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I hope you won't be disappointed to
read that the main structure on the Xingyang Brickworks Railway is made of bricks |
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| The
ponds have fish in them and the pondkeeper has to go out in his
boat to break up the ice. This shot is the first train shot I've made
with remote fill flash - on the tree, which would otherwise be
completely dark |
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| Then
we went for a walk up to the edge of the cliffs for a few shots
from up high. The weather was really, and rarely, clear
The trains are
tender first when empty and chimney first when loaded (upgrade
on the bridge and up to the brickworks)
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| Local
dude |
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| A
loaded train coming under a main road before coming to the
bridge |
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| Each
train has three or four brakemen/women who perch on the wagons
and operate the brakes |
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| During
the lunch break, we walked uphill from the viaduct and
encountered some guys lining a cutting with... well bricks
of course |
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| Trackside
cement plant. Hope it doesn't set in the flangeways |
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| Close
clearances |
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| Up
at the brickworks, it looks like ... |
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| ...turtle
soup will be on the menu tonight |
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| Men
At Work. We found this nice wee aqueduct across the tracks and
it was moderately warm here in the sun |
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| Shot
from aforesaid aqueduct of the train chuffing (there's no other
word for it really) uphill past the brickworkers |
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| And
a widey from the same spot |
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| A
tasty sunset shot |
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| We
lucked out (an American phrase - I would have said we 'lucked
in') with this night shot. They rarely run trains after dark.
And Mike and I just made it to the hotel and back with the gear.
And my 1Ds ran out of battery juice, so I had to whip over the other
side of the ponds to grab the 40D from where Aaron was.
And a wider angle lens. And to top it off, this shot is one
camera, firing a remote camera which fired the flashes. This way
we were able to get two different shots - one from each side of
the pond - with one burst of flashpower. Technology in action. |
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| Hell
that's not bad eh? |
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| Next
morning was also 'luck-full', although obviously we could have
done with the train being earlier as the sun was about to scoot
out of frame. |
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| Vert
with the other camera. As the train could be heard approaching
in the distance, a
farmer walked his herd of sheep across the narrow viaduct and the train had
to go into full emergency, Flintstones style I imagine, and
stopped just on the edge of the bridge as the last of the sheep jumped
onto the embankment. I feared it might have been sweet and sour
lamb all around for lunch. Fortunate for us I guess as he had to
smoke it up to get moving, whereas normally he would have been
drifting here |
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| Uphill
trains always run tender first though, so there's a money back
smoke guarantee. This shot was a feeble effort to replicate a
better shot that Aaron had taken from here with the earlier
train. If you can't beat 'em, join 'em as the punchline from
some old rude joke goes. |
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| Rock
the boat. Don't rock the boat baby. Icebreaker, Xingyang style. |
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| And
you think you have a tough job? He also lives in a
hollowed out house in the cliff. |
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| One
of his dawgs, or dags for those in Europe. |
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| We
explore the clay loading end of the line and catch another
loaded train |
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| And
again from a similar spot as the train prepares to go into a
'tunnel' under the main road at the loading end of the line, 4
or 5 Ks from the bridge. |
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| Back
near the bridge end of the line... |
|
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| ...I'm
having fun with the locals... |
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| ...while
Aaron is doing his best to get arrested. Big Trouble In Little
China indeed. |
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| Somehow
we manage to escape after promising to clone out all the litter
and old steam trains in Photoshop |
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| About
this time we bump into Rob and Yuehong Dickinson who were
getting some nice video footage. Rob seemed quite disappointed
that a pair of camera toting hillbilly foreigners had discovered
Xingyang, so we told him we'd paid
the drivers to give us nice smoke effects, run a special night
charter for the flash shot, set up the whole sheep thing with
the crews and were arranging a backhander scheme with the Police
to charge admission to all visiting train nerds. I keeeeed, I
keeed. |
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| Rob
headed off, leaving us to perform our international humanitarian
duty by flashing our Platinum American Express cards about and
buying a 10 course lunch. I keeeeed, I keeed. |
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| This
is either a bicycle repair man or a guy who likes having his
picture taken. Probably the latter |
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| Insert
clever caption here |
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| I
quite like this shot, although it took a dual raw conversion to
get the effect. What makes it really neat though, is that it's a
remote shot... |
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| ...taken
by me, standing here, about half a kilometre up the line |
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| Final
shot for Xingyang. Bah. Should have been on the other side with
Mike and Aaron... We set up another night shot, but no other
trains ran so we had to be content with pictures of me being the
flash-test-dummy. Shame too, as it would have been a nice
one. |
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