Tiny Trains

I have always been fascinated with model railroads. When I was a young child I received as a gift an "N" scale train from my parents. The track when set-up only ran the train around a small oval. In fact so small I couldn't even run the engine it at it's highest speed because when circling with it's two cars it would fly off the track! Regardless, I must have watched the train go around that circle for hours. Such is the simple fun of my childhood.

My uncle had a model train set. It was a much larger scale. He spent hours and days setting up and fine tuning his track. Like photography is my Hobby, train building and running was his. When we visited, which was quite often, I always loved to go downstairs and have him turn it on. I was fascinated with the world that he created and how much time and car was put into it's design. Even then when he would take me and my cousin to the hobby store and look at his next purchases how much money a single engine was. I knew nothing of the history of trains. The method of propulsion; electric vs steam vs whatever. I just knew that they were cool! I was never old enough to run his trains, well at least he never trusted me. As I look back I don't remember them running without a hitch very often either. There was always some breakdown to something that didn't work right.

My Grandfather had an "H" scale train. His first love was photography, but for a period of time he built and maintained an older "steam" engine on a board enclosed in it's little world. I and my 15 cousins would have the run of the house. Fascinating and wonderful house it was. He lived and owned the old school house were my mom and her sisters went to school. when they built the multi-room schoolhouse they closed all the one-room school houses down. There was old desks, books, clocks and just about anything you can imagine. In one room, locked upstairs was a train set. One of my cousins was to get it when Grandpa got too old or past away. Nobody got it. It burned down, the train along with 40,000 slides gone.

People who follow this blog know my love for the Botanic Gardens. I go as often as I can. Amongst all the flowers, greenhouses, lakes and rivers is a train exhibit. It changes every year. They usually celebrate the National Parks of the US. Many of those parks I've been to, so I get to look at a little tiny version of the park that I have seen the full-scale of and watch train churn it's way through the countryside. There are volunteers there to discuss most anything you might want to. I believe the size of the Trains are known as "Garden Scale" There big is what I know.

Some of the later pictures taken by my normal VAL are of me in full gear. Some have asked how I carry my equipment when I'm out in the field. I've used a number of pieces of equipment on the past, but I have settled with what I started with the Kinesis Gear system. There are a number of pieces and you can spot me in them. When you look through the pictures you can see that Kate has captured my better side.

I have already blog about my picture of Buddy earlier. Though I do own a tripod and use it often, I just like grabbing my camera for the most part, framing a shot and keeping in motion. I know and have experienced how much better a picture is with a tripod, but continue to not learn this simple fact. Photographs are better when the camera isn't moving.

Despite this purchasing the D3 has helped me freeze action. When you can crank that ISO up to 3200 or even 6400 and it is pretty noise free, you can get those shutter speeds up and make your own pictures that much more sharp while hand holding.

The train shots in many I was trying to capture the sense of speed that the trains move around the track. Please let me know if I succeeded. To me they just look like OOF pictures.

As always thanks for looking and please comment either at Smugmug or below in my comments section.

The pictures can be found here.

A slide show of the pictures can be view here.