Tag Archives: #Canada

Announcements, photography, Rail transit marathon, Tips and Technique

Rare Photo or Missed Opportunity?

In May 1985, I was on the last leg of a two-week railroad trip.

I’d used up most of my film making photos of trains at a variety of destinations and stopovers from Atlanta, to Cumberland, Chicago and Toronto.

On this final bright morning, I rolled by the action at Dorval in suburban Montreal.

Although I still had a few frames of 120 black & white film left in my father’s Rolleiflex, along with some Kodachrome 64 loaded in my Leica 3A, I opted to make this image on 35mm black & white film using a spare Leica fitted with an old Elmar lens with antiquated coatings. While sharp, the lens was poorly suited to modern image-making. Complicating matters, I did a poor job processing the film.

My results were flat, grainy, and uninspired. I wish I’d used the tools at hand to make a better photograph of this VIA Rail LRC—an MLW-powered tilting train, the likes of which I’m unlikely ever to see again.

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Announcements, photography, Rail transit marathon, Tips and Technique

Glinty Rolling Meet in Toronto

On a very frosty morning in February 2010, I visited Toronto with photographers Pat Yough and Chris Guss.

We braved the Arctic-chill on the four-track line near Sunnyside, west of Toronto Union Station.

Shortly after sunrise, using my Canon EOS-3 with a telephoto lens, I exposed this Fujichrome slide of an eastward VIA Rail LRC train meeting an outbound GO Transit commuter train.

I scanned this slide the other day using a Nikon LS-5000 slide scanner and processed the Tif file using Adobe Lightroom.

Below is the unprocessed scan and the processed version of the same image, plus the Adobe Lightroom work window to show the changes that I made.

Scaled but otherwise unmodified scan of an original Fujichrome slide.
This is the same image as above following a range of adjustments to level, contrast and exposure aimed at improving the appearance of the image and maximize the data in the scan. This was scaled following post processing.
Screen shot of the Adobe Lightroom work window showing the slider controls used to adjust the scanned slide.

Tracking the Light Posts Daily!

Announcements, photography, Rail transit marathon, Tips and Technique

VIA Rail Sunset

I’ve been reviewing and scanning slides that I made on a trip to Quebec in October 2004. While a few of these photos have appeared in my books, most have sat for more than 20 years unattended and unedited.

This slide caught my eye. It shows a westward VIA Rail train west of Coteau, Quebec on the Canadian National. This was a trailing shot that I exposed on Fujichrome using my old Contax G2 rangefinder.

Comcolor in Springfield, Mass., processed the film. and I scanned the slide yesterday using a Nikon Coolscan 5000 (LS-5000) powered by Vuescan 9.8.42.05 software, then made final adjustments using Adobe Lightroom.

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Classic Kodachrome—VIA Rail RDCs at Dorval, Quebec.

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In August 1984, I was on a big solo rail adventure. Among the places I visited by train was Montreal.

My friend Brandon Delaney had recommended Dorval as a place to watch trains. Here, double-track Canadian Pacific and Canadian National mainlines ran parallel to each other and there was a continuous parade of freight and passenger trains.

On August 14th, I traveled out on commuter train from Windsor Station and spent several hours soaking up the action.

Among the trains I photographed was this eastbound VIA RDC set on the CN heading for Central Station.

I’d positioned myself where the codelines crossed from the north-side to the south-side of CN’s line. This was my clever compositional trick that makes for a more interesting photograph by focusing the eye toward a secondary horizon.

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