The Author – Bart Busschots
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Jun
25
Photo of the Week 70 – Speeding to Dublin
Filed Under Photography on June 25, 2009 | 1 Comment
It seems like just far too long ago that I did a single Photo of the week post. sure, it’s late, but not so late as to need combining with next week’s post!
This is a fairly recent shot, and one that demonstrates the results of some recent experiments to spice up my train photos by creating motion blur in-camera. The idea is quite simple, set your camera to exposure priority mode, dial in the lowest exposure you can hand-hold and keep sharp, then shoot a moving object while panning with it. To give you a better chance of success, I also set the camera to burst mode and pan with the train while constantly shooting. Not every shot will be sharp, but by shooting a burst of 10 or so you have way more chance of getting a good shot!
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/60 sec
- Focal Length: 18mm
- Focal Ratio: f/22
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Bias: -0.3EV
- Processing: Used Aperture’s Dodge & Burn plugin to darken the sky a little, lighten the foreground a little, and lighten the train a little more.
May
20
Photo of the Week 65 & 66 – Transportation in Duffel, Belgium
Filed Under Photography on May 20, 2009 | Leave a Comment
Since I’m going to be away next weekend I’m combining this week’s photo of the week with next week’s to give yet another double-installment. As always when I combine two weeks into one, I’ve chosen a theme to unite both shots, in this case, transportation in the Belgian village of Duffel (my birthplace). In some ways these images span centuries. The first is of a heavily laden barge powering down the navigable river that passes through the village, the Nete. The Nete was the best transport link to the village for centuries, if not millennia! The second shows a train on the main line between Brussels and Antwerp which passes through Duffel. This is not the very oldest railway line in continental Europe, but it’s very close, being an extension of the very first one which ran from Brussels to Mechelen. That historic first section of what is now the line form Brussels to Antwerp opened on the 5th of May in 1835, while the remainder of the line, including this section in Duffel, opened a little less than a year later, on the 3rd of May in 1836.
Although Duffel is about 100km from the sea, Belgium is so flat that the Nete is still a tidal river as it passes through Duffel. In fact, at high tide many parts of the village are below the level of the river! For this reason the river is bordered by large dikes on both sides. These dikes are now paved, and serve the local communities as cycle and walking routes. It’s just north of Duffel that the river Nete now connects to the Nete Canal which brings shipping traffic up to the Albert Canal. Because of low bridges and the tidal nature of the river in Duffel, larger boats can only navigate the river at some times of the day, the water being too shallow at low tide, and the bridges too low at high tide. Smaller barges can navigate the river at any time without fear of running aground or crashing into bridges. In this shot we see a barge called Despatch making its way down-stream towards the village of Duffel at the very peak of high tide. As you can see by how low the barge is in the water, she’s clearly fully loaded, probably with coal, sand, or gravel. This kind of barge is low enough to pass under the bridges even at high tide.
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/320 sec
- Focal Length: 40mm
- Focal Ratio: f/5
- ISO: 400
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Processing: lightly tonemapped in Photomatic Pro, then the barge was lightened slightly using Aperture’s Dodge & Burn plugin
My second chosen shot is of an evening express service from Antwerp to Brussels crossing the rail bridge over the Nete a little down-stream of Duffel village. This train is making its way along the same track bed that the first train between these two cities ran on way back in 1836. To put that into context, trains have been running here since 60 years after the (US) declaration of Independence. This train is made up of the best coaching stock the NMBS (Belgium’s national railway company, also know as the SNCB) has to offer. These M6 carriages give travellers two decks full of creature comforts on their short and speedy journey between Belgium’s two largest cities. The locomotive pulling the train is an NMBS Class 27 electric locomotive. Although these locomotives are approaching 30 years of age, they are still in fine condition and more than up to the task of whisking passengers between Belgian cities at speeds of up to 160km/h.
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/500 sec
- Focal Length: 55mm
- Focal Ratio: f/5.6
- ISO: 400
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Processing: lightened the train a little using Aperture’s Dodge & Burn plugin
Apr
7
Photo of the Week 59 – Last Train from Galway
Filed Under Photography on April 7, 2009 | Leave a Comment
Following on from last week I’ve chosen another image generated by tonemapping a single RAW file. This is an example of a shot that’s not possible with traditional HDR techniques because the train is moving. Normally HDRs are built by combining multiple separate exposures, but since the train is moving, it would appear in a different place in each exposure, resulting in a great big mess!
I took this shot while I was in Galway for a few days for a conference. The weather was mostly terrible, and there were very few trains per day, but I managed to find a moment when the weather was good, I was free from conference duties, and there was a train due none-the-less. The sky also really co-operated, putting on a spectacular show.
The train is the last InterCity service of the day from Galway to Dublin-Heuston. In this case it was made up of a single six-car Diesel Multiple Unit (DMU) set. Irish Rail only have a few of these Class 22031 DMUs, which are the big brothers of the much more common Class 22001 three-car DMUs that run many InterCity services. I quite like these modern looking trains, though I do miss the old days when InterCity services were made of up regular railway coaches pulled by locomotives. I prefer the sound of the big powerful locomotives, though I think the locals prefer these near-silent DMUs 🙂
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/160 sec
- Focal Length: 48mm
- Focal Ratio: F8
- ISO: 400
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Post Processing: Single RAW file tonemapped with Photomatix Pro
Feb
25
Photo of the Week 53 – Rounding the Corner
Filed Under Photography on February 25, 2009 | 2 Comments
This is a photo I shot a while ago, but I re-visited it recently and tweaked the crop and the processing and now I’m much happier with it, happy enough to use it as a photo of the week in fact!
This is an Irish Rail class 22001 Diesel Multiple Unit (DMU) rounding the sharp corner on the approach to Maynooth from the Dublin side. The shot was taken from the towpath of the Royal Canal which runs next to the track for much of the line’s length. Because the canal is lower than the tracks, and because the vegetation along the canal and the tack was in full summer growth, you can’t see the tracks at all, giving the image a rather strange feel. I also quite like these new modern InterCity trains. As well as being much quieter and more comfortable than their predecessors, these new trains also look quite stylish and modern.
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 55-200mm
- Exposure: 1/1600 sec
- Focal Length: 200mm
- Focal Ratio: F11
- ISO: 800
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Bias: -1.0EV
Jan
11
Photo of the Week 47 – Into the Night
Filed Under Photography on January 11, 2009 | 3 Comments
As a friend of mine put it on Flickr, this photo combines my three nerdy hobbies, Astronomy, Photography, and trains. This is a 5 second exposure of a commuter train approaching Maynooth reflected in the waters of the Royal Canal in the late evening while Venus & the Moon shine over-head. This is a shot I’d tried before, and each time I learned a few more valuable lessons. So, although this is the result of a learning experience, I’m still shocked at how lucky I was to get everything to line up as well as it did. The train, the reflection, the silhouette of the tree, those things I could control, but the positions of the Moon and Venus, those were a pure bonus! Anyhow, if I had to pick my three best photos yet, this is one I’d definitely choose.
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 5 sec
- Focal Length: 18mm
- Focal Ratio: F5
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Manual
- Exposure Bias: -2.0
Nov
30
Photo of the Week 41 – Homeward Bound
Filed Under Photography on November 30, 2008 | 2 Comments
This is one of those photos that I just love but I have no idea why. I’m not even sure it’s actually a good photo, but it’s one of my favourites all the same. What makes my love of it even stranger is that it’s of what I consider to be the ugliest class of train the NMBS (Belgian national rail company) ever brought into service! A real low-point in Belgian train design! Maybe there’s some kind of sub-concious bond because these trains are the same age as me, we both date from 1980.
For those of you interested in such things, here are the technical details of this shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/160 sec
- Focal Length: 55mm
- Focal Ratio: F6.3
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Auto
Oct
18
Photo of the Week 34 & 35
Filed Under Photography on October 18, 2008 | Leave a Comment
With this double-post I’m finally back on schedule with my photo of the week. Since this is a double-bill I decided to pick a theme, these are my two of my favourite pics shot in my native village of Duffel in Belgium.
The first is a fantastic winter scene that greeted me on the first day of my Christmas holiday in December 2007. When you combine a very thick fog with a very heavy frost followed by a clearance in the morning you get an almost fairy-tale-like scene. I took quite a few shots but this is the one I think worked best.
The second shot is of a Thalys express train passing through Duffel with an international express train from Brussels to Amsterdam. These trains are actually French TGVs in a different coat of paint and are part-owned by the national rail companies of France, Belgium, The Netherlands, and Germany. There are very few places where you can get photos of electric trains without pylons in the way, the rail bridge in Duffel is one of those rare places.
For those of you interested in such things, here are the technical details of the first shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/320 sec
- Focal Length: 18mm
- Focal Ratio: F5.6
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Compensation: 0.33
And of the second shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/250 sec
- Focal Length: 30mm
- Focal Ratio: F8
- ISO: 200
- Camera Mode: Auto
Aug
12
Photo of the Week 25 – Commuter Reflection
Filed Under Photography on August 12, 2008 | 3 Comments
I really don’t know why this is one of my very favourite images but it is. Maybe it’s the colours, maybe it’s the reflection. I do have a thing for reflections in photographs. This is just an ordinary Irish commuter train making it’s way from Maynooth in to Dublin along the Royal Canal on a summer evening at rush hour. For my fellow train spotters this is an Iarnród Éireann Class 29001 Diesel Multiple Unit.
For those of you interested in such things here are some of the technical details of the original shot:
- Camera: Nikon D40
- Lens: Nikon DX AFS 18-55mm (D40 kit lens)
- Exposure: 1/1000 sec
- Focal Length: 18mm
- Focal Ratio: F10
- ISO: 800
- Camera Mode: Aperture Priority
- Exposure Compensation: -0.67
[tags]train, canal, Royal Canal, Maynooth, Kidlare, Ireland, photography[/tags]