The Big Storm Picture

HDR Test

2009-11-03T14:09:00.006-06:00

HDR, or "High Dynamic Range" is a type of photography that utilizes several images in order to create one image that captures as much lighting detail as possible. I have a tutorial up here that explains how to do this in Photoshop CS4. There are more popular programs out there, such as Photomatix, though I tend to not be fond of the output of such programs, as they often come off as being extremely unrealistic.

I'm testing out a new HDR algorithm; in the past, I'd never really found an HDR program that could render realistic output in storm situation or handle the fact that clouds tended to move between shots. I think this one is zeroing in.

This photo was taken on April 23, 2006, in central Kansas. In the foreground are storm chasers Amos Magliocco and Robert Hall.

Below is a screenshot of the individual RAW files used to assemble this image:

Interestingly enough, it's kinda amazing how quickly light changes at sunset and how dramatic a difference this can have on storm appearance. For example, the non-HDR image below (which I like more) was taken not long after the HDR image above, but it is completely different:

Rainbow Chasers

2009-11-02T16:58:00.004-06:00

In honor of last night's episode of Storm Chasers, which finished off with a team of valiant "Rainbow Chasers", I give you a pair of Vortex 2 probe-team storm chasers (one of whom is the chasing legend Tim Marshall) driving under a freshly minted rainbow in western Nebraska, June 6, 2009. This high-based storm pelted us with some quarter to golfball sized hail (which made my windshield wobble with each impact), but was fairly tame otherwise.

Getting the Shot

2009-10-28T14:47:00.003-05:00

Today's photo is from June 5, 2009, in Goshen County, Wyoming. Journalist Brian Pollack gets the shot of the developing tornado; you can see some the results of this work at the Weather Channel. This was quite a beautiful tornado; you can see more clips from this storm here and here and here.

Scanning through the wheat

2009-10-06T20:30:00.002-05:00

Today's photo is of the CSWR crew setting up to scan a now LP supercell near Dodge City, Kansas, on June 9, 2009. This storm slowly died over the course of the next half hour, but it was darn pretty as it did it.

Who said science wasn't awesome?

2009-10-04T22:21:00.003-05:00

Today's photo might be a repeat, but if it is, I'm repeating it because I LOVE IT SO MUCH. This was shot while covering Project Vortex 2 on June 5, 2009. In the distance, a tornado is rapidly closing; in the foreground, Tim Marshall (crouching, right) and Lindsay Bennett (crouching, left) are deploying a "Tornado Pod" -- a heavy probe loaded down with weather instrumentation designed to be dropped in the direct path of a tornado. They're in a hurry, as the tornado is less than 5 minutes ETA from this exact position, and they still have a couple probes left to deploy and get the heck out of there, with over 40 vehicles trafficjammed along the roadway also getting ready to pull the trigger on bugging out. To the left, you see Mike Tittel, a rather talented photographer, snapping away as well. To the right is a reporter and videographer for Lord-knows-who; the Discovery Channel and the Weather Channel and an IMAX crew were all permanent fixtures on this science mission, along with a handful of reporters from around the world who would drop in and out throughout the weeks. I guess what I love about this shot is the drama of it -- this is one of the only shots I took on the entire mission that captured just how incredibly awesome the work these guys and gals were doing really was.

You should be able to see this intercept later this year (probably on the season finale) on the Discovery Channel's show, "Storm Chasers". It was quite dramatic.

Waiting

2009-10-03T00:31:00.002-05:00

Today's photo is from June 6, 2009. A Vortex 2 probe team member waits as a supercell slowly develops in the distance and slides towards his position. They were out in Western Nebraska that day -- and they didn't catch much off of this storm, unfortunately. This would have been a great storm to have had a tornado as it was literally in the middle of nowhere and likely wouldn't have threatened so much as a cow. I did have a bit of a run in with golf-ball sized hail a little after this was shot, but a little-known fact is that hail often comes in different consistencies. Sometimes it's really hard, sometimes it's a bit softer. Luckily this was the "softer" kind, so even though the whole car reverberated each time a stone struck and I could literally see my windshield wobbling with every hit, it did no real damage to my car.

Tornado Detail

2009-10-02T11:57:00.003-05:00

Today's photo is a rather pedestrian shot of a tornado from Goshen County, Wyoming this past June -- the only tornado Vortex 2 intercepted last year. Even though this isn't a spectacular shot, what I love about it is the small vortices you can see at the edge of the main funnel. This tornado was in the process of transitioning from a very stout cone to a much thinner funnel that eventually roped out. Vortex 2 got data of the entire cycle of this tornado from birth to death; I can't wait to see some of the papers that come out of this research.

Dangerous Driving

2009-09-27T17:22:00.003-05:00

Today's photos show the number one thing I worry about when chasing -- poor driving conditions. These were taken *before* sunset -- though admittedly rather late in the day.

The first photo was taken as the Vortex 2 probe teams pulled over in western Kansas to wait for a hail core to pass. The operational day was over -- V2 doesn't operate as it approaches evening -- and the trucks have tons of expensive weather instrumentation mounted atop their hoods. Despite this, they didn't escape the hail core (and neither did I, as I was following them) -- fortunately, it wasn't terribly large hail, just buckets and buckets of quarters and a truly intense core of pea sized hail that sounded like God was dumping a skyfull of pebbles on the roof of my car. (Sometimes I wish I shot video.)

The second photo is of us finally emerging from the precipitation of this storm, with the light of setting sun just creeping in under the stormclouds. For a linear storm, this thing packed a surprising wallop. I'm pretty sure there was a supercell embedded somewhere in there.

End of the Day

2009-09-20T16:23:00.002-05:00

I like this shot -- this was shot at the end of a day of chasing in Amazonia, Missouri, on June 7, 2009. At left is a Doppler on Wheels truck, owned and operated by the Center for Severe Weather Research during Project Vortex 2 -- you can see them in action on the Discovery Channel show "Storm Chasers". At left is a videographer, shooting for (I believe) the Weather Channel and MSNBC. This particular supercell was a bit of a nailbiter; it started out less than promising, then rapidly ramped up as the Vortex 2 crew waiting for it atop a hill in Missouri. Suddenly, over the radio, Josh Wurman, the usually unflappable leader of CSWR, began yelling at everyone to get te heck out of the way for the expensive radar trucks and probe trucks who were rapidly fleeing the area, as 5 inch wide hail was falling only 1000 meters away. It chased us all the way to the interstate, where the crew finally got ahead of the storm again. This is where we all parked to wait for the storm to pass over our head -- and this is the view of the storm after it did.

Limited 11x14 print sale for readers of this blog

2009-08-26T14:13:00.008-05:00

Always wanted to have one of my storm prints but never pulled the trigger? The first 10 people who email me at digicana@gmail.com can purchase an unsigned 11x14 of the above print (taken near Dodge City, Kansas during Project Vortex 2) for $34.99. The print will be printed on Kodak Professional Endura photo paper (real photo paper, not inkjet) and professionally mounted on styrene board. All payments will be handled through Paypal. This offer is only open to readers with U.S. shipping addresses (this includes Alaska and Hawaii) -- shipping to other countries is too cost prohibitive to offer at this price. Also, because I use FedEx to ship, these can't go to P.O. Boxes. Thanks to all the loyal blog readers out there -- it's cool to know that so many people out there enjoy storm photography. :)

*edit* This offer is now closed. Thanks!

A Ham Radio Operator's Dreammobile

2009-08-24T20:48:00.006-05:00

(Click image above to view licensing information at Getty Images)

One of the more awesome things that the Center for Severe Weather Research (the group that owns all those "Doppler on Wheels" trucks you see on the Discovery Channel) acquired this year was a truly ginormous mobile retractable antenna. Installed on the back of DOW 6, this antenna rises some 50+ feet in the air. Once raised, it acts as a "repeater" essentially, a large antenna that listens for things that Vortex 2 chasers transmit with their smaller radios, then rebroadcasts them at a much higher power with a much larger antenna, meaning that V2 chasers can talk to each other on the radio even if they're almost 50 miles away. It seems like the kind of thing that should belong to the military or to some HAM radio fan who won the lottery. When you consider that the full-sized semi cab also has a humongous Doppler Radar dish mounted on the back, a crew cab with a swivel chair and a four-monitor workstation, wireless internet, and is linked into a network of radio transponders tied to GPS satellites that allow a graphical layout of where all Vortex 2 units are at all times, this thing is pretty much the most tricked out Nerdmobile in the history of the Geek species.

By the way, speaking of the Discovery Channel -- the new season of Storm Chasers starts quite soon -- October 11th! Here's a preview video of the season to come:

(the above video is Copyright the Discovery Channel.)

The filming crew invested a lot more resources this year, so I suspect that it'll be an awesome season. I think I might have a cameo appearance in it, too, considering they asked me to sign a model release -- I just hope and pray I don't come off like a complete jackass. :) I tried real hard not to walk into anyone's camera shots, but they just had so dang many cameras and I tend to completely lose track of where I am when I'm composing a shot...

Double Rainbow

2009-08-22T20:27:00.005-05:00

My wife reminded me last night that I've been neglecting the blog! I've been working like a horse to get somewhere in the neighborhood of a thousand images into the Getty Images archive; hopefully this will fund many more storm chases in the future. :)

Today's photo is a beautiful double-rainbow. I shot this while covering some Vortex 2 probe trucks running "transects" (basically just driving back and forth and collecting data) in western Nebraska on June 6, 2009. I'd given up following them because the hail was approaching golfball-size and my windshield was already cracked form hitting a bird on I-80 a couple days before. Rainbows are caused by refraction and reflection as light enters a drop of water -- in this case, a drop of rain. A double rainbow occurs when light enters a drop of water and reflects twice inside the drop before exiting at a different angle. One interesting thing you'll notice is that the secondary rainbow -- the one on the outside -- has the colors in the reverse order of the inside rainbow -- this is because the second reflective "bounce" inside the raindrop inverts the image of the colors. Of course, you aren't seeing all the colors of a rainbow being refracted from one drop, but rather from many, many drops that are at different angles relative to you, with each drop giving you a slightly different color. The best diagram I've seen that explains this is here.

If you want to view this image at Getty.com in order to license it, just give it a click.

Looking up

2009-08-09T23:02:00.003-05:00

Storm chaser Andrew Arnold looks up into a supercell's rotating updraft in western Nebraska during Vortex 2 on June 5, 2009. This storm had previously produced a tornado in eastern Wyoming -- and the cloud overhead was producing a funnel cloud only five minutes before this was taken. As a storm chaser, I'm a bit of a scardy-cat in that I don't usually like to allow rotating updrafts to slide directly overhead (even when they look this disorganized) -- but Project Vortex 2 featured a large number of mobile doppler radar trucks which constantly scanned the sky looking for rotation, acting as an early warning system of sorts.

Young(ish)

2009-07-30T23:51:00.003-05:00

Look, an anemometer!

Notice anything funny about it? This is an example of the the Tornado Intercept Vehicle crew's sense of humor. The propeller and tail of their (multi-thousand-dollar) Young Marine anemometer was ripped off by a tornado in Wyoming on June 5, 2009, so they, ahem... fixed it. Behold, a Young(ish) anemometer, constructed of the finest cardboard, printer paper, and gaffers tape that money can buy.

About to Produce

2009-07-29T19:56:00.003-05:00

Watching a tornado form in an open field, far from anyone to hurt or anything to destroy is an incredible sight, and one that storm chasers often find themselves cheering on. In this photo, shot on June 5, 2009 in Goshen County, Wyoming, a wall cloud begins to put down a wide, lowering funnel. In the foreground, Phil Berg's Vortex 2 Probe Truck is parked alongside the road -- the guy on the left is a freelance writer for New Scientist. This funnel touched the ground around 30 seconds after this was shot and remained on the ground until it overran the location this photo was shot from.

Scanning

2009-07-25T22:58:00.002-05:00

Today's shot is of the Doppler on Wheels truck DOW 6 (owned by the Center for Severe Weather Research) scanning a developing supercell west of Dodge City, Kansas, June 9, 2009. I've posted pictures of this storm here previously -- finding this storm was a result of some truly gifted forecasting done by the Vortex 2 steering committee. While this storm never put down a tornado, it's was easily one of the most photogenic storms of the entire Vortex 2 mission.

Thunderbanger over Lincoln Last Night

2009-07-25T13:57:00.003-05:00

A nice little thunderbanger went over Lincoln last night. This is kind of a mundane photo, as they go -- but seeing as I don't do much lightning photography, it's worth posting. I've got to learn more about taking good lightning pics. Shot this from atop a parking garage near the Journal Star.

What the...

2009-07-23T12:17:00.002-05:00

One of the most amusing aspects of Vortex 2 was the general public's reaction to first seeing Sean Casey's Tornado Intercept Vehicle 2. It's big, it's completely surrounded with steel armor, it's kevlar lined, it has bulletproof glass, it has pneumatic stakes that shoot into the ground to anchor it down -- it is, in a word, enigmatic. Thus, your average person seeing it cruising down the interstate or out on some dusty road or, in this case, parked in front of a Village Inn in Salina, Kansas, will stop, and pause, and stare, and give it a look something akin to the look that a cat would give to a purring dog.

Wind, Rain, Sleet, or Hail

2009-07-19T21:52:00.002-05:00

Today's photo is a bit of a snapshot. To picture the scene, imagine that you'd just successfully intercepted the first tornado of the year after almost a month of driving and driving and driving and failing and failing and failing. Not only that, but you'd managed to drop weather instrumentation in front of the tornado -- so much weather instrumentation that this tornado is now the most studied tornado in the history of humankind. Imagine you'd done all this, then floored it south down the highway, narrowly missing getting struck by the tornado. Now the tornado has passed. You've returned to pick up your tornado instrumentation. You've done it.

This is the scene: June 5, 2009, Goshen County Wyoming. From left to right, Chris Bowman, Andrew Arnold, and Matt Rydzik of Project Vortex 2 are checking and preparing to retrieve their tornado pod -- which likely took a direct hit from a tornado. Chris, on the left, has found a nice treasure -- a tennisball-sized piece of hail. If these three guys look elated, it's because they are.

Science is Awesome

2009-07-18T14:32:00.002-05:00

This is another photo of weather instrumentation set up in the path of a tornado in Goshen County, Wyoming, June 5, 2009. This picture was taken at more or less "Ground Zero" -- about 90 seconds after this photo was taken, the tornado in the distance passed almost directly over this spot. I was gone by then. :) I can't decide if I like this version of the shot more than this version. The latter I've punted off to Getty Images.

It was kind of amazing to see how quickly everyone was able to set up and get out of harm's way, especially considering the "traffic jam" that ensued. Imagine 20+ vehicles all trying to pull off of the shoulder of a small highway to head south at the same time with less than 2 minutes before a tornado runs them over -- it was a fairly white-knuckle moment.

Mammatus

2009-07-11T12:36:00.002-05:00

Today's photo is of a cloud phenomenon that is very familiar to people who live on the great plains and the midwest -- Mammatus. In the foreground are the weather instrumentation of one of Vortex 2's probe vehicles. The instrument at middle measures dewpoint and temperature.

This was shot in western Kansas on June 10, 2009, after the probe vehicles pulled off the road into a small gravel lot, waiting for instructions. Eventually they were ordered to start running transects -- basically, 3 mile runs back and forth through the storm environment, collecting data the entire way. Later on this data will be fed into computer models (along with data from the radar units, etc.) and science will happen.

This was my last day on the Vortex chase -- a bittersweet end to a long journey. Bitter because chasing storms amazes me, but sweet because I was coming back to my wife and my life in Nebraska, which I'd take over chasing storms any day.

Mothership

2009-07-06T20:04:00.002-05:00

Today's photo was taken on June 9, 2009 (and is the same storm as the previous two photos.) This storm was a happy surprise, given the relatively low instability in the atmosphere. As Erik Rasmussen put it the next morning, "I'm beginning to think that CAPE (i.e., instability) is not the key ingredient in supercells."

Vortex 2 arrived on this storm fairly early, positioned, and then watched the storm develop and move directly towards us. As a chaser, I don't usually allow the mesocyclone (the actual rotating part of the storm) to go directly over my head, lest a tornado suddenly drop on top of me. These guys did it all the time, though, since they had enough radar trucks to ensure that it was safe -- and this storm was no exception. I sat there with the probe trucks, watching this beautiful storm slide closer and closer, until it was finally overhead. At that point, everyone repositioned to the east.

LP

2009-07-03T23:08:00.004-05:00

Today's photo is of a LP (or "Low Precipitation") supercell on June 9, 2009, near Dodge City, Kansas, This is a storm that started out like a classic supercell before transitioning into this beautiful LP. At frame center, you can see the inflow base with slight lowering. To the right, you can see a small precipitation core quite far from the updraft base. Just beautiful structure. While I don't have an special insight into the science end of Vortex 2, I imagine that it was good that they had a chance to scan and observe this storm, seeing as it transitioned from a classic to an LP, and that seems (to me) to be an interesting thing to collect data on.

Needle in the Haystack

2009-06-30T19:20:00.003-05:00

Click photo to supersize

Today's photo is a panoramic stitch from a beautiful supercell near Dodge City, Kansas, June 9, 2009. This storm was truly a diamond in the rough on what was supposed to be a crazy day of chasing in eastern Kansas. The steering committee of V2 quickly decided that the setup in eastern Kansas wasn't going to pan out, so they booked west into what most chasers would have called a "crap setup" relying on nothing more than a very educated guess by their forcasters. Result? They found one of the most photogenic storms of the day. While this never produced a tornado, it was easily one of the prettiest storms I shot in 2009, eventually transitioning into an LP supercell.

The original file is around 10,000 pixels wide.

Whoa! A Laptop!

2009-06-29T16:21:00.004-05:00

This picture cracks me up. This guy probably has a perfectly legit reason to take a picture of his laptop (he's part of Vortex 2, a two year science mission into studying tornadoes), but there's something hilarious about the juxtaposition of the beautiful mayhem behind him. This photo compliments yesterday's shot -- it's the same storm at roughly the same time. You can't ask for better lighting than this!

*edit* A commenter claims this is a PR person for Lenovo, which is quite possible, since Lenovo supplied V2 with a good deal of kit and sent a rep to see how things were going. If this is a Lenovo PR guy, then that's an awesome ending to this story -- I guess that's definately a legit reason to take a picture of your laptop in a thunderstorm!