Shooting Steam

This past weekend, I shot the Southern Railway 2-8-0 #630 at the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum in Chattanooga. It was only the second time I had seen this steam engine at work. The first time had been in April of 2013 when Norfolk Southern brought her over to run steam trips out of Spencer, North Carolina for a weekend. The steam bug is biting me hard now that the old Norfolk & Western #611 is in Spencer getting rady to ride the rails again. The 611 and sister unit #1218 were main stays of railroad excursions in the 80s and 90s as I was first getting into trains and railfanning, but I somehow managed to miss every single trip, including those in my own backyard. (No internet yet. Now I know when someone sneezes in the shop near the 611.) The 630 and fellow Southern` survivor 4501 were also on the main line back then, but by the time I got into serious railfanning, all four were back on display in various museums. I spent a lot of years kicking myself for not shooting steam back then.

The best hope was always for the Tennessee Valley Railroad Museum to get the 630 or 4501 bask out. The 630 came first and that was nice. The 4501 just got back on the rails this year, too. I saw and shot her in Chattanooga over the weekend. But the stars of the show were always the N&W engines. Some people liked one better than the other. I believe most folks prefer the streamlined 611. I was always partial to the big 1218, but was very happy when it was announced that one of these were going to be rebuilt. The people who know steam engines said the 611 was closer to being ready. It would take less time and less money to get steaming again. Buzz out of Spencer say she's halfway there and while there are no publicly announced plans, I suspect she will come out of retirement next year.

Shooting steam trains is a bit harder than regular freight trains with diesel power. You generally want rods down, so there's a matter of timing with that. If the engine is really putting out a good plume of smoke, you have to ask if you want the smoke to trail off or can you crop the plume off and still have a good photograph? Do you want contemporary aspects in the shot? There was no way NOT to shoot the parking lot in this shot, so it became a chronicle of an old steam engine in the modern day



The shot works because of the modern cars and the folks dressed in 2014 garb with their digital cameras. Then there was this shot. I initially was not pleased with the location. I knew it was going to be a straight on shot with no scenery other than trees in the background. I almost left to find another spot, but then there was the train whistle in the background and I had to stay.



It turned out to be my favorite shot of the day for all the reasons I just listed. It's just a train and some trees. If you get past the fact that it was taken with a modern DSLR, there's nothing to say that it could not have been taken in 1914 instead. And then there was the plume of smoke. Things just worked out really well in this shot. As I was processing it, a question arose: color or black and white? I did both versions, but ultimately chose the color version. The green really pops out against the black of the steam engine and the plume of smoke.

But black and white really goes with steam engines. it makes you think of the days before digital photography when Mr. Link was out and about and others documented a fascinating time in the history of the nation. Such was the case with the shot from tis past weekend as the #630 came back into the station. I processed my 20X30 in color and then switched to B&W. The B&W seemed to fit here better than color initially. You have to get by the Nike swoosh on the guys shoes though as well as the fast food cups. But at a quick glance, it was another shot that could have been taken early last century --



So this was the version I initially loaded to FAA as well as the train photography site, Railpictures. Then a few nights later, I opened the color version --



I like it, too. The lighting was a little subdued that day. It wasn't backlit exactly, but it wasn't full on sun either giving it a different look than the shot above it. What will others prefer? There's a case to be made for both shots. This time, I put them both on FAA.

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