Best Bolts & Strikes

Taken in Oracle, Arizona. Captured a brief surge of an otherwise weak summer monsoon. Lots of lightning, heavy rain, colorful sunsets. Video was recorded in slow motion (240 fps).

This upload to focuses on an amazing lightning display recorded during the golden and blue hours after sunset. I thought Bach's "C Major Prelude" was actually a great companion to this time-lapse. This is one of my most favorite classical piece that fit with one of my favorite weather events.

Taken 23 September between 6-8:30PM near Tucson, Arizona. Lightning was captured with GoPro 10 @ 240 fps. Lagoa v2 by Kevin MacLeod is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ Source: http://incompetech.com/music/royalty-free/index.html?isrc=USUAN1100865 Artist: http://incompetech.com/

Taken 2-8 August 2022 from South Central Arizona.

The Southwest Monsoon is at full force and these spider lightning events have been awesome in Arizona.

Very active display.

Taken on 22 August 2019 and slowed 10x real-time. Used YI 4K action cam with 155 degree field of view (F.O.V.). This is a 4K resolution clip.

Slowed to 17 percent real-time. Image at end of short clip is stacked image of lightning. Taken 6 August 2019.

Taken on 4 July 2019 with Nikon d7100, Nikkor 35mm f/1.4 lens in video mode and slowed to 1/10th real-time.

After most of the rains tapered off, a few lightning flashes caught my attention and I quickly started my YI 4K action cam in video mode. Within 2:49 and 5:13 minutes, I captured these two nice anvil crawlers. I slowed the video 10x and included the original 30 fps speed captures. After these strikes (within 0.7 miles), the rest were in-cloud and just bright flashes. Taken 21 October 2018 near Tucson, Arizona.

I slowed 30fps 10x to catch various lightning discharges in more detail. These three strikes represent: (1) multiple flashes (negative); (2) fading strike (positive); and (3) quick powerful discharge (super bolt, probably positive). Taken: 15 August 2018

Recording day lightning is difficult enough under ideal conditions. This attempt, the best for me thus far, captures two separate discharges at 240 fps using my iPhone 7 Plus. The first bolt is actually a series of discharges aimed at different directions. The second bolt shows a step down leader in distinct segments. However, even slowing down the speed 8x realtime is still not slow enough. You may have to watch this clip more than once. These lightning strikes followed the virga (precipitation) channels from high based thunderstorms. Relative humidity was only 20 percent so no rain reached the ground. Anyway, enjoy. Taken 27 June 2018.

This raw clip is quite noisy but gives you an idea on the potential for capturing lightning at 240 fps with the latest iPhones. This video was taken by hand in dark conditions. Future attempts will be under more control and should be of better quality. In any event, at 240 fps, the lightning is slowed enough to see individual step leaders moving across the sky.

Well the pre-sunset thunderstorms fizzled as they move through my neighborhood. However, I managed to capture 2 strikes (cloud-to-ground) and slowed them up from real-time, to 50%, 25%, and 10%. The 2nd strike was particularly a long duration one that faded over 3/4 of a second. It was about 1 mile from my house. Looked a lot closer!

Lightning and Thunder on 6 June 2016 from Cheyenne, WY. Turn up the volume to appreciate!

Lightning flashes are quick. Ones that last more than half a second are rarer. Some are a product of multiple stokes but many are slow spreaders (sometimes labeled as crawlers). Anyway, the strokes in this short clip are seen in real-time and 1/10th real-time. Taken 30 July 2016. Taken They are both beautiful and terrorizing at the same time.

Taken 8 Jun after the passage of a severe thunderstorm. This anvil crawler was captured through my window since it was raining. My Fujifilm X-T3 (video mode at 60fps) was used.

Taken late afternoon on 6 August with iPhone 11 Pro Max in Slow Motion (240 fps). The initial part of this short clip shows what lightning looks like at 24 fps. In this brief instant, 3 of 4 cloud to ground strikes occur. The 4th appears to have not reached the ground. These strikes were about 1.5 miles away based on the thunder that followed. Note the intense flash as the bolt hits the ground and the return stroke develops.

About 6 cloud to ground strikes occurred between 3:30PM and 4PM. I managed to capture 2 decent ones using my iPhone 11 Pro Max, handheld in slow motion mode. Each event occurred in about 1/20th of a second (or 1 or 2 frames with a convention movie frame rate of 24 or 30 fps). The 1st strike looks to be negative, the 2nd positive.

Between 6:42PM and 6:54PM, I stood in my garage as I captured a nice electrical storm just 1 to 3 miles away. Using a iPhone 11 Pro Max in slow motion mode, I slowed the strikes to 1/10th real time. If a strike was faster than 1/24th of a second, there was a good chance I'd miss it if I took a normal video. However, at 240 fps, many strikes were recorded with remarkable detail. I was holding the iPhone as the storm moved by.

iPhone captures at 240 fps (slow motion)

This short clip records a lightning strike that occurred 26 Aug 21 about 1000 feet (+/- 50 feet) and the sound of the thunder that followed. I of course froze the frame since the strike occurred in probably under 3/1000th of a sec. The thunder lasted 17 secs which would made sense since this bolt originated about 3.5 miles above me. The car at the end of the clip was probably the same distance as I was when this bolt hit. If it would have been 12 seconds sooner, it might have been struck. The car did zoom by me so I think it took notice of this event and hit the accelerator a bit more than usual. :-) Recorded ~7:58PM, 20 minutes after sunset.