Tag Archives: #FujiFilm X-T1

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Amtrak at Prospect Park

In December 2014, Pat Yough lent me his FujiFilm XT1. At the time I was seriously considering this camera system.

We drove to Prospect Park near Philadelphia, Pa., where I put the camera through its paces. I wanted to see how it handled sunset situations.

Among the test photos I made was of this northward Amtrak train on the Northeast Corridor led by then-new Siemens ACS-64 Number 607.

Ultimately, I bought an XT-1, and I’ve been using one for more than 6 years.

This photo was adjusted from the camera RAW using Adobe Lightroom to manipulate shadow and highlight settings as well as fine adjustment to color temperature.

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photography, Tips and Technique

Cabbage Pan on the old Milwaukee Road

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In the mid-1930s, Milwaukee Road introduced its high-speed streamlined Hiawatha on its Chicago-Milwaukee-Twin Cities route where elegant purpose-built shrouded 4-4-2 and 4-6-4 Alco steam locomotives whisked trains along in excess of 110mph.

Today, Amtrak’s Hiawathas have Siemens Chargers on the Milwaukee end, and former F40PH Control-Cab/baggage cars, known as ‘Cabbages’ on the Chicago-end.

While Amtrak provides an excellent corridor service, today top speed is just 79mph.

I can’t help but think that as a nation we’ve lost the plot on this one.

We went from elegant, fast steam streamliners to this?

Panning my Fujifilm XT1 plus 27mm lens in parallel with Amtrak’s fast moving Hiawatha has allowed for the effect of speed and motion. ISO 200, 1/125thof a second. Note: that my shutter speed wasn’t especially slow.

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Tips and Technique

Sunrise at Worcester Union Station

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Autumn sunrise. No two are the same. The mix of clouds and particulates in the air make for endless mixtures of texture and color.

Last week I arrived in Worcester to take the 7am MBTA train to Boston.

I made these sunrise views using my FujiFilm X-T1 with 12mm Zeiss Touit lens handheld.

Worcester Union Station: MBTA 011 with the 7am train to Boston.

Worcester Union Station.

December sunrise in Worcester, Massachusetts.

Working with the RAW files, I made some minor adjustments in Lightroom to balance highlights with shadows and tweak color balance.

The RAW file is not what your eye sees.

Where the in-camera Jpg uses a pre-profiled set of parameters in regards to color saturation, contrast etc. The digital RAW file represents the data as captured by the camera and is comparable to a film negative; it represents an intermediate step that requires adjustment and interpretation to produce a pleasing photograph.

I typically expose both a pre-set in-camera Jpg (often with one of Fuji’s digitally replicated film color profiles, such as Velvia) and a RAW file simultaneously.

 

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photography, Tips and Technique

Dublin Airport: Colourful Contemporary Jets with a September sky—Lots of Photos!

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A sunny September Saturday afternoon in Dublin; what better time to make a visit to the airport. Not to travel to distant cities, but simply to watch and photograph the parade of commercial aircraft.

Lots of different airlines make for a colourful parade of planes.

I used this as an opportunity to test my FujiFilm X-T1’s various auto-focus settings.

The ‘C’ (continuous) setting seemed to produce the sharpest results, but introduced a slight delay from time I pressed the shutter-button until the actual moment of exposure. I found the delay difficult, but so long as I could anticipate the delay I was able to work around it.

Another challenge was trying to keep the camera level while panning the rapidly moving planes.

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