Railfan and the digital camera.

1. Railfan and the digital camera. The easy way to take good railway pictures.

2. Enjoy ! • Railfanning and the associated photography is meant to be fun. • Taking pictures is one of the most potent forms of expression that the railfans have. • We capture a slice of time – an event that may never occur again. • Instead of enjoying the process, are we getting caught up with the Aperture, F stops, ASA setting, Focus and other technical bits ?

3. Do you Aim and Shoot ? • While all the terms mentioned before are important, but do you have to know all before taking a single good picture ? • You may have a simple aim and shoot camera – so can you take good pictures ? • Having a good camera is only a part of the story !

4. The bad news first, As a railfan photographer you have very few controls on your subject. • Light may be wrong, • Time may be wrong, • The trains that take you to and back to that special place may be at the wrong time, • Vantage point may not be available, • RPF and other unsympathetic people may be around you.

5. More bad news…. • Your camera may be slow. • Slow from off to on, • Slow from wide to telephoto and vice-versa. • Slow from shot to shot, • Slow for the flash to charge, • In any case, flash cannot always be used as it may attract the attention.

6. Taking good pictures - • As our parents wanted us to – STUDY ! • It is all about good composition. • It is about relationship of shapes, lines, colours and shades. • Study the composition with a “lazy eye”. • Let this lazy eye snap the objects that you want to show and not the unwanted bits. • Be aware of what you like about a picture. • Be aware of what you want to see in a picture.

7. Study ! • Look at as many pictures as possible. • Look at trains pics an say sites such as www.railpictures.net etc. • All the pictures on these sites have been filtered by a strict process, so they meet a technical standard. • Again – analyze what you like about a certain picture. • I like Shanky’s pic of the WDG 3A at Hitec City >

9. Be prepared - Equipment • Know your camera, the controls and the response time. • Be prepared – adequate batteries, spare batteries. • Large memory card – the largest you can afford. Make sure that the card is empty before you come for a railfanning session. • A good camera bag – that allows you to flick the camera out from storage without fumbling.

10. Be prepared – Yourself • Adequate rest. One tends to lose enthusiasm when tired. • Good shoes, clothes, sun protection. • Food and water. • A knowledge of the area – you may have to ask around – as Ashish says – He who has a mouth would find Rome ! • A knowledge of the timetables. • Be prepared to take the EFFORTS more than the RISKS.

11. Be prepared – in your mind • Continuously visualize the scene against the changing background. • Even if you are not with a camera, keep an open eye (and mind) about interesting locations to shoot railways against – train your mind to be framing images all the time. • Be aware of the background in a picture – it may be good or it may be bad !

12. Be prepared – Camera tips • Know your camera’s response against the train’s speed – anticipate how many pictures would be possible before the train leaves the frame. • Choose an interesting place off the track – be ready for that special angle when the train goes past – there would be just one of these opportunities! • Ensure that the date stamp in the camera is OFF. • Take as many pictures as possible and shoot continuously! • Shoot in the maximum possible size. This is very important. • Do not shoot in the B&W or Sepia mode – those effects can be added later. You may need the colour image.

13. Be prepared – Camera Tips • The best pictures of trains are from the ground – not door or window shots. Be prepared to go out there ! • Try to capture the train against an interesting background – a wall, flowers, trees, cutting, mountain, water. • Do not shoot only the zoom, use wide also. Keep in mind the time taken for a camera to shift from zoom to wide. • Pay attention to the catenary and signal posts ! • Avoid shooting one’s own shadow.

14. Treating the camera • Keep the camera steady while clicking. • Keep the camera steady till the shutter has re-closed. • Use the flash if required to get rid of shadows in the picture – this may be needed in the bright sun also. • Practice taking night shots without flash by keeping the camera on a surface. • Use a small timer to fire the shutter in the night shots. This timer (~2 seconds) overcomes the shake caused by the operation of the shutter button. • You may not be able to use the flash for the macro shots – the excess light would washout finer details.

15. Anticipate/Participate • Anticipate the events - at what point will the driver notch up, or switch on the headlamp or when will the four flags, Crew, Under guard, Guard and SM, show ? • Build a series of pictures – write a story linking these pictures in your mind. • You could take notes using the camera. • Participate in the passage of the train – wave at the crew to thank them for that special pose. Wave at the children in the train too !

16. Light source • Early morning and late evening light is the best for shooting pictures. • Be aware of where the light is coming from – maybe take advantage of the light and shadow by shooting the train as it comes into light. • Example of an against sun, morning shot, with train coming into a light patch. ->

18. Cropping • As mentioned before – shoot as many images as possible in the largest size. • The large image then can be “cropped” to make more sense of the composition. • The large image size would allow deletion of the irrelevant bits in the picture, thus improving the focus on the primary objects. • Cropping would also improve the composition of the picture – the next image is the uncropped version of a picture followed by the cropped version.

21. Resample • After Cropping – “Resample” the image to a smaller size – keeping the Horizontal dimension to 1024 pixels or the Vertical dimension to 768 pixels. • This would reduce the size of the file. 768 1024

22. Unsharpen • This technique is used to actually sharpen the picture. • The JPG image tends to blur after every manipulation – “unsharpening” brings out the edges, giving that special finish to the picture. • The next picture is the original image followed by the “unsharpened” image; notice the increase in detail in the second pic.

25. Another example of Cropping • The next picture is the uncropped image opened in Paint Shop Pro. • Next is a screenshot showing the process of cropping. • Next is the cropped image itself. • Last is the cropped + unsharpened image.

30. Post shooting • See all the pictures in a slide show on a large monitor. • Expect only 10 % or your pictures to be good. • Identify the pictures that should be displayed – Every good picture does not have to be uploaded. • Be very disciplined in the amount of pictures to be uploaded. • Process the pictures – crop, resample, unsharpen. • Write the description with the fullest details.

31. Software to be used • With a digital camera, knowledge of image editing software is mandatory. • Learn Photoshop. If that is not possible use a lighter freeware like PaintShop Pro 4 or Ifran View etc. • Aim to learn advanced techniques for removal of unwanted objects and for correcting the levels.

32. Removal of unwanted objects • The following two images are examples of an unwanted objects. • The second image is kindly provided by Prakash Tendulkar.

35. Correcting levels • The following two images are examples of improving an image that is too light. • The second image has been tweaked in Photoshop to give some level of balance.

38. Thank You for your patience !