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Classic Chrome—February 18, 1988

In 1988, while I was attending the Rochester Institute of Technology, I shared a rented apartment in Scottsville, New York.

Among the benefits of the apartment was that it was in earshot of the former Buffalo, Rochester & Pittsburgh line to Rochester, operated by Genesee & Wyoming start-up Rochester & Southern.

On the afternoon of February 18, 1988, the horn of the southward RS-1 (mixed through freight from Brooks Avenue Yard in Rochester to East Salamanca, New York) was sounding for a crossing. Track speed wasn’t very fast, so I had time to catch the train and follow it in the afternoon light.

Between Garbutt and P&L Junction, I made this view on Kodachrome 25 slide film of the leading locomotive, a former New York Central GP40.

A Kodachrome in Kodachrome light of a southward Rochester & Southern freight from Rochester, New York, the home of Kodak. A few days after exposure I sent the film to Kodak’s Rochester processing plant, which was returned to me later in the day.

This was among a group of slides that I rejected and sorted into a box labled ‘seconds and thirds’. I scanned it last week for presentation here.

Full frame Kodachrome slide, exposed using a Leica M2 with 50mm Summicron lens-February 18, 1988.

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Bad Chrome File: Buffalo, Rochester & Pittsburgh in Transition

On the evening of Easter Sunday 1988, I visited the old Buffalo, Rochester & Pittsburgh station and yard at East Salamanca, New York.

CSXT was still a relatively new railroad, and this southward freight from Buffalo featured former Baltimore & Ohio GP40/GP40-2s painted for CSXT component Chessie System but with CSXT sublettering.

CSXT was in the process of spinning off it’s former BR&P trunk to Genesee & Wyoming start up Buffalo & Pittsburgh. I was anticipating the change, but the sale was still several months away.

I made a series of Kodachrome 25 slides of the train changing crews at dusk using my Leica M2 with 50mm Summicron firmly mounted on a tripod. Unfortunately, I miscalculated the exposure and my slides are about one stop too dark. This one was made at f4 at ¼ second. 

Part of my problem was that my Sekonic Studio Deluxe lightmeter wasn’t accurate in low light. Another issue was that I didn’t compensate for reprocity failure, which was a characteristic of Kodachrome films in low light.

April 3, 1988. Kodachrome 25 exposed for 1/4 second at f4 with Leica M2 and f2.0 50mm lens.

I scanned this K25 slide with a Nikon LS-5000 scanner using VueScan software which enabled a multiple pass scan to maximize data capture of highlights and shadows. I imported the high-res (4000 dpi) scan into Lightroom and adjusted the file to compensate for underexposure.

File adjusted to compensate for under exposure.

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