The sunset, as it turned out, wasn’t doing anything all that spectacular. There were a few clouds in the sky, but we were not too impressed with the colors on this particular warm, late summer evening. I was able to capture your typical yellows, greys, and a few blues/purples; but nothing very impressive.

We decided to take a walk over to the Mr. Rogers Memorial on the North Shore to set up the tripods and capture a few night shots of the city from this vantage point. I snapped a few pictures of the sun setting over the North Shore on the walk, but again was only really able to capture the same old colors.

As we approached the Mr. Rogers Memorial, I couldn’t help but admire how nicely it frames the city, with our favorite friendly neighbor dutifully watching over our city. There was enough daylight yet over the city to capture a pretty view. Otherwise, we set up our tripods and I took a few shots trying to determine what I liked. You can start to see the glow of the city lights on the buildings, but the sky is still pretty bright.

However, the weather was about to surprise us…

What seemed like out of nowhere, clouds rolled in right over the city. We could see the quick storm front moving in as it darkened the city, yet when I turned around I saw a clear beautiful colored sky over the trees and stadiums. The sky over the city turned dark, then purple. Suddenly, we saw mother nature come alive with bright streaks of lightning over the city. This was exciting as we now had the opportunity to capture lightning bolts over the city.

To my chagrin, this was no simple task as it was luck of the draw as to whether or not you would be able to time the shutter perfectly when the ions in the sky decided to discharge to the ground. I was a bit jealous as Brandon was lucky enough to grab a few good shots of the lightning and I all seemed to be able to grab was clouds over the city. I will admit, those clouds were quite magnificent as they lit up a deep purple to white color when they were charging the lightning.

As the rain poured down on us, the moisture helped disperse the light to lead to some neat shots. Lucky for us, the Mr. Rogers Memorial provided shelter from the warm late summer storm.

Finally, my luck turned just as I thought the storm had passed over us and I was able to grab two to three bolts on “film” (eh hem, memory card).

After the rain subsided, the lightning and thunder rolled on passed and became a distant sound somewhere around the airport, undoubtedly disturbing some poor travelers’ plans. The sky cleared up and provided us an excellent canvas to grab some crisp night shots of the city from this vantage point.

It turned out to be quite an exciting night – much different than the slow boring sunset that evening began with.