Clear autumn mornings are one of my favorite times to make photographs.
The other day, everything came together: the weather was perfect, and Norfolk Southern’s New Holland Branch local was right on time. This featured classic EMD diesels back to back, and I had just enough time to get into position at Jefferson Drive to catch the train in lush setting.
I made this sequence of photos as the train squealed through the curve on its way toward New Holland, Pennsylvania.
Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom set to 46mm; f5.0 1/1000th sec, ISO 200.Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom set to 24mm; f5.0 1/800th sec, ISO 200.Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom set to 30mm; f5.0 1/800th sec, ISO 200.Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm Z-series zoom set to 32mm; f5.0 1/800th sec, ISO 200.
Two weeks ago, Reading & Northern’s Class T-1 4-8-4 2102 was the star attraction that captured most of the pixels that day.
I think back to the photos my dad made of a Reading Iron Horse Ramble led by a T-1 back in 1959. This was assisted by a pair of Reading Company Baldwin diesels. The T-1 is still with us. The Baldwins have been gone for a half century.
So, in another 60 years, I’ll bet 2102 is still around, but how about the GP38-2s that were also in excursion service that day.
There was a time when a GP38-2 was just about as common as diesels get. I hardly paid them any notice at all. But these days, some of those GP38-2s are now a half century old.
I made a fair few photos of Reading & Northern’s GP38-2s in between bursts of pixels of T-1 2102. Here are a few for your consideration.
The other day on a brief visit to Palmer, Massachusetts,Kris and I paused for a minute to make a photo of this Buffalo & Pittsburgh GP38-2 at the New England Central’s former Central Vermont yard. (Both NECR and B&P are part of the Genessee & Wyoming family.)
I thought of the countless photos that I’ve made of locomotives here over the last 45 years. Yet, I had never seen this locomotive here before. (Or certainly not in its current guise anyway.)
I made the image toward the end of daylight. Rich winter light graced the late afternoon sky, while the locomotive was largely bathed in shadow.
Lumix LX7 photo. I arranged my composition to show more than just the locomotive, but also feature the road, yard tracks, freight cars, and of course the clouds. To minimize the effects of some distracting glint on therighthand number board on the locomotive, I took the photo from a relatively low angle.
To make for a more pleasing image, I balanced the highlights and shadows and made adjustments to color temperature and contrast using Adobe Lightroom. The Sky Mask tool sampled this work. I felt my initial edit was a bit heavy handed so I toned it down a bit for presentation here.
