History of my apparatus recording visual and sound effects of thunderstorms

A CANON-POWERSHOT SX500 IS is programmable, (Updating CHDK firmware, MDFB2013.lua script can make the camera react in 0.1 s to sudden movements), and makes the camera much easier to take daylight lightning photographs.

Bought the CANON-POWERSHOT SX500 IS, which has 30x optical zoom and 14 MP. I use it with the SAMSUNG WB150F on my second tripod simultanously. The SONY STEREO Dictaphone can recharge its NiMH batteries itself safely and the cameras do not require NiMH batteries, this means the VOLTCRAFT recharger only needs to be used in case of special conditions like charge refreshing, decreasing memory effect of the batteries.

Got the new SAMSUNG WB150F 14 MP camera. It can record videos in high definition but due to it's opportunities to manual settings, it will be used for photographing lightning with the KONICA MINOLTA DIMAGE Z10, the PANASONIC will be used mainly for taking videos.

I asked a more modern recharger to the accus for Christmas. This new VOLTCRAFT recharger increases the life of the batteries, and repairs the capacity of the old, weakened accus. In addition, I bought a head-mounted lamp as well.

The low quality MP4 recorder-player purchased in May of 2011 got replaced by a SONY ICD-UX512 stereo recorder dictaphone at Christmas. This dictaphone can record a 3 hours long piece of recording at 44100 KHz, 16 bits, stereo. The legacy from the MP4 Player is a 2 Gb sized micro SD card. I can store another 3 hours long audio recording on it. So the system became capable of storing 6 hours great-quality stereo recording.

The USB connector of the MEIZU MP3 player, which I was given for my birthday in 2006, has been destroyed, so the device became unusable. Therefore as the thunderstorm season was about to come, I temporary bought a MYAUDIO MP4 recorder-player. But the quality of the recording was lower than the MP3 player had, only 32000 KHz at 16 KHz, mono. And in some cases it recorded the sounds badly in rainstorms, so they unfortunately needed to be deleted.

I had opportunity to make a helping tool from a completely useless piece of metal used to be a cover sheet of my damaged computer power supply and some unused screws. This tool is capable of pushing the camera shutter button continuously. After that, I did not have to stand beyond the tripod set in the intensive lightning, it was enough to watch the camera recording photos and videos from a room. The risk of lightning bolts hitting me got reduced significantly. At the same time, the number of successful photos is increased as well.

For Christmas I got a PANASONIC LUMIX DMLC camera. The camera is able to record videos in 640 x 480 pixels. A video file has a maximum duration of 15 minutes. The sound quality is poor, 8000 KHz at 8 bits, mono, so the camera is unable to replace the MP3 player in recording audio. The camera has a resolution of 8 megapixels camera, which is a bit (2,5x) larger than the KONICA MINOLTA DIMAGE Z10 camera has, but has much less manual options, as the KONICA MINOLTA DIMAGE Z10 camera. So this camera can be only used for making videos.

I got a suchion-cupped stand from my grandmother, to which the MP3 player can be attached. The MP3 player became available to record much less distorted sounds instead of being on the windowsill. And the risk of damaging by the rain was also reduced.

The coin-cell battery of the KONICA MINOLTA DIMAGE Z10 camera got in 2005 (I assume it has a coin-cell battery inside) discharged. The settings I set on the machine is not memorized anymore, so I have to set up everything again after replacing batteries from the date and time to picture quality, due to factory defaults always be set after removing the battery (e.g., Flash on, fast shutter speed and poor image quality).

For my birthday, I got the MEIZU MP3 player, which is capable of recording in 44100 KHz, 16 bit, mono sound quality. The quality is excellent, but it was difficult to set up, so used this tool only from 2007. This tool completely replaced the GRUNDIG cassette recorder and its accessories, and the recording quality became much cleaner.

For Christmas, I got the camera named as KONICA MINOLTA DIMAGE Z10. It has the pixel resolution of 2048 x 1536. Both the shutter speed and the aperture can be set manually. The longest shutter speed lasts for 30 seconds. With the 8x optical zoom and the mentioned properties it replaced all the CANON camera and its components and in addition I did not have to wait for films to be developed and the risk of corrupted images reduced. There was only one problem with this new camera: the objective protective cap hadn?t got an attachment. So I needed to make one.

We move to a new place, from where there is a better view!

Damage caused by the DAEWOO radio CD recorder! It creased the tape inside while playing one of the high-quality thunder-sound and destroyed both the recording and the tape. All of the recordings added in that section will have bad quality. The recorder is currently operating in the kitchen as the radio.

I was given a PHILIPS external microphone for my birthday to the GRUNDIG tape recorder. The recording had much less distortion than the inbuilt microphone of the cassette recorder from that time. At the same time I got a DAEWOO CD-radio-tape player.

I got a teleobjective to the CANON SLR camera, the focal length could be freely set between 100 mm and 300 mm.

I was given a wide angle objective to my CANON SLR camera, which has a focal length of 28 mm. This meant better chance for the lightning appearing on the picture.

I was given a CANON SLR camera of course with a tripod. The objective of the camera can be replaced. A 50 mm focal lengthed objective was also a part of the apparatus. It made sharp and high-quality photographs.

I was given a GRUNDING cassette recorder in December of 1997 and I made the first published sample of thunder recording. The sound quality of the built-in microphone is a little distorted.