Lately, I’ve been scouring my archives for images of signal towers for my next book. Among the photographs that surfaced was this seriously underexposed image of a westbound Guilford freight on the Boston & Maine passing the disused signal tower at Johnsonville, New York.

I was a senior in high school when my father lent me his 1960-vintage Rolleiflex Model T, which I loaded with 120 Ektachrome. My exposures were less than ideal, and this image was among the dark transparencies that resulted.

Previously on Tracking the Light, I detailed my methodology for recovering some of the other photographs from this unfortunate roll of film. See: https://briansolomon.com/trackingthelight/boston-working-with-some-underexposed-photos/.

I’ve applied a similar strategy to improving this photograph.

What I like about this image is the way I balanced the composition to show the abandoned right-of-way to the left of the tower. This was the old Troy & Boston route, dating from the 1850s, which later became part of the Fitchburg Railroad before ultimately being absorbed into the expanding Boston & Maine network. The line on the right served as the B&M’s main line to Mechanicville and Rotterdam Junction, New York.

Below are three versions of the same image. The top is the original, unmodified dark transparency. The two lower versions demonstrate different degrees of lightening, color correction, and contrast adjustment.

I don’t know if this view will make the book, but working on it brought back memories from long ago.

Tracking the Light looks back at old photographs!