A quest, and a quest for cropping

[asis80]

http://www.railpictures.net/viewreject.php?id=744931&key=0


Story : It's been nice for the past few days and being off of work for once, I took advantage of it. I was originally headed to NS rails due east of me near Greensburg. But as soon as I turned the radio on, I heard that Q368 was being led by 2 NS units. Not a big deal, I know. But I like to go for the different stuff. I headed to Connellsville and just missed it in the yard. I figured an Ohiopyle (State park) shot would be wonderful with the white water rapids and such. Still missed it. So following it southeast, I missed it at almost every location on the Sand Patch grade because my car isn't what you call "powerful". Going up the slopes is hard on my little 80 hp 4 banger. I finally beat it to this location which is about 80 miles from my home, and another 40 or so to Connellsville. So it was indeed a quest for me. I thought more of the ground would fit. But alas, it doesn't appear so.

I'm assuming either use one of the shots I took that has more room in front of the lead, or crop down a little bit to get rid of some of that ground. Any ideas?

Ben

[EMTRailfan]

Honestly, I think it is a great photo. It doesn't follow the Rule of 1/3s vertically, but it's also one of those shots called an exception.

[cblaz]

I'm assuming either use one of the shots I took that has more room in front of the lead, or crop down a little bit to get rid of some of that ground. Any ideas?

Both. I'm assuming you don't have more sky in the original rejection (if you do this is a lot of wasted typing), but I think there's just too much brown ground here. The best place to crop the bottom would be at the base of the tree closest to the photographer near the middle of the shot. This way there's still some nice field left in, but not so much brown mass.

Since you have to cut from the bottom, I think you have to use a shot a few frames back. If you have one where the first engine has just cleared that one tree that blocks the train, it might work. Hope this helps.

- Chris

[Paolo Roffo]

If the field butted right up to the tracks you'd have a winner. Unfortunately the trees in between kill it for me. Going farther out on the bridge (I know, not enough time) might have helped in that regard.

As for the 80hp thing, my previous car packed something like 96hp, and I'm pretty sure she was running on three cylinders for my last few chases over The Patch, so go figure how much power was actually getting delivered to the wheels. But as they say, it ain't the size of the dog in the fight - its the size of the fight in the dog. (Manual shift is a definite advantage in that regard - I was lost without it in the rental car I was stuck with at TrainFestival.)

[asis80]

Chris, I do have a few frames a bit earlier, as I knew a cropping issue would come up, but in field I just couldn't decide where I wanted the line (the train). This looked the best to me, but enough wide view to work with something in case of a bad cropping situation. I'll work with it later on when my eyes aren't so tired. A combination of tired eyes and a need for new glasses is deadly when processing. Thanks!

Ben