really is addictive!

Keep trying, because you will eventually make those incredible shots. It really is all about how you study the weather and how you position yourself. I am no expert either, but with some basic knowledge I manage to pull it off reasonably often, and more often as time goes on.

Eight years of trying (we do not get many thunderstorms during tulip season) and I finally got my perfect tulip lightning shot. On this evening in 2023, everything lined up. Sony A7R V · 12-24mm f/2.8 GM @ 12mm · f/9 · 25s · ISO 200

9. Use a drone

Drones are great for chasing storms. You can see the storms coming from far away and position yourself perfectly in front of them. Be careful though: you will want to be back down on the ground right before the storm hits, to avoid the strong winds. With a drone you can also easily make fast panoramas to capture entire cloud formations.

A drone panorama of an incoming shelf cloud. DJI Mini Pro 4 drone · f/1.7 · 1/100s · ISO 100

10. Be careful, maybe the most important one of all

I will end with the most important point. I notice in myself that I always want the shot, no matter what. But you have to stay careful. Especially in places where the weather does not mess around, like with tornadoes, some photos can be genuinely life threatening and scary. So know what you are doing, respect the conditions, and do not do anything crazy.

A great photo is never worth your safety.

That is it for now. I hope this gives you some inspiration and a few things to try the next time a storm rolls in. The weather will not wait for you, but with a little preparation and a lot of patience, you will be ready when it counts. Stay safe out there, and have fun!

Thanks for reading!

Albert