Shows Dublin’s LUAS trams.
In recent weeks, two advertising trams have been working the LUAS Red Line in Dublin. Previously, I featured a view of the white TESCO tram.
In this post, I ofter a few view of the brightly adorned Lidl advertising tram.
This really stands out and distinguishes it from the multitude of LUAS Citidis trams on the Dublin network.
I made these photos with my Lumix LX7.
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Sunday’s Railway Preservation Society of Ireland excursion paused on Dublin’s Loop Line waiting for a clear signal to enter Connolly Station.
I had just exposed views of the train crossing the River Liffey.
(see Monday’s Tracking the Light; http://briansolomon.com/trackingthelight/2019/09/23/sunday-steam-charter-crosses-the-river-liffey/).
Photographer Jay Monaghan and I were walking toward Connolly to meet the train when this over and under scenario unfolded.
LUAS Red Line Tram in the TESCO supermarket wrap came around the bend having just made its stop at Bus Aras to present a rare juxtaposition with RPSI’s Cravens.
I made these photos with my Lumix LX7 before proceeding to Connolly to get steam locomotive number 4 arriving.
The lessons from this exercise:
1) Sometimes the most unusual photographic opportunities unfold when the sun is hiding behind the clouds.
2) Always have a camera ready for those unexpected moments.
3) Keep going, don’t give up, there’s might be another opportunity!
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A week ago, I had a some spare time in the Dublin city centre and the sun was bright, so working with my FujiFilm XT1 with 90mm prime telephoto, I exposed a series of photos of LUAS trams working the Red Line on Abbey Street.
This is a selection of my results.
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I was having a cup of tea and I made these views with my Lumix LX7 of a Dublin LUAS tram decorated for supermarket chain TESCO.
The tea wasn’t bad, it helps with the jet lag.
But tea lag (lack of tea), that can be serious!!
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Looking north on Dublin’s O’Connell Street, I exposed this black & white photograph in March 2019.
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Yesterday (Monday, 15 April 2019) I made these photographs of LUAS Tram 5003 working Green Line trackage in the Dublin City Centre using my Lumix LX7.
This is one is decorated for the Tesco supermarket chain and is one of four trams presently wearing colorful full-body advertising liveries.
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Tracking the Light is on ‘auto pilot’ while Brian is traveling.
Here’ the LUAS banana yellow advertising tram crosses the River Liffey in Dublin.
On the side of the car it says ‘click it’. Gosh, I’m glad I brought my Lumix!
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Last Friday (22 March 2019), Mark Healy and I met in the Dublin city centre to seek out an elusive tram, recently dressed in a yellow advertising livery.
A steady rain was falling by the time we found it.
I made these photos with my Lumix LX7. In post processing, I adjusted the camera RAW files using Lightroom to improve colour temperature, make the contrast more appealing, and restore texture to the afternoon sky.
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I exposed this pair of digital photos about a month ago of LUAS trams crossing the old cast iron Kingsbridge (Sean Heuston Bridge) at Dublin’s Heuston Station.
Soft and orange-tinted evening light made the interesting scene even nicer.
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Sunday morning 10 March 2019, I paid another visit to the old Midland Great Western terminus at Broadstone in Dublin.
You have to admit the name is cool. Broadstone just sounds like something substantial in a medieval way.
Anyway, this old Dublin railway terminal has served as a bus depot (garage) for decades, and in recent years has been nearly encircled by the new LUAS Green Line Cross City tram route.
Continued landscaping has much improved the grounds around the old railway station.
I made these photos using my Lumix LX7.
More soon!
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Sometimes there’s great photos to be made in the rain.
Exposed hand-held with my Lumix LX7 at Heuston Station in Dublin.
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A beautiful thing about Dublin on a Sunday morning is the relative lack of traffic.
Not so pretty is the rubbish, broken glass and other carnage that tends to litter the streets following a lively Saturday night.
To make the most of the scene on Westmoreland Street looking back toward at College Green, I used my FujiFilm XT1 with 90mm and made low angle view of a northward LUAS tram passing the 18thcentury façade of the Bank of Ireland (right).
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I made these views the other day on Beresford Place near Bus Aras in Dublin.
An outbound LUAS tram on the Red Line had stopped for traffic Gardner Street, while a southward DART suburban train rolled across the Loop Line Bridge on its way from Connolly Station to Tara Street.
This is the sort of common scene that is repeated hour after hour, day after day, and yet only rarely get recorded.
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Yesterday, I had one frame of film left in my Nikon F3.
I’d been exposing photos of Dublin’s North Side and I wanted to process the film before dinner.
I exposed this view of Heuston Station and the old Kingsbridge (now Sean Heuston Bridge) on frame 37.
The sky was impressive; dark blue with textured clouds rolling across it like a flowing tapestry.
To make the most of the usual light, I did a few tricky things.
I exposed the film for the sky and clouds with the intention of some non-standard chemical processing.
To make the most of the shadows with out roasting the highlights, I presoaked the film in a very dilute bath of Kodak HC110 at 75F for 6 minutes with very little agitation. Then, I drained the presoak solution and processed the film in Ilford ID11 mixed 1-1 with water at 68F for 7 minutes (considerably less than the recommended time).
The results were even better than I expected.
As the sunset on Dublin, Monday a week ago (15 October 2018), I used my FujiFilm X-T1 to expose several series of silhouettes as LUAS trams crossed the old Kingsbridge (now formally Sean Heuston Bridge) over the River Liffey.
My goal was to capture the rays of sun bursting through the windows of the tram cars.
I only had a few minutes where the sun was in the optimal position, and luckily LUAS was operating trams on short headways, so I had several opportunities.
My camera was set for ‘turbo flutter’ (continuous high or ‘ch’ on the left-hand dial) which exposes a rapid burst of images when pressing the shutter button.
By exposing for the sky and sun, I allowed the shadows to become an inky black. Using the smallest aperture (f22 on my 90mm lens) creates the sunburst effect while also allowing for better definition of the sun in the sky.
Yesterday, 29 September 2018, I made these views of a LUAS Green Line tram wearing the latest fully covered advertising livery as it worked up Dawson Street in Dublin on its way to Broombridge.
September often brings sunny days in Ireland, and yesterday was a fine afternoon to make a few photos.
This encounter with the colourful tram was fortuitous, rather than planned, as I was on a shopping mission and photography was a secondary activity.
All the images were exposed using my FujiFilm XT1 with 18-135mm zoom lens.
The Green Line Cross City extension cuts through College Green, one of Dublin’s most pictured intersections.
I made this view in August 2018 using my Canon EOS 3 with 40mm lens on Fuji Acros 100 black & white film.
This I processed by hand in a Paterson tank using Rodinal Special liquid developer concentrate mixed 1 to 31 with water for 3 minutes 45 second at 68F.
The negatives were scanned with an Epson V500 flatbed scanner, and contrast was nominally adjusted in post processing to make for a more pleasing digitally presented image.
Yesterday (Wednesday 19 September 2018) high winds attributed to storm Ali resulted in widespread transport disruption across Ireland.
Some railway lines were closed because of downed trees. It was reported that a Galway-Dublin Intercity Railcar (ICR) was damaged when it struck a tree.
In Dublin,LUAS Green Line overhead wires were damaged and service suspended between Cowper and Dawson in the city centre.
As of this morning, LUAS was still only operating a limited service in the city centre and on the southern extremities of the Green Line route.
I went to explore the turn-back operation relating to the temporary Dawson terminus. While trams were only carrying passengers as far south as Dawson Street, the trams themselves were running toward St. Stephens Green to use the facing point crossover on the north side of the Green to reverse direction.
Photos were exposed digitally this morning, 20 September 2018.
There’s a purple tram prowling Dublin’s Green Line.
The other day I was on my way over to John Gunn’s Camera Shop on Wexford Street and I made these photos with my Lumix LX7 of LUAS trams gliding along Harcourt Street.
This is a perfect place to pose modern Citadis trams against a backdrop of Georgian Terrace houses.
To compensate for flat lighting, with two of these three images I made some minor manipulations in post processing to boost sky detail, lighten shadows and improve contrast.
That means one of the images is simply the unaltered camera-JPG. Can you guess which one that is?
Here’s an example of when a rainy day allows for a better photograph.
Dublin’s recently extended LUAS Green Line passes the famous Fusilier’s Arch entrance to St. Stephen’s Green.
Two problems with a bright sunny day:
Certainly you can make some kind of photo here on a bright day, but it will look pretty different than this classical view.
The cherry trees are about two weeks later to blossom in 2018 than last year.
I made this view with my Lumix LX7 on a bright evening a few days ago.
Two weeks ago, I was traveling south on the LUAS Green Line from Marlborough Street to Harcourt Street, when I spotted the one-of-a-kind LUAS Avonmore advertising tram taking the bend around Dublin’s St. Stephens Green.
My Lumix is always at the ready, so I made a few grab shots from the windows of the tram, which was bound for Broombridge.
I’d worked out in my head roughly how long it would take for it to make a return trip, and did some shopping to kill time.
An hour later I returned to the curve and made a few more photos of the same tram going the other way.
Well it’s the only time I’ve seen it .(so far)
I was on Abbey Street, when I heard the familiar Dong-Dong warning of a LUAS tram . . .
this wasn’t a red line tram, but rather a car working the new Green Line Cross City route on Marlborough Street.
So there it was in all its creamy-whiteness; the red-white-blue Avonmore Super Milk Tram!
Lucky for me I had my Lumix LX7 at the ready.
Construction of Dublin’s new Cross City LUAS tram route has resulted in two square crossings. One at Abbey and Marlborough Streets, the other at Abbey and O’Connell Street.
This has opened up a variety of photographic opportunities to get two or more trams in one photo.
I made this view on O’Connell Street looking east on Abbey Street toward the pub called Grand Central.
Dublin’s new LUAS Cross City tram line transits the old Midland Great Western cutting on its way from the city centre to Broombridge.
In my exploration of the new line I’ve been keeping a close eye on sun angles. Although many of the locations are familiar to me, when the sun favors the trams still requires careful investigation.
Owning to the depth of the cutting direct sun only illuminates the tracks for a relatively short period during midday this time of year.
I timed my visit to the Phibsborough station of the North Circular Road to make the most of the lighting.
Exposed using a FujiFilm XT1 with 18-135mm zoom lens.
Five years ago I featured Dublin’s Broadstone Station that was historically Midland Great Western’s Dublin terminal.
See: Two views of Broadstone, Dublin
Today, the new LUAS Cross City tram line skirts the front of the historic building in a purpose-built cutting.
I visited this much altered location on a bright morning, aiming to feature a LUAS tram in the sun with the old station.
Beyond Broadstone, the tram line has re-used the old railway right of way to reach its terminus at Broombridge.
Photos exposed using my FujiFilm X-T1 with 18-135mm zoom lens.
The bright wall in the cutting combined with the lightly coloured stone on the station façade along with the silver tram complicated my exposures, because these reflected more light than normally expected for a Dublin city scene.
Ok here’s the story: so as part of Dublin’s Cross City Extension, new extra long Citadis 502 trams were ordered from Alstom. These have nine-sections and are claimed to be among the longest trams in the world to date.
I knew that.
Mark Healy and I had discussed this on the day the photo was made.
We were out to photograph the new LUAS Cross City line.
Then I needed to visit the Bank of Ireland, and run a few errands. It had clouded over the light was flat and dull.
On the way back into the Dublin City center I saw an out of service tram on Parnell Street so, having the Lumix handy I made a few photos as it passed.
Not being up on the new tram numbering, or paying that close attention to it, I though very little of this photo.
It didn’t even make my initial cut.
I wasn’t going to show it on Tracking the Light.
A couple of days later Mark phone to let me know that somehow we’d missed one of the pioneer trials with the new longer trams.
‘Oh?’ I said. ‘What’s the number of the tram in question?’
‘5027’
‘You know, I think I have that.’
Afterwards I looked back through my photos from the day, and here it is! (I blame jet lag).
Now, I warned you that you weren’t going to believe me!
Over the last few years I’ve posted a variety of photos showing Dublin’s LUAS Cross City tram line under construction and trial/training runs.
In December 2017, this new LUAS service commenced from St. Stephens Green (at the north end of the original Green Line service) to Broombridge on Dublin’s Northside. But, at that time, I was elsewhere.
So last Friday (26 January 2018), Mark Healy and I went for a spin out to Broombridge and back. I made digital photos with my Lumix LX7 and colour slides with my Nikon N90S.
These are a few of my digital views.
On 2 October 2017, I was walking the LUAS Red Line in Dublin. The sun was out but a dark cloud was fast approaching from the north.
I could I see the rain coming.
While watching the sky, I met fellow photographer Ciarán Cooney. He too was watching the lighting conditions unfold, but was heading for the tram.
He said to me, “I have bad luck with rainbows. I suppose I’ll see this on Tracking the Light!”
A minute later he boarded the LUAS tram that appears in these images.
The other day on the way to Dublin Airport with Honer Travers, I spied a LUAS trial making its way northward on O’Connell Street on recently completed CrossCity trackage.
This made for an unplanned photographic opportunity. I posed near the Larkin Statue that I featured on the cover of my illustrated E-book on Dublin titled Dublin Unconquered (designed for viewing on Apple iPad and similar Apple devices).
After making a silhouette that mimics my book cover, I turned to make a few going away views of the tram passing Dublin’s iconic General Post Office.
The GPO is a symbol of Irish independence owing to its roles in the 1916 Easter Rising.
Later Honer and I boarded the 747 Bus, which gave me another opportunity to catch LUAS trial trams working CrossCity trackage.
This new LUAS line forms a link between the Green Line and Red Line routes that were formerly completely isolated from one another.
If you have access to an Apple iPad, iPhone, iPad, iPod touch, and Mac and are interested in my E-book Dublin Unconquered you can download the book from Apple iTunes for roughly the price of a sandwich. The book features many carefully crafted photographs along with detailed text and a lovely map.
https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/dublin-unconquered/id548794442?mt=11&ign-mpt=uo=4
It was the annual Dublin Culture Night Event when dozens of establishments open their doors and/or host special events free for the public.
I was making my rounds, and I happened upon a LUAS 4000-series tram making trials of the new Cross City trackage.
I believe in taking advantage of photographic opportunity when presented, and I made these views using my Lumix LX7.
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I found it fascinating to finally see a tram negotiating Dublin Cross City trackage having followed the construction of the line over the last few years.
This my third post showing LUAS tram trial on 18 August 2017.
These photos were exposed using my FujiFilm X-T1 fitted with a 27mm pancake lens. That’s right: fixed focal length (no zoom).
Never mind the camera, what amazed me was how completely oblivious most passers by were to the tram. What does it take these days to catch notice?
On Friday August 18, 2017, Mark Healy and I met to document a LUAS 5000-series tram trial on new Cross City trackage.
This was my first experience seeing a tram working recently completed Cross City trackage.
Mark and I have been documenting LUAS Cross City progress for more than two years.
This afternoon Mark Healy and I were in the Dublin city centre to observe a LUAS tram trial on new Cross City trackage.
The trial was delayed when the tram was blocked by what appeared to be an illegally parked white Toyota Prius occupying the tracks on Parnell Street.
Eventually the driver of the automobile arrived to remove it from the tracks and the tram resumed testing.
I’ll post more LUAS Cross City trial photos in the coming days.
Back on 9 April 2017, I exposed this view of my iPhone while traveling on Dublin’s LUAS Green Line.
The photo displayed on the phone was of a tram I’d photographed a week earlier in Brussels using my Lumix LX7 that was the featured post on Tracking the Light.
You could call this ‘Tracking the Light on Tracking the Light.’
The other day, I loaded my old Nikon F3T with Rollei 35mm black & white Infrared film. A few weeks earlier I tested a roll of this emulsion and processed it to determine the ideal chemistry, times and temperature.
These photos are from the second roll, which benefited from refined processing technique.
All photos were exposed as recommended by the manufacturer using a 25A (red) filter. To obtain more extreme infrared effects I’d need to use a 72R (deep red) filter. Since I’m not in possession of one of these, we’ll have to wait for that experiment.
By design, infrared film yields high contrast images with brilliant highlights and inky dark shadows. (Blue light is rendered darker than with pictorial pan chromatic emulsions, so blue sky and shadows appear unnaturally dark.)
I made these photographs along Dublin’s LUAS Red Line on Abbey Street. Late low sun made for especially dramatic lighting.
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