Is this my least successful railway photo?

I exposed it a while back on a visit to Belgium.

Standing on a platform in suburban Brussels, I attempted a 90mm telephoto view of an outbound electric local train.

The weather dull, relatively dark and hazy, in other words the light was about as unappealing as it can get. Also it was early Spring, so the trees were leafless and the landscape bleak.

Suburban Brussels is not Tehachapi, or the Swiss Alps, or the Rhein Valley. If you say ‘so what?’, you misunderstand me.

It was not a great setting to begin with.

As the train approached one of the passengers on the platform drifted into my field of view, obscuring much of the scene as an out of focus blob. This resulted in the further complication of confusing the camera’s autofocus system at the last instant, which instead of honing in on the rapidly approaching train, sharpened a corner of platform instead.

Oh, and the train is adorned with graffiti tags.

So this image was pretty much a ‘fail’ on all counts, except possibly exposure. I seem to have got that about right.

Not every effort results in success. But we should learn from our mistakes, or at least laugh!

Tracking the Light Posts Daily!