Storm on Lake Balaton

Balaton Lake is a very popular summer destination in Hungary. It’s one of the largest lakes in Europe and summer storms can create some amazing weather conditions especially at sunset. This photo of approaching thunderstorm clouds was taken just after sunset and only just a few minutes before the rain started to pour.

Post processing

This is a single exposure and a simple composition showing the pedal-boats which is a very typical scene you see everywhere around Balaton. The focus of this photo was to capture the stormy clouds and the light of the setting sun with the waves produced by the strong wind.

The post-processing was quick and easy: first in Lightroom to adjust the white balance and increase the exposure with the shadows while reducing the highlights. This was needed to balance the strongly backlit scene.

Once in Photoshop, some of the colors needed to be adjusted: yellow shifted to orange, add more blue in the sky and add some extra contrast. The next step was to dodge and burn the waves and some of the clouds and finally remove some unwanted objects with the patch tool.

• Camera: Fuji X-T3
• Lens: Fuji 10-24 f4 @15.9mm f11
• Single exposure 1/10 secs