My recent family vacation led me nowhere near an active railroad, so instead I’ll throw something up that I found online. It’s an interesting video montage of the life of a conductor, set to, appropriately, a song titled “You Are A Conductor” by The Constantines. From the early-morning on-duty call to a bunch of cab ride footage, you’ll enjoy this:

Technorati Tags: railroad, conductor, youareaconductor, theconstantines, cabrides, videos

I haven’t posted any good railroad links around here lately, but I definitely want to share one with you.  I recently discovered FL9, a blog and photo site from Texas which features some great photos along with good writing.  Check it out!

Technorati Tags: railroad, railfanning, fl9, trains, photos

Lots of folks love to bash Railpictures.net.  Sure, the site’s claims of being “The best railroad photos on the ‘net” are perhaps a bit ego-centric, but the reality is that they host a lot of photos, and like most other photo repositories on the internet, some of the photos are pretty good.  If you check out the most popular photos and the People’s Choice winners, you probably won’t be disappointed.

A lot of photographers won’t submit work to their site because they don’t feel the accept/reject judging is done correctly.  My attitude: who cares?  Do I agree with all of their decisions?  Of course not. I know whether or not I like a photo.  If I post it to their site, and they like it as well, then I get more exposure for my work.  If they reject the photo (for whatever reason), then I haven’t lost anything, and perhaps their reason for rejection could spur some thought.

I’ve sold a few photos to magazines based on exposure on their site.  And now they have twice chosen one of my pictures as their “Photo of the Week” featured on the site homepage.

So while some folks sit back and complain, I’ll take the free publicity.

Technorati Tags: photos, pictures, photography, railpictures.net, railroad

As some of you know who have followed my photography, I have been branching out into more general photography and not just trains over the last year or so. I’m still taking railroad photos but have also started a new web project to share some of the things I’ve learned as I’ve grown as a photographer.

I call it Photoschooled.

The topics include general photography information, ideas on how to improve your photos, and digital image management including organization and online photo websites. Bookmark the site, subscribe to the RSS feed, and comment on what you see.

Technorati Tags: photography, photoschooled

Everyone does their own thing with the railfanning hobby.  I recently learned of someone with an interesting website offering downloadable train jigsaw puzzles.  The creator is now featuring one of my photos as one of the puzzles.

If you’re looking to kill some time with an online railroad game, check it out; it might be a good way to share the hobby with children.

Technorati Tags: trains, railroad, railfanning, puzzles, games, onlinegames