Tag Archives: Monasterevin

photography, Tips and Technique

Irish Rail’s IWT Liner on a Saturday

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I was traveling with Denis McCabe.

‘So where do we go?’

‘Try Cherryville first,’ I offered.

It was a bit brushed in and completely backlit. But we knew that.

‘How about Monasterevin? If we go to the bridge over the Barrow the sun will be side on.’

And so it was. We caught a the parade of Saturday morning passenger trains (I posted one of these yesterday). But then it clouded over.

‘Not much use here when there’s a white sky.’

So we moved up to the station.

We didn’t wait there long before the headlight of an 071 appeared.

In short order we caught the IWT Liner passing on its way to Ballina, County Mayo.

After  exposing a few colour slides,  I made a burst of digital images using my FujiFilm XT1.

Owing to the high contrast scene, I opted to make some exposure and contrast adjustments in post processing. I did this within the parameters of the histogram and so retained all the detail captured in my RAW file.

Tracking the Light Posts Daily.

Tips and Technique

Irish Rail Crossing the Barrow at Monasterevin.

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I made this broadside view of an Irish Rail InterCity Railcar (ICR) crossing the River Barrow at Monasterevin.

To stop the action, I set my FujiFilm XT1 manually as follows: ISO 400, Shutter Speed = 1/1000th second, f-stop = f6.3.

I was working with a fixed focal length 90mm telephoto (a ‘prime’ lens which is not a variable focal length ‘zoom’).

The XT1’s digital format this is roughly equivalent to a 135mm lens on 35mm film.

A high shutter speed is necessary for stop action photography when photographing at a right angle to the subject’s direction of travel.

Tracking the Light Posts Daily.

photography

Irish Rail: Transition at Monasterevin; 5 May 2006.

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On 10 March 2016, I will present a feature length illustrated talk to the Irish Railway Record Society in Dublin; my topic, Irish Railways in 2006.

This will begin at 7:30 pm at the IRRS Dublin premises near Heuston Station, Dublin.

In keeping with this theme, today’s Tracking the Light looks back at 2006: A year that saw many changes on Irish Rail. Among these was the introduction of the Mark4 push pull sets on the Dublin-Cork run.

Exposed on Fujichrome using a Contax G2 with 45mm lens.
Exposed on Fujichrome using a Contax G2 with 45mm Zeiss lens.

I made this view from the canal bridge over the River Barrow of Irish Rail’s viaduct over the same river.

Here a 201-class diesel in the recently introduced green and silver livery (designed to match the new Mark4 sets) leads a train of Mark 2 carriages.

Green 201s and Mark IIs only co-existed for a short time and I was please to make this striking image of this comparatively unusual combination.

Key to my composition is the billowing clouds to the north of the line.

Tracking the Light posts every day!