A Tucson strike at sunset

(please click image to view on black // canon 5d mark ii, rokinon 14mm 2.8, iso 50, f/16(ish), 2 sec // buy print)

After I took this shot, I gave a high-five to a Frenchman who was standing beside me who captured it as well. I met Dimitri up on Tucson’s A-Mountain last night (check out his website) and we had a blast hanging out for almost 2 hours. He was actually on vacation from France in Arizona for the sole purpose of shooting lightning. I mean…how awesome is that?

He had a serious setup…two full frame cameras each with a lightning trigger, plus a major HD video camera.

Anyways…we’d been shooting for a long time when suddenly this rain falling over metro Tucson started turning orange. A beautiful sunset was in store for us. And then the lightning started And while you may have a hard time seeing it because of the intense orange color of the sky, there is a rainbow in there running vertical alongside the right edge of that bolt.

I looked over at Dimitri and asked if this was his best shot since he got here a week or two ago…and he said yes. He was a lot like me…hooting and yelling everytime he got a great strike. Was so very cool to see the same passion I have in a guy visiting from France.

Good luck my friend, hope the rest of your trip rocks!

Also…on the full-sized image…you can make out where every strike lands…pretty amazing.