18
Technique
8 Ride the
lightning
Lightning is another
dramatic weather effect
which can transform an
image, but again, you
need to think how it will
interact with other
elements in the frame.
Hugo Begg, the Young
Weather Photographer
of the Year 2020,
focused on the town
across the bay where the
storm was heading to
‘because it was the only
real reference point in
the framing’. Trying to
focus on the lightning will
be very difficult, however
fast your reactions.10 Don’t get ‘frozen’ to the spot
Helen Trust, who won the weather round of our APOY
competition, puts a five-minute alarm on her phone
so she doesn’t get stuck in one spot, compulsively
shooting away once she has got the exposure and
focusing sorted out. This is a common pitfall. It stood
her in good stead for APOY – by choosing a
different shooting angle for this Norwegian house in
thick snow, she beat lots of other entries.9 Use ND Grad filters
Whether you are shooting snow or cloudy days, filters are
really handy. For this winning image in Weather
Photographer of the Year 2019, Gareth Mon Jones used
a 0.9 ND grad filter to get a nice balance between the
darkness of clouds and the pre-dawn light, without
blowing out the highlights in the sky. Practise fitting filters
beforehand so you can work quickly in chilly conditions.7 Polarisers pay dividends too
Polarising filters also come in useful with piercing winter light, as they can be used to
reduce glare, remove reflections from water and other reflective surfaces, as well as
deepen blue skies. Melvin Nicholson used one particularly skilfully for this famous
‘fogbow’ image, where preserving detail and clarity in this unusual, fleeting
phenomenon was crucial.
© MELVIN NICHOLSON
© HUGO BEGG
© GARETH MON JONES