Archive for June, 2006

If you’re a member over at Railroadforums.com - feel free to vote for my “Shortline Steam Times Three” photo in the current photo contest poll.

If you’re not a member, why not?

Subtitled: My Bus can Kick Your Streetcar’s Butt

There’s quite a spirited discussing going on in the comments over at Portland Transport on the post about the direction being planned for Portland’s future Eastside Streetcar.

A schedule to be effective July 1 was posted over on Trainorders, which includes the new fourth Portland-Seattle train:

http://www.trainorders.com/discussion/read.php?4,1174905

Over at DSLRBlog, there’s a post discussing When to Buy a New Camera. The case in point given is someone who purchased a high-end Nikon DSLR for about $5000 and is now disappointed they’ve released a new model… should he upgrade?

I’ve pondered a new camera body myself. I currently use a Canon EOS-300D which isn’t the newest kid on the block. Every time I think about it, I can’t come up with a good argument for upgrading. The pictures that come out of my camera are just fine, and are just as good as the day I bought it. Sure, a newer body would give me a few more pixels or a slightly larger buffer or another shot per second, but are those things really worth another $1,000? Not yet.

Every camera will be obsolete at some point. But what does that mean? Does it matter if the camera is “obsolete”? Will the fact that it’s obsolete prevent the camera from serving its purpose? No.

To me, determining when to buy a new camera isn’t that hard of a question to answer. One should purchase a new replacement camera when the set of new features becomes worth the re-investment price. If a new camera is only going to offer a small marginal improvement, then spending the money to buy something which is 90% the same as something one already owns doesn’t make much sense. That money could be spent more wisely on better glass or accessories which will outlive the camera body.

An eastbound UP stack train passes a few rural structures at Cobb, Idaho on 4/29/2006 as seen from across the Snake River.

Several months ago I was one of the founding members of RailroadPhotoEssays.com and I had high hopes for the site. The URL only tells part of the story. Sure, there’s photo essays, and that’s where ideally the “meat” of the site lies, but there’s also a lot of darn good single-shot photography that is posted for critique, and lately I am happy to report that the site has become much more active, with lots of interesting discussion about photo technique and the philosophy of photography.

If you haven’t yet checked out the site, head on over there and take a look around. Even if you don’t want to submit an essay, we’d love to have even more folks jump in on the photography conversations and critique.

I know I’m not getting rich taking pictures. It’s good to know I’m not alone…