10/20/07 – Day In North America

Finally getting a chance to dig out a bit here. This past Saturday was Railroads Illustrated‘s Day In North America date. What that means for those who don’t know is the magazine picks a day and tells everyone to go out & take pictures of railroading in North America. They then pick out the best and publish them in one issue dedicated to DINA, showing essentially a cross-section of railroading on the continent on that one particular day. This year I did something a bit different – normally I head out solo, but I wanted to try out some new locations, so I teamed up with fellow photographer Tom Mik (click here to see some of his work on Railpictures.net) for the day. We spent the day along the southern portion of the Hudson River on both the CSX River Line and the Metro North Hudson Line. It was nice having someone to talk with, not only on the drive (it gets a bit boring talking to myself…especially when I get into an argument…), but also trackside. It really did make the day much more enjoyable. Plus having someone who knows the area and the angles helped out immensely – I didn’t waste time scouting out locations, we pretty much drove up, hiked in and started shooting when the trains showed up.

The day started quite early – about 3:30 AM, which gave me enough time to get ready and get to Tom’s house by 5am, when we were to leave for eastern NY state. The day began under glorious blue skies at Bear Mountain and Iona Island, then moved south to the Metro North Harmon Shops open house, and ended under cloudy skies, with gusty winds and passing showers at Breakneck Ridge. As of right now I’ve only got a few photos ready – I took 2 rolls of Kodak T-MAX 400 film, which I have developed and scanned a few frames in. But the digitals are still in process. Plus because I’m submitting some to RRI, I’m holding off on posting the bulk of them until I decide which 10 will be going to the magazine for the DINA feature (they limit entries to 10 per photographer). Anyways, here’s what I’ve got posted thus far. I’ll make another post with more details and photos within a week or so. Stay tuned for that.

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Thanks for looking & stay tuned!
Tom