It’s that time of year again. The setting sun is at a nice angle for reflective glint at Jefferson Drive in Lancaster, Pa. With the smoke from Canadian wildfires continuing to tint the setting sun, I thought I’d try a 200mm view of Amtrak Keystone 658 on its eastward journey.
In post processing, I made a variety of minor adjustments to shadows, highlights, saturation and contrast to improve the overall appearance of the photo.
Below are two images in my sequence. Both received the same adjustments.
During the early summer, the evening sun sets north of Amtrak’s Harrisburg Line. The combination of the angle of light and pollution lingering in the western sky makes for some excellent evening glint.
We paused at our usual place at Jefferson Drive in Greenfield, east of downtown Lancaster, Pa., and here I caught Amtrak’s westward Keystone train 653 that was running just a few minutes behind the advertised time.
I made a series of NEF RAW files using my Nikon Z7-II with the 24-70mm lens set at 70mm.
Below is a comparison between post-processed files.
The top reflects the NEF RAW file before Adobe Lightroom adjustment and correction; the next is the same NEF file following Lightroom adjustments to lighten shadows, control contrast, and correct for color; the second to last photo is the same image-file converted into a DNG using PureRaw and then adjusted using Lightroom. The last image is a screenshot of the Lightroom work window of the DNG conversion following processing corrections which shows the position of Lightroom slider controls.
You tell me: can you see the difference in processing?
NEF RAW file prior to adjustment and correction.NEF RAW file following Lightroom adjustment and correction; notice the effect on shadow areas and changes to the sky.NEF RAW file converted into a DNG using PureRaw and then adjusted using LightroomAdobe Lightroom work-window showing the postions of adjustment slider controls reflecting the corrections and changes to the converted DNG file.
Yesterday’s post featured the Middletown & Hummelstown, a classic shortline that connects its namesake Pennsylvania towns.
Over the last 18 years, I’ve paid more than a dozen visits to Middletown. However until last Sunday I hadn’t visited Hummelstown.
[That’s not precisely accurate. Back in 1992, I traveled through Hummelstown by rail on the way to Pittsburgh. I recall passing the nearby Hershey plant.]
Kris had suggested that we take a drive to see if we could find a train on the move.
As we drove into Hummelstown for our first visit, we heard a distant horn sounding for a crossing. We made our way to the tracks, arriving in time to spot the headlights of an eastward Norfolk Southern double-stack container freight. Evening sun made for a nicely glinting silhoette. Talk about lucky!
I reached for my Nikon Z6 with 70-200mm zoom and exposed a series of photos.
In post-processing, I cropped the distant image. Below are three versions of the distant view plus a closer image.
Full-frame without cropping.Same image as above cropped to emphasize horizontal elements. The M&H track is at the left.This is the same file with a few adjustements to contrast and exposure, plus cropping to emphasize vertical elements.Closer view of the same train at Hummelstown.
I exposed this Kodachrome 25 slide on February 25, 1995 at Highlands, Illinois, on the famous Burlington triple-track raceway.
Amtrak No. 6, the eastward California Zephyr, was on its final lap to reach Chicago Union Station.
I was working with my old Nikon F3T fitted with an f4.0 200mm lens. The secret to this photo was my notebook, which I used as a lens shade to control flare, thus making the glint effect more dramatic.
Another key element of the image was my choice of focus, which I set on the signal bridge, which is the secondary subject and a important part of the composition.
I scanned the slide using a Nikon LS5000 slide scanner.
Working with my Z6 with AF Nikkor 35mm f2.0/D attached via a Nikon FTZ adaptor, I made this imag sequence of Amtrak Keystone 618 racing eastward at Jefferson Drive in Lancaster, PA.
I timed my arrival just a minute ahead of the train.
My objective was to see how the traditional 35mm lens would handle the glinting sunset on my Z-series digital camera. I adjusted my exposure manually (aiming for overall underexposure to better capture the effects of the bright sun), then made changes to the camera’s NEF RAW files in post processing to make for overall appealing photographs.
Reviewing my slides from the mid-2000s, I find that 2006 was an unusually productive year for me. My techniques and equipment had reached a peak, while my varied subjects resulted a wealth of interesting images.
Consider this Fujichrome slide exposed near Branford, Connecticut in February 2006.
A westward Shore Line East commuter train caught the glint of the sun a few minutes before sunset. The low winter evening sun tinted with particulates from pollution along I-95 combined with crisp winter air to create a rich quality of light.
I scanned the slide last night at high resolution and made a few minor adjustment using Adobe Lightroom to improve the dynamic range of the scan.
In August 2006, Denis McCabe and I made an epic tour of Poland by road. Over the course of about two weeks we drove across the country in a rented Opel Astra.
On the evening of 22 August, we photographed this PKP (Polish Railways) SU45 diesel accelerating away from the station at Zwierzyn.
I made this view on Fujichrome with a Nikon F3 with 180mm f2.8 lens.
The glint of the evening sun illuminated the train and the sunflowers in the foreground.
This was among hundreds of my Polish slides that had been stored in Ireland.
I made these glint images looking west from the Railfan’s Overlook at Cassandra, Pennsylvania toward the November evening sunset.
The trick to successful glint images is correctly exposing for the highlights in order to retain sufficient detail.
Another trick is to select a ‘daylight’ white balance, rather than using an automatic white balance setting.
Westward Norfolk Southern intermodal train passes Cassandra, Pennsylvania on the West Slope of the former Pennsylvania Railroad Main Line grade over the Allegheny Divide.Helpers at the back of a westbound double stack train.
In 1997, I still kept one camera loaded with Kodachrome 25.
At the end the day on August 6th during a visit to Vermont, Mike Gardner and I paused at the Bellows Falls station for a few photos.
Working with a Nikon F3T, a 24mm Nikkor wideangle lens, I made this Kodachrome slide of the setting sun reflecting off the rails of the diamond where Green Mountain Railroad crossed New England Central.
There are certain types of lighting siutation where Kodachrome really shined! And this is one of the them.
In the 1990s, I chased the glint with Kodachrome in my cameras.
Sometimes on the remote chance of getting a one in a 10,000 shot, I’d set up on some lightly used section of track in the golden hour on the off chance that I’d be rewarded.
My chances were better than the lottery
Sometimes I got lucky.
Last Saturday, September 26, 2020, I was driving around western Maine with Kris Sabbatino. We stopped near Bethel to get bottles of water at a convenience store. Ahead of me in line was a woman who spent $81 on a six pack of beer and lottery tickets.
Personally, I feel that lottery tickets are a waste of money. Although my grandfather had phenomenal luck with cards and lottery tickets and sometimes won.
Instead of spending money on the lottery, we took a slight detour to the old Grand Trunk tracks. This is now Genesee & Wyoming’s St. Lawrence & Atlantic. Operations are infrequent and largely nocturnal. The number of daylight trains through Bethel in a year can be counted on one hand. This year I’ve been aware of only three.
Despite these remote odds, I set up in the glint light and waited for a few minutes.
I was only rewarded with this sunset view of empty tracks. Yet my odds of success were far better than the lottery and I saved money on the tickets.
Exposed digitally using a FujiFilm XT1 fitted with 90mm prime telephoto.
We were visiting the California Tehachapis four years ago. After more than two decades absence, it was my second trip there in as many weeks.
At sunset, I positioned myself at the famous Bealville grade crossing, where I photographed a passing Union Pacific intermodal train (historically on Southern Pacific this would have been an eastward train, but my notes from the day indicate that it was a ‘southbound’.)
Working with my FujiFilm XT1, I made a series of photos. Two variations of one of the head on views are presented here. One is the in-camera Jpg, the other is an adjusted image the I made in Lightroom from the Fuji RAW file.
In camera JPG, scaled for internet presentation. Adjusted RAW file; contrast and color balance was altered to improve the appearance of the image.
The last image is a trailing view showing the signal and grade crossing gates.
My monthly column in September 2020 Trains Magazine features a photo that I made near this same crossing.
