Archive for September, 2006

It’s about time I talked a bit about the photography gear I use.  While I believe its not the gear that makes the photograph, a quality body and lenses do help with ensuring the technical aspects of the image are the best they can be.  With that in mind, here’s what I carry…

My camera body is a 8 mega pixel Canon EOS-20D DSLR.  I purchased it in February of 2005 after I watched the excellent quality photos produced by my FoamersNW cohorts and their DSLRs.  As is typical with the digital camera arena it was pretty much outdated 6 months to a year after purchase, but balancing budget and quality I feel like it will serve me well for a solid 5 years.  I figure by then the ‘gotta have a new one bug’ will bite.

Again, learning from my FoamersNW cohorts I chose to take the extra time and save up my money to purchase good quality lenses.  I read lots of reviews and opinions and came to the conclusion that if I spent the extra money on a couple of quality zoom lenses I would be very satisfied with the quality of the photos and I would be able to retain the zoom feature that seems to work well for railfanning.

The first lens I decided on is the EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS.  I don’t know exactly where to start with my comments on this lens because honestly it does everything I ask it to do and the images are consistently outstanding technically.  It is a workhorse that retains excellent quality throughout the zoom and aperture ranges.  The trade off here is weight, to obtain f/2.8 there is a lot of glass in this lens which weighs in at 3.5 lbs.

To complete my zoom range I purchased the EF 24-70mm f/2.8L.  At the time I was planning to purchase this lens the reviews were very mixed, some had superior results and some had images that were consistently soft.  About 6 months before I purchased Canon recalled all of the lenses and replaced them because of a manufacturing defect.  From that point on everyone raved about the lens with the only gripe remaining that the lens was soft around the edges at 24mm with the aperture wide open.  I purchased and have been consistently happy with it.  The color it produces is always vibrant and accurate and the photos are always sharp (I tend not to pixel peep, so the claims of softness in the corners has never been proven by me).

I wanted to extend my reach a bit without a big cash outlay so I purchased an EF 1.4X II Extender. Extenders are somewhat of a compromise but combined with the EF 70-200mm f/2.8L IS the results are outstanding.

One nice feature of the lenses I purchased is they all accept 77mm filters! Last spring I purchased a B+W Slim MRC Circular Polarizer.  The best use I found for this tool was during my visit to Stampede Pass.  At the high sun times the glare off the green trees was tremendous.  I used the polarizer to cut that a bit.  This polarizer works quite well and in most applications just using a bit of polarizing is sufficient.  Apply too much give you that “I have a polarizer on” look which I’m not a fan of.

To hold the whole kit I purchased a Tamrac Expedition 5 5575 backpack-style bag.  This bag is designed to hold a body with the 70-200mm f/28.L mounted down the center pocket.  All of the interior walls are Velcro mounted to the outside wall so this bag can be configured most any way to hold additional lens and accessories.  As I’ve added accessories or reconfigured to carry other items (like food when hiking) I found it quick and easy to rearrange.  A tripod can be strapped to the outside to form a complete kit.  I have used this bag on a couple of hiking trips (for railfanning and pleasure) and even though it weighed nearly 15 lbs. with camera, tripod, food, and water it was very easy on my back and shoulders. 

I use a Gitzo GT2530 Mountaineer 6X tripod with a Really Right Stuff BH-40 LRII head to support my camera.  The Gitzo is rock steady and doesn’t deflect under the weight of my gear.  The BH-40 is a fabulous piece of gear that is designed for the success of the photographer.  It is wholly capable of handling all my gear and does not go overboard with its size or weight.  Both the tripod and head operate very smoothly and make the business of camera support simple and easy. I also have Bogen leveling base for panoramas and a Cabellas window mount just in case I get really lazy and have to sit in the truck to take photos.

I of course have the usual extras in my bag, a remote release (Canon RS-80N3), extra memory cards (mostly SanDisk Extreme IV and Ultra II) and lens cleaning rags.  What I consider my best accessory purchase is an Op/Tech Pro Loop Strap for the camera.  This strap is quite wide, made of foam rubber and has several elastic pieces around the neck area to absorb shock.  It literally turned my camera with 70-200mm f/2.8L mounted into a feather weight.  Its a bargain at just over $20. 

As time and budget permit I plan to purchase some items on my “wish list” which currently includes the parts for the tripod revamp project previously mentioned and an EF 16-35 f/2.8L II.

My big railfan trip for this year began by boarding Amtrak’s southbound Coast Starlight, Train #11, in Vancouver, WA on Saturday, September 16th. The train was scheduled to arrive into Vancouver shortly after 13:00, but since it was Amtrak, it was delayed in Seattle due to some last-minute maintenance and arrived almost an hour late to pick me up.

Service started out on a very positive note. While I was waiting for the train, one of the station agents (Caron) tracked me down to let me know that as the lone sleeping car passenger that I would board at a different part of the train than everyone else. As the train pulled into the station I noted that it had a Parlour car which would enhance my journey (not all of the Coast Starlight trainsets have a Parlour car due to Amtrak’s inability to maintain the fleet).

I boarded car 1130 and made my way to Roomette 9 on the upper level. As I put away my bags my attendant asked if I wanted lunch. I figured they’d be done serving by now but he told me they were expecting me. As the train departed the station and crossed the Columbia River, I walked to the diner and found myself the lone passenger in the car. I was quickly seated and ordered the Angus Beef Burger based on several positive recommendations I’d read on the web. I wasn’t disappointed… the burger was thick, made of real beef without fillers, and had great flavor. While I dined alone, the dining car staff discussed last night’s adventures in Seattle and speculated about where one of the servers had spent the night and why he wasn’t fully rested in the morning

Once I finished lunch I walked back to my room as we were arriving in Portland. The room was setup simply with two bottles of water. I noticed there was a timetable, route guide, and two Amtrak postcards. We departed Portland at 15:12 and I made my way to the Parlour Car for the wine tasting which is complimentary to first class (sleeping car) passengers on the Coast Starlight. We sampled three white wines and I enjoyed a nice conversation with a couple who were returning to their home in Santa Barbara after visiting family in the Portland area. Our Parlour car attendant Mahdee announced that he was doing double duty and also covering in the diner since the train was short one crew member. He was polite, cheerful, and always ready to serve. I suppose being a Parlour attendant is one of the better jobs on the train, but it’s always nice to see someone enjoying their job and providing good service.

The good service theme did not extend to my sleeper attendant. I returned to my room after the wine tasting, but he never came by to introduce himself or explain any of the features of the car. I’d been in a roomette several times before so I knew how things worked, but if someone was a first-time rider they would have been lost. Dinner on the Coast Starlight is by reservation, and I got one for 18:45.

Chris Guenzler, who has ridden over 950,000 miles on passenger trains, says his number one tip for train riders is that “Every trip is an adventure.” With that in mind, we came to a stop in the siding at Clackamas. After sitting for a few minutes, the conductor announced we were being held due to a boulder which had fallen onto the tracks ahead at Oregon City. We encountered about an hour and fifteen minutes of delay due to the boulder before continuing south.

As I listened to my scanner in my room, I realized I’d forgotten my Altamont Press Northwest Region timetable, but fortunately I had one of Freadman’s Fog Charts which told me everything I needed to know about the territory. I took in my surroundings and noticed I was in Superliner sleeper #32088 which had been refurbished at Beech Grove to feature new blue upholstery. Using the restroom, I noted that the faucent seems to have been calmed down during the rehab. The Superliner bathroom faucets are generally known for shooting water out so fast that you manage to wet your pants as you attempt to wash your hands… this one was much calmer.

The lower level of the Pacific Parlour Cars feature a theater; around 17:15 Mahdee announced he was starting “RV” for anyone who wanted to watch. I hung out in my room while we made a 5-minute station stop, departing Salem at 17:40. There was a brief moment of humor as I overheard the conductor say that he worked for Enron before he hired on with the UP. I wonder if that was a good thing or bad thing?

We departed Albany at 18:12 and made our way south. Dinner reservations were running close to on time and I was in the diner while we got held just north of the Eugene depot due to signal problems for about 20 minutes. For dinner I had the Lamb Shank which was excellent. The meat literally fell off the bone and the flavor was very tasty. Dessert was a piece of Mississippi Mud cake. While eating we made an abbreviated Eugene stop from 19:37 until 19:46.

After dinner I played three games of cribbage in the Parlour car with an older gentleman also traveling to Sacramento. I play cribbage occasionally and wouldn’t consider myself a pro by any means. This man plays daily with several of his retired friends and is a card-holding member of the American Cribbage Congress. I beat him all three games. As I made my way to my roomette, I noted we were running a little over two hours behind schedule, and asked my attendant for an 0615 wake up. Laying in bed on the east slope of the Cascades I watched the stars outside my window as we raced south. We made it to Chemult around 22:45. I then fell asleep, waking up only once during the night which happened to be wherever we met the northbound Coast Starlight #14. I didn’t note the time.

I woke up on my own as we stopped for a freight meet and I noticed it was daylight. Looking at my watch I saw it was past my wake up time and was getting close to 06:30. Yet another missed service opportunity for my attendant. I got dressed and as I was putting things in order the conductor walked by. I asked about our location and was told we’d be in Chico in about 20 minutes.

I went to the Parlour car and found several folks gathered since the diner hadn’t yet opened. I enjoyed some juice and a muffin while watching the agricultural scenery drift by. Soon we were invited to the diner, where I ate breakfast with a couple heading home to San Francisco and a man from Seattle who works in a shop that produces barcodes on labels for various products. After a good breakfast of quiche, hash browns, and turkey sausage I returned to my (now made-up) room for the remainder of the journey to Sacramento.

About 07:45 the conductor made an announcement about our progress. We had an ETA to Sacramento of 09:10, and he reminded all connecting passengers for the California Zephyr to detrain in Sacramento. Because we were running late, folks who had connections to the earlier San Joaquin train could detrain and wait for the next one. We stayed fairly true to the estimated schedule and arrived into Sacramento just after 09:00. As I detrained, I chose not to tip my attendant. He failed to introduce himself, failed to explain any of the car features, and failed to wake me up. I will tip well for good service, but I won’t tip for a failure to do one’s job.

SP logo on a wooden bench in the depot

I made my way into the large waiting room of the former SP depot in Sacramento and had a couple hours to kill before my connecting train, the eastbound California Zephyr, would arrive.
(to be continued in a later post)

After my visit to Stampede Pass last month where I stumbled onto the original switchback route, I spent some time on the Internet looking for more information about that line’s history.  What I found cemented my belief that historic documentation AND access to that documentation is vital.

My initial Google searches on the switchbacks turned up some basic information on the history of the switchback route, but I wanted more.  I wanted a map, photos, and detailed dates of operation.  So I headed for the Northern Pacific Railway Historical Association (NPRHA) website.  Clicking the research button I was presented with a search box…I typed in Stampede.  Within moments I had located 3 relevant articles (including maps, photos, and documentation on the operation!) on the switchbacks from NPRHA’s publication The Mainstreeter.  A few more clicks and I had back issues of the magazine on their way to my door step.

When the materials arrived and I was thrilled with what I found.  The issue that focused on the switchbacks put into one concise article all of the facts from various NP documents, news articles, and previous publications.  There was some serious work put into the creation of the article including quite a bit of hiking and scouting to verify things like trestle locations (NP documents included some discrepancies which were cleared up during the scouting trip).  In my mind this was just one example of the consistently outstanding historical documentation from this group.

I tell you that story to make the point that we all need to be conscious of historic preservation as we go about our railfanning.  Though we may not think it is all that impressive today to see 3 orange Dash-9s on the point of a train changing crews at the Vancouver Yard office, someday having documentation of that act will be valuable historical knowledge.  I encourage all of us to carefully document our photographs and include some contextual information about why the subject we photographed is important in addition to the usual who, what, when, and where information.  I also believe we should make that information available for indexing and eventual searching like the NPRHA has (technology should aid us with this over time).  

Thank you NPRHA for reminding me of the importance of historic preservation!

I’m back from my trip to Colorado, Wyoming, and Nebraska for railfanning via Amtrak and a rental car. I have a few hundred photos to go through which will provide plenty of material for posts to come, but here’s a quick recap of the first thoughts that come to mind as I look at each day of my trip. These thoughts will be expanded over the next few weeks, with photos as well.

• Saturday the 16th: Coast Starlight. Late as usual, but not too late. Worst sleeper attendant service I’ve ever seen… in fact, the first time I have not tipped my attendant at all.
• Sunday the 17th: California Zephyr. Same menu as the Coast Starlight. Eastern Nevada == boring as hell.
• Monday the 18th: California Zephyr. Made it to within 20 miles of Denver before sitting there for over 2 hours due to UP track work, making me late enough to miss my $8 bus and requiring a $50 taxi instead.
• Tuesday the 19th: Initial impression of the Powder River Basin is that I got to the tracks in time to miss an empty going by. Never mind, I looked to the left and here comes a load!
• Wednesday the 20th: More Powder River Basin. Starting to get tired of coal trains. How come they don’t let the new SD70ACes lead trains very often?
• Thursday the 21st: Off to the Ponderosa Ranch at Crawford Hill. More coal trains. Lots of hiking for a fat guy like me. Lost a few pounds but shot over 100 frames.
• Friday the 22nd: Afternoon on the Moffat Line… and it’s snowing!
• Saturday the 23rd: More Moffat, more snow, more trains and a flight back home.

Aw what the heck, I guess I’ll include at least one photo with this post.  Here, a coal load with a pair of dirty Grinstein SD70MACs rounds the horseshoe curve on the Ponderosa Ranch as it climbs Crawford Hill.

After spending half of last Saturday following the Daylight up the Gorge I headed for BNSF’s Columbia River subdivision for several days.  The Columbia River sub lies between Wenatchee and Latah Jct. just west of Spokane.  The subdivision primarily follows Crab Creek from the Adrian area to just west of Edwall.  The creek provided the GN with a water level route and gentle curves between Wenatchee and Spokane.  Today, the BNSF takes advantage of this geography and engineering by routing much of its Seattle and Tacoma bound intermodal traffic over this line.

The most famous feature of this route is of course Trinidad hill.  Since that has been well covered elsewhere I’ll spare everyone and present some photos from places not regularly shown.

An eastbound Z train enters double track at Lamona.  The double track segment extends just over 20 miles from Lamona to Bluestem.

Back to single track east of Bluestem, S-TACLPC winds through an S curve as the track drops down grade to cross Crab Creek one last time.

SP 4449 leads an excursion east out of Vancouver, WA this morning.

I’ll be on vacation and offline for about a week, starting today.

A few days ago I received an e-mail from a reader:

…should I spend big bucks on prime lenses or get a workhorse zoom? Never really gave it much though until now. Do you really have to sacrifice portability for quality, and vice-versa?

Seems like a reasonable question to ask, and I figured I’d offer my thoughts publicly in response. I think the camera industry is at a point where the prime vs. zoom issue doesn’t really matter, and that the quality of the lens is more important than if it has moveable parts. I started out with cheap lenses, and while they produced adquate images, they weren’t quite up to par with some of the higher-quality glass that’s available.

A good quality zoom will produce a better image than a poor quality prime. I seem to be going the prime route with my latest lens purchases, but Steve (also posting on this site) uses good-quality zooms including the excellent Canon EF 70-200mm f/2.8L and gets excellent results.

For a great resource on evaluating lenses with some first-hand stories, I recommend the reviews section at FredMiranda.com

This Sunday, instead of heading to the Vancouver depot as usual, I proceeded directly to Felida (that’s about 6 miles north of Vancouver for the out of town folks).  I was glad I did because I was rewarded with 4 ex-BN SD40-2s leading a southbound BNSF manifest.  After meeting Amtrak 500 they departed southbound in a wonderful symphony of 645s!!  Man I miss solid consists the these fine locomotives. 

After a northbound UP passed Felida I headed north towards Ridgefield where I caught Amtrak 501, two northbound freights, and this southbound S-TACBPA leaning into the super elevation at Ridgefield South. 

A couple of Saturday’s ago I went to a railfan slide show (not a multi-media presentation) in Portland that was attended by many nationally and regionally known railfan photographers.  It seems in the past few years at these gatherings, a discussion of film vs. digital always breaks out.  This time was no different and the discussion this time made me more aware of one of the barriers to entry into the digital world.  One of the film photographers commented he’d attempted digital but has been less than impressed by the results.  The common theme was the images just didn’t look as good out of the camera as slides. 

I’ll agree with him on that point because DSLR produced digital images (as we know them today) need post processing.  I have to believe that this is the most complicated transition point for a film shooter who is used to the images arriving in a yellow box fit for showing. 

How to handle images after loading them onto the computer can be an adventure because unfortunately (or fortunately depending on your point of view) there is no single ‘perfect’ post processing workflow.  My film friends should not be frightened by this though because there is help available.  I have found three workflow tutorials that I return to over and over for guidance.  These are Workflow Guidelines on the Fred Miranda Post-processing & Printing forum and Luminous Landscape tutorials A Digital Workflow Primer and An Image Processing Workflow.  All three are written for the full version of Photoshop (6, 7, CS) so using a different tool requires adaptation, however the general concepts still apply.

These tutorials will probably not make new digital photographers experts overnight, but I hope they will help others improve their output like they helped me.

One last note on the film vs. digital discussion.  Most of the traditional film photographers agreed that digital will likely take over eventually. Until it becomes impossible for them to use film most agreed that they’ll be sticking to it for the foreseeable future.  In my opinion this is just fine as they are comfortable with the medium and they still produce long lasting quality images.

Next Saturday the 16th I’ll be leaving for my big railfan trip this year. I’ll be riding the Coast Starlight to Sacramento, then taking the California Zephyr east to Denver. From there I’m renting a car and driving up to the Powder River Basin for a few days. Then I’ll head back to Denver and have about a day and a half for the Moffat line before flying home the following Saturday.

If anyone has any Powder River / Moffat / Front Range / whatever tips or such and feels like throwing them my way, either post it as a comment or drop me an email.

As Aaron mentioned in his post he and I and a co-worker headed into the Gorge for the day Saturday.  Traffic was quite consistent with our longest duration between photos being an hour and 40 minutes.  Had the train we were waiting for not gone into emergency for a mysterious reason, our longest wait would have been around 1 hour.  In the end we were able to photograph 17 trains!  There was traffic on the south side of the river but since our goal was reconnaissance for the Daylight trip in a few weeks so we chose to stay on the north side the entire day.  Here’s my selections from the day:

Amtrak 27 running nearly an hour late briefly disturbs the fisherman on the Klickitat river as it roars across the bridge west of Lyle.

After meeting a westbound manifest a train bound for the Oregon Trunk departs from the North Dalles siding.

After dodging Amtrak 28 a westbound manifest winds through the S curve east of Home Valley.

On Saturday, Steve and I played tour guide for a coworker who wanted to scout out potential photo locations for his chase of the 4449 in a couple weeks.  It was a great opportunity to spend a day in the Columbia River Gorge.  The weather was in the mid-90s.  Unfortunately the area was very smoky/hazy due to several wildfires burning in central and eastern Oregon.  Here’s a few of my favorite photos from the day:

At Avery, we ran into Will Holloway of Iron Horse Amercia Video.  He was camped out and introduced himself once we rolled up and got out our cameras.  Here’s an eastbound manifest at Avery:

We saw a wide variety of power, and I think this was one of my favorite consists, westbound at Horsethief Lake:

A GEVO leads a grain train through one of the rock cuts at North Dalles:

And the last shot for now, a westbound loaded coal train bound for Centralia crosses the causeway just west of Lyle:

This is the third part of three postings of photos I shot while in Alaska in June 2005. These images were the basis for my show at GorgeRail 2006 titled “117 Miles of Beauty.” You can also see my photos from riding and chasing the railroad.

ARR herald on an old boxcar

That’s 1,526 days without an injury at the Anchorage Shops

A second life for this caboose

The Alaska Railroad was a partner in the Sea Life Center at Seward. This metal logo is several feet across.

Three of the four Budd RDC cars at the shops

Three old boxcars in Seward

That wraps up the assorted Alaska Railroad images.