{"id":15652,"date":"2016-06-09T05:46:13","date_gmt":"2016-06-09T09:46:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/?p=15652"},"modified":"2016-06-09T11:29:47","modified_gmt":"2016-06-09T15:29:47","slug":"pan-am-southern-retro-photos-of-a-retro-railroad-old-tech-in-2016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/pan-am-southern-retro-photos-of-a-retro-railroad-old-tech-in-2016\/","title":{"rendered":"Pan Am Southern; retro photos of a retro railroad; old tech in 2016."},"content":{"rendered":"

Let’s gaze back in time; 30 plus years ago I was a young enthusiastic photographer with a 35mm Leica rangefinder. I was fascinated by the Boston & Maine, operated by Guilford Transportation Industries (as Pan Am Railways was then known).<\/p>\n

B&M\u2019s quaint operations, traditional signals, and antique General Motors diesels had a real appeal. Back then I focused on catching the EMD GP7s, GP9s, and GP18s, plus EMD switchers and run-through Delaware & Hudson Alco C-420s and C-424s.<\/p>\n

I made hundreds of images trackside in those days.<\/p>\n

On June 4, 2016, I picked up my old Leica, as I do from time to time, and loaded it with Ilford HP5 (often my choice film back in the day) and headed for Pan Am Railway\u2019s East Deerfield yard before dawn, (as I have since I learned to drive 33 years ago).<\/p>\n

Antiques still run the rails on Pan Am.<\/p>\n

\"Pan
Pan Am Railways’ SD40-2s at East Deerfield Yard on the morning of June 4, 2016.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"A
A real rare pair in 2016; back to back high-hood GP40s. How sweet is that? This is Pan Am’s EDRJ (East Deerfield to Rotterdam Junction).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\"\u00a9Brian<\/p>\n

\"As
As the EDRJ was getting its train together the morning fog began to burn off. Cosmic light.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\"\u00a9Brian<\/p>\n

My lens of choice has a long history.<\/p>\n

In the 1970s and very early 1980s, I\u2019d often photograph with a Nikon 35mm wide angle made with a Leica screw-mount.<\/p>\n

This\u00a0lens had gone missing for decades and only recently\u00a0re-emerged. In the interval it had seized up (as old equipment does when the lubrication dries out). My dad sent it for servicing and its now back in our\u00a0arsenal of working photographic equipment.<\/p>\n

Good lenses are relatively common these days. Most off the shelf digital cameras have pretty good optics compared with many consumer-grade film cameras of yesteryear.<\/p>\n

But, truly great lenses remain\u00a0hard to find.<\/p>\n

This Nikon 35mm is a great lens. Not only is it sharp, lightweight and compact, but it has a distinctive optical quality that is rarely found with modern lenses. In short it has \u2018that look.\u2019 (look at the photos).<\/p>\n

\"Pan
Pan Am’s EDRJ roars upgrade through Shelburne Falls, Massachusetts passing an old Boston PCC streetcar that resides at the Trolley Museum. I used to ride these cars on the Riverside Line in the early 1970s.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

After exposing my film, I processed it with the aid of a Jobo film processor to my own custom formula.<\/p>\n

Basically, I used a twin bath developer of Kodak HC110 with constant agitation at 71 degrees F for 4 minutes, 15 seconds. Stopbath for 30 seconds; twin bath fixer; rinse; permawash; and final wash. Negs were scanned as TIF files using an Epson V600 flatbed scanner at 3200 dpi . Nominal contrast adjustment was necessary with Lightroom.<\/p>\n

Undoubtedly, someone will ask, \u2018but isn\u2019t that a lot of work?\u2019<\/p>\n

Yes, it is.<\/p>\n

And, \u2018Couldn\u2019t you just convert your digital files to black & white?\u2019<\/p>\n

\u00a0You<\/span> could, yes.<\/p>\n

And, so I ask, \u2018do you<\/u> have any favorites here?\u2019<\/p>\n

\"With
With a roar of 645 diesels and a cosmic cloud of exhaust, EDRJ approaches the east portal of the famed Hoosac Tunnel on the morning of June 4, 2016.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"North
North Adams, Massachusetts.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"The
The trees are taller at Eagle Bridge, but this station looks today much as it has looked for at least three decades. I’ve feature this in my book; Railway Depots, Stations and Terminals.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Eagle
Eagle Bridge, New York, the old Boston & Maine station is a relic of former times.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Railroading
Railroading gone retro! Hooray! Ilford\u00a0HP5; f8 1\/200th of a second.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Tracking the Light has new material every day.<\/span><\/h3>\n

 <\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Let’s gaze back in time; 30 plus years ago I was a young enthusiastic photographer with a 35mm Leica rangefinder. I was fascinated by the Boston & Maine, operated by Guilford Transportation Industries (as Pan Am Railways was then known). B&M\u2019s quaint operations, traditional signals, and antique General Motors diesels had a real appeal. Back … Continue reading Pan Am Southern; retro photos of a retro railroad; old tech in 2016.<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15650,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_s2mail":"yes","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"footnotes":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[10,48],"tags":[3814,26,3590,29,82,883,3589],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/06\/\u00a9Brian-Solomon-582548.jpg?fit=2525%2C1584","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2BVuC-44s","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15652"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15652"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15652\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15685,"href":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15652\/revisions\/15685"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/15650"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/briansolomon.com\/trackingthelight\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}