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Beyond the Rutland


PHOTOGRAPHY TIPS AND TECHNIQUES


Open Up to the Possibilities of Wide Angle Lenses GUEST COLUMNIST: SCOTT LOTHES


MANY RAILROAD PHOTOGRAPHERS PROCLAIM the advantages of normal and telephoto glass — including some who have built their reputations on those lenses — but far fewer extoll the virtues of wide angles. If anything, railroad photographers seem as apt to deride wide-angle lenses for distortion as to say anything positive about them. I personally do not understand this. When used effectively, wide-angle lenses can open up a world of possibilities for context and depth in creative railroad photography.


What is Wide? The normal focal length for any camera


Now operated under the Vermont Rail System banner,


you’ll see the early operations of the Vermont Railway,


Clarendon & Pittford, and the Green Mountain Railroad!


From the marble quarry pits to piggyback trailers, from steam excursions to heavy freight! From the Rutland’s last gasp to the Vermont


Railway’s modest start, you’ll enjoy great black and white photography documenting


this picturesque New England shortline from end to end. A detailed locomotive roster


and diverse equipment photos round out this look back at Vermont Railway’s early


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WhiteRiverProductions.com 54 NOVEMBER 2015 • RAILFAN.COM


format is the diagonal distance across the film plane or image sensor. Anything longer than that is considered telephoto, while anything shorter is wide angle. In the 35mm film format or full-frame digital format, the image size is 24x36mm, with a diagonal of 43mm. Thus the 50mm lens, considered the standard or “normal” lens, is actually a slight telephoto. And even though most photographers consider the 35mm lens to be a wide angle, it’s no more of a wide angle than the 50 is a telephoto. So, to me, wide angles begin at around 28mm in the full-frame format, or around 18mm in the “cropped” or DX format. Today you can get lenses that go a great deal wider. These further heighten the characteristics of the wide angle, and the considerations for using them become even more important.


Deep Advantages Wide-angle lenses accentuate the depth


of any scene, creating a more pronounced sense of distance between foreground, middle ground, and background elements. This, to me, is the most important characteristic to understand about wide angles in order to use them effectively. It’s also the antithesis of what telephoto lenses do, which is to compress the depth of the composition, making the elements appear closer to each other. If you’re most comfortable shooting with telephoto lenses, wide angles are going to require a near-complete re-calibration of your compositional eye. Nearly all good photographs, regardless


of the length of the lens used to make them, rely on a certain degree of interaction


RIGHT: Tasseled corn frames an eastbound crude oil train on BNSF Railway’s main line near Cochrane, Wis., in this “ultrawide” angle view from a July evening in 2012. The corn dominates the foreground, while the train occupies the middle ground, and the wooded bluffs of the Upper Mississippi Valley form the background. Side lighting, coming in low from the left, accentuates these relationships, adding depth by creating a dramatic interplay of light and shadow that’s seen on the corn as well as on the bluffs. Direct, over-the-shoulder lightning would not have worked nearly so well here. SCOTT LOTHES


between foreground, middle, and background elements. This is especially important for wide-angle lenses, though, since they heighten these interactions. O. Winston Link’s favorite dismissive comment of what he considered a poor photograph was, “It lacks depth.” Link used mainly normal lenses for his evocative photographs of the last years of steam on the Norfolk & Western Railway, and he was a master of creating interplay between elements both near and far. Wide- angle lenses can allow you to take this sense of interplay even further, and deeper. When using wide angles in railroad photography, this often means that the railroad subject — whether it’s the train, tracks, a signal, a structure, or even a person — is just one of at least three main elements in the composition. If the railroad subject is in the middle ground, there should also be important compositional elements in the foreground and the background. And to really take advantage of wide-angle lenses, it’s often best to get up close and personal with those


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