Arc Light

Watching the weather, waiting for a good time to head out to do some milkyway photography. I road out some 100 miles to a place I thought the conditions would be good after checking the weather. Unfortunately here in these mountains the weather has a mind of its own, so I for a good few hours determined that I would shift gears and do some location scouting the clouds rolling in converging over the areas I thought best to do the shoot. That aside as I road back homeward bound I began noticing flashing off on a neighboring ridge line. Lightning within the clouds making itself apparent, I wasn't sure if it would be worth it at first, but the opportunity was there, I had to at least try and capture the image. I had gotten the entire camera setup and ready to go, a bit of a zoom, a hope and a prayer that I would capture the event... and amazingly it paid off. I took a test shot to see if things were mostly in focus, and while yes it is a bit out, a little soft, the very first shot I took was this. A bolt erupting from the clouds up, back down and in the background you can see two strikes behind the red tower. It was amazing, I stuck around for another thirty minutes but the lightning came to an abrupt end not long after it had started leaving me with this lovely image, and a reminder to always give it a shot when opportunity knocks on your door.

ISO: 160
Aperture: f2.8
SS: 30 seconds
Focal: 77mm