Tag Archives: #Plow extra

photography

Sun and Snow; Russell Plow on the Move

Friday, March 3, 2023, Conway Scenic operated a plow extra from North Conway to Attitash.

The sky was a clear azure dome; the snow a blazing white blanket. I exposed my photos using Nikon Z-Series cameras.

Establishing correct exposure was tricky, especially when the plow was backlit against a dark wall of leaf-less trees.

For the most part I handled exposure by placing the exposure setting dial in automatic-aperture priority (‘A’ mode) then manipulated the +/- exposure compensation control to make adjustments. The challenge was retaining detail in the snow while maintain good overall exposure.

In post processing, I adjusted the RAW-NEF file to maximize highlight and shadow detail in order to display greater amounts of infomation than exhibited by the in-camera Jpg.

Z6 with 70-200mm lens set to 96mm; exposure f6.3 1/2500 of a second, ISO 200.
Z6 with 70-200mm lens set to 200mm; exposure f11 1/2500 of a second, ISO 200. Exposure compenstation set to minus 1.
Nikon Z7-II with 24-70mm lens set at 55mm; exposure f4.0 at 1/1600 of a second, ISO 100.

Images edited for contrast and exposure in Lightroom.

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photography

Plow Extra Preview

Winter has finally made its footprint in New Hampshire’s White Mountains.

After weeks of unseasonable weather that led to speculation that snow was a thing of the past, a series of snow storms has brought plently of snow.

Following a heavy snow fall that lasted most of the day on Monday (January 23, 2023), Conway Scenic called a plow extra on Tuesday to clear its lines.

I made these views of Work X255 in the yard at North Conway as the crew was getting ready to head west to Attitash.

I worked with the NEF RAW files in Adobe Lightroom to make the most of the dramatic sky. Adjustments included my standard repertoire; lighten shadows, darken highlights, adjust color temperature and color saturation and scale for internet presentation.

Later I followed the Plow Extra west to make photos of it clearing the tracks.

Stay tuned!

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Tips and Technique

Plow Extra!

Yesterday, January 20, 2022 (01-20-2022), Conway Scenic Railroad operated its first plow extra of the season.

This resulted in the vintage Russell Plow being readied for the service it was built for. The extra was needed help clear flangeways of snow and ice accumulation, push back mounds of hardened snow, and to serve as an equipment refresher and training excercise for our crews.

I made this series of photos of the plow and GP35 216 using my Nikon Z6 mirrorless camera with 24-70mm zoom lens. For this I set the exposure mode to ‘A’ (for automatic/aperture priority), manually dialed in ‘+1/3 stops’ to help compensate for the bright snow, and controlled the aperture manually.

The bright snow conditions tend to result in underexposed railroad images because the camera meter treats the snow as gray rather than white. Thus the need for slight overexposure.

I made some nominal corrections to the camera’s NEF files using Lightroom and converted to moderate size JPGs for internet presentation here.

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Uncategorized

Wild Ride on a Plow Extra.

Wednesday, February 10, 2021, Conway Scenic organized another plow extra to clear accumulating snow on the line between North Conway and Attitash near Bartlett, NH.

Instead of following the plow train by road as I have in the past, I arranged to travel on it, mostly riding in GP7 573 that powered it.

Although there was only about 18 inches of snow at North Conway, we encountered deeper snow and drifts on the run toward Attitash, with some of the deepest snow along West Side Road, near where the old Maine Central Mountain Division ducks under Route 302 west of Glen, NH.

I made these views with my FujiFilm XT1. It wasn’t as warm as it looks!

This morning I am preparing a short video on the plow ride that I will post on Conway Scenic Railroad’s Facebook page later today. This is a follow up to last week’s video of Conway Scenic’s Plow Extra that has proven extremely popular with hundreds of thousands of views on Facebook.

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