Railroad Video Questions

Trains Magazine General Discussion
1

I am all sure that folks in this forum have ordered and watch railroad videos by the various production companies that advertise in trains magazine.

Here are my questions, what type of railroad video do you like better, do you like videos that focus on a particular subdivision, or do you like videos that focus on a region by blending clips of railroad footage together to give a feeling of railroad action in different places in real time. For example railroad footage in Portland, Oregon, Los Angeles, California, Donner Pass, and Spokane, Wa.

Also, do you like railroad videos with narration or without narration?

Feel free to weigh in.

2

I suspect you will get a broad spectrum of what people like and want to see.

Personally, I like Steam Locomotives and want to see them working, up close and personal. See the parts in operation, HEAR the parts working… side rods, air pumps, brakes, fuel feed mechanicals, water handling… If it does something, show it doing what it does and how it does it.

Narration can be a good thing, if the narrator (sound editor) is not so rude as to continue speaking when the locomotive is ‘speaking’. Narration should be clear, concise, and spoken by someone that knows how to pronounce words correctly. In a similar vein, on-screen text should be readable, spell checked and quickly removed so as to not interfere with seeing the subject being displayed.

I don’t mind “establishing shots” as long as they are not used just to make the video longer. If all you have that is worth while is 10 minutes of video, don’t add 50 minutes of opening credits, establishing shots, and closing credits to make it an hour of video. If the ‘subject’ of the video is not in the scene, the scene should not be longer than a second or two.

Similarly, if the video subject is Steam Locomotives, I don’t really care to see and hear 3 year old children clapping and squeeling and immitating the steam whistle. If you want a video about how children react to a RR, by all means, make that video, advertise it as such, I will let those that like that sort of thing buy it.

Music can be an other pleasure killer. Too often RR music is seen as always having to be ‘plinky-plinky’ country-western-hill-billy banjo and harmonica noise. Just because the video processing equipment has the ability to add background music is no indicator that it must be used. For me, Glenn Miller’s “American Patrol” would be great background music while pacing the U.P. 844 accelerating up a hill, but ONLY if WAY in the BACKGROUND. Again, if it interferes with the sound of the locomotive,

3

I like videos that are historic in nature, a good example of which are the Herron Rail series. (Not a commercial for them, mind you, but Herron’s a class act. Good music, narration, editing, et al.) I like division videos as well, stories of particular areas past and present, my own favorites being roads in the Northest, especially New Jersey-New York roads.

The only critisism I’ve got with a lot of video makers is they don’t seem to know the old show business rule of “leave them wanting more.” I’ve seen a lot of good one hour videos that have an outstanding 45 minute video in them screaming to be let out. Some of you may know what I mean, run-by after run-by after run-by in the same location over and over again. Come on boys, one or two is plenty!

I find the old railroad promotional films that have been resurrected and put on video a lot of fun as well. The only downside is those films weren’t really expected to last 50, 60, 70 years or more and frequently the quality shows it. Some good restoration work is called for, these films really are historic artifacts and should be treated as such.

And I’m with the other poster who thinks the C&W background music on some videos is a bit much. If it’s a Southern road OK, but for other parts of the country swing, jazz, or even classical is much more appropriate.

4

As for me, my tastes are pretty eclectic.

I love steam, diesel, freight and passenger. I love to go through Youtube and just surf around. I found one today…It is a poor quality, and the sound is not to my taste, but the subject is fascinating . The Construction of CPR’s 3101 4-8-4 Steamer from 1928.

( posted on the Steam& Preservation part of this Forum.

Lots of European and Russian videos are pretty interesting as well. I sort of steer away from the commercial stuff for a lot the reasons Firelock76 stated above. [2c]

5

Thanks, that is one of the things that annoy the heck out of me when you shoot in public areas is people screaming at their kids. Another thing that annoys me is people acting stupid or wanting to talk about some conspiracy theory. These actions ruin the audio on most shots.

I also like to see the parts of a train working when I can get a shot of it. We don’t get much steam on the mainline in the Pacific Northwest, however if one of the historic locomotives runs to Pasco, Washington or Seattle, Washington then you would have a real treat.

6

I surf youtube myself and I watch quite a few trains out of England, Poland, and Russia. I have to say a lot (not all) of the train footage that comes out of eastern europe tends to have techno music.

Just as country music with US railroads drive some folks crazy, I don’t think that techno music and railroad footage mixes.

7

You Tube! I forgot all about them! Sure, I surf You Tube as well. I’ll typically start on a particular item, like say “NJ Transit Ridgewood NJ” , pick it up and follow the threads. Some great stuff on there, some lousy camera work as well, but hey, not everyone’s a John Ford or C.B. DeMille.

I’ll tell you who to look out for on You Tube. Try Penn Rail Videos. They’re shot by a fellow who’s about 21-22 years old, and if the quality of his work is any indication that young man has a future!

“You Tube Penn Rail Video”. Try it and see what you get.

8

The name sounds familiar, another good youtube channel is wsuraifan. Lots of railroad and river footage from the west coast.

I don’t know if you have watch any videos from that channel, but one way or another check it out. You might find that guys work to be very good as well.

Just cut and paste into the youtube search:

wsuraifan

I will also check out Penn Rail Videos.

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wsuraifan. Thanks for the tip, I’ll have to check them out!

10

You were right about Penn Rails Video’s channel on youtube.