844 comes to Denver (picture heavy post)

Trains Magazine General Discussion
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So I’m not thrilled with these shots. I had the shutter speed too slow for standard shots and too fast for panning shots in the daylight images. And of course I forgot to turn on mirror lock-up for the night shots, so there’s a bit of ghosting in them.

Add to that a huge crowd of people that just wouldn’t go away, and had a special knack for walking in front of cameras (they didn’t seem to understand the concept that the shutter could be open for 30 seconds). Of course there’s always one or two guys who completely disregard every other camera and just walk up to the locomotive like they owned it. I guess I should have been out on Thursday evening. Apparently, there was no one there.

Oh well, even if the pictures aren’t that great, the experience is still cool. After seeing 844 again, I can’t help but wonder how anyone can dislike the UP, or how they can be die hard diesel fans, and not really care about steam. Even when she was just sitting getting photographed to no end, 844 was a live creature. When she was moving, there was no denying that she was poetry in motion.

Anyways, enough of my ramblings, here’s a few of the shots:

South of Brighton, just off of US 85. Should of had a bit more shutter speed (as I mentioned), and maybe a little more telephoto. Still, I like this shot, even if it is flawed:

An attempted pan shot. I was figuring that she would be coming through around 50 or so. Alas! I think she was only making about 30 mph, so I should’ve taken the shutter speed down to 1/40th or 1/50th. That would have given a little more blur of everything else. If I get really bored, maybe I’ll do a little photoshoppery:

The Ski Train, and the Frontier Days train at Union Station. Shades of glory days!:

My favorite shot of the evening, though it does have a bit of gho

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Don’t be to hard on yourself! Those are still nice shots! I enjoyed them. Thanks for posting.

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No such thing as a bad shot of live big steam. The fun is being there.

Jay

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Chris>>>

Thank you for all of the pic’s . Regardless of good or bad shots , I wasn’t there . Thanx to you , I saw the event . Remember, even Mr. O. Winston Link had his bad nights also . Keep on snappin’ .

Thanks again, Cannonball

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Chris: Being tough on yourself will improve your technique. The shots of 844 are OK. That “attempted” pan shot is nice, as are the night shots. Some of the old masters didn’t mind “ghosting”, see some old back issues of this Magazine or any of several books. The masters had a lot less to work with than you did. With luck you will have a chance to get it right with 844, or better, 3985 in the future.

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Chris,

The shots are pretty good,I wish I could have been there with you…I LOVE 844 ! You cant have enough pics either…Danny

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Chris, your worst shots are better than anything I’d be likely to come up with. But I agree with you–any face-to-face contact with 844 or 3985 would probably make a believer out of the strongest anti-UP person. You’re lucky this year–hope my turn comes again sometime soon.

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Thanks everybody for the nice comments. I’m still not 100% satisfied with them, but they are growing on me. If nothing else, this gives me a good reason to go chase 844 on one of her outings in August or September.

Thanks again!

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Great shot as usual Chris. But you can’t hog the steamers. You must send one or both out this way sometime.[swg]

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Where’s 4449 been lately?

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Brooklyn roundhouse in Portland, Or. The 4449, 700, Doyles FP, an exAMT F40PH and some other equiptment has lived in the Brooklyn roundhouse for years. They are there on borrowed time as they expect the UP to kick them out soon. I think they have found a site near the Oregon Museum of Science and Industry but need funds (for a building I think). SP 4449 and SP&S 700 went out on some excoursions on the W&P (I think) to raise money & awareness. They derailed at low speed and tore up some track dureing these excoursions. There was also a steam excoursion down to Salem not too long ago but I think 700 did the honers on that one.

The UP has not been receptive of the 4449 running on there rails as they have ther own steamers (as we all know). So 4449 has become somewhat of an orphan. Seince the UP merger 4449 has done little running on UP. 4449 has seen more running on the BNSF and W&P then home rails. It even got a coat of black paint and a BNSF logo for the BNSF employee appriciation specials up the Columbia river back in 01’ (It has seince been repainted into Daylight colors).

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Nice pictures. Here is a very brief clip of some video that I took when UP #844 and E9A’s 951/949 departed for Denver on Saturday with the Frontier Day’s Special. (Approaching MP511 and Tower A)

http://www.zippyvideos.com/3368070535665686/up_844/

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Nice video…really like the telephoto compression that you used at the beginning of the video. You must have a pretty strong telezoom on your cam?