"This is what" was the question put to me when my friends were shown the above photo. The shot was not taken during daytime. No, not during the solar eclispe, which had been a brief fad in the past week in this part of the world.
So, what is this? This is one of the shots for which I had waited and take on a stormy night. I just anticipated the moment of the next strike of the bolt, photographed on the continuous drive mode and ended up with this photo. I am sure that the CX1 can do a better job with its much higher continuous drive speed.
As the scene was actucally dark, the trick was to pre-expose for a lit-up area (say, a shop when you passed by one or an indoor light if you're indoor) and lock it up with the AEL lock. Don't forget to turn off the power saving feature of the camera, so that the camera won't switch itself off beyond the idle-time and the exposure combo be gone.
Some other tips are: 1) Safety comes first when you shoot in inclement weather. Don’t take risk. 2) Don’t hide under any tree when you photograph the bolts. Better do the shooting indoor. 3) Drag the shutter speed and use the lowest ISO setting. 4) If the lightning is haphazard, do horizontal shots. If the bolts flash repeatedly and expectedly in certain spots, do vertical shots to render the image more dramatic.
"What is this" was also my exclamation when I watched the news on TV about the solar eclipse and saw the lady (above) used a GX100 to photograph the sun. I was amazed by not the lady but the 15-second free air-time of the TV shot showing the back of the camera with the big RICOH letter thereon.
I doubted that the camera man was a Ricoh user himself. Otherwise, he must have been very inadvertent about it, which might have caused him some rebuke by the news editor.
Maybe there is a lesson for the camera makers to learn from this: put your logo or brandname on the front and also at the back of the cameras.
Another thought is related to the VF-1: The lady would have appreciated the VF-1 if she had used one for shooting the solar eclipse because she could comfortably turn facedown towards the eyepiece and the lens up to the sun, sparing herself the squinting eyes and repeated guessing for the composition.
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