Why Hardly No Interior Photos of Locomotives

I hope this post is in the right place, I didn't see a catagory specific to railroad books.

I have probaby twenty or so railroad books and one thing I've noticed that is missing in most of them are any interior photos of locomotive cabs (both steam and diesel). Personally, I love photos or books that show the inside and all the controls that operate the locomotive.

I was wondering if anyone here knew of any books out there that had good interior cab photos. One in particulare I've looked for is the inside of a GG1.

Thanks for the help!

It's very hard to take a good photo of the interior of an engine. First, you have lighting issues. Second, you have focal issues. Third, you have field of view issues. It's possible to use a wide-angle lens to address the latter, but then everything gets distorted.

If you go to RailPictures.net, scroll down to the Railroad Photo Search Engine section, then go down to the drop-down menu that says "Select Category..." and choose In-Cab Photos, and then click the "Find the Photos!" button, you will get lots and lots of photos from inside the locomotive.

Here are a few that I particularly like:


http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=218814

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=218354

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=217973

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=217159

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=215987

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=215821

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=215528

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=215395

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=213262

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=212765

http://www.railpictures.net/viewphoto.php?id=211878

Enjoy!

Thanks for the replies!

I'm a photographer and don't buy the "its hard" excuse. I know it's not as simple as point-and-shoot but it's not that difficult.

It is actually very easy with any good SLR camera with a strobe, it is helpful if you have an additional slave strobe with a spring clamp that you can secure halfway back in the engine room of cab type units. Autofocus cameras sometimes have trouble shooting down the walkway of a dark engine room, using a manual focus camera with the focus set for about ten feet works well. I would recommend using a fixed focal length wide angle lens to avoid the "barrel" distortion of zooms, which gets very noticable in this kind of photography.

As far a published interior photos are concerned, many of the current crop of railroad book authors are mass production writers who have never worked for a railroad or locomotive builder, don't care to put the additional time and effort into their work, or don't care to get their clothes dirty doing this kind of photography. Taking exterior shots and running them really big to kill lots of space gets them to their payday a lot quicker than doing detailed technical work. I have noticed that some of them have trouble getting the terminology of things on the outside of the locomotive correct, so getting an interior shot captioned properly might be a problem for them.

MX

There's also the three pages of cabshots stickied at the top of this forum

I have about 750 photos of a GG1 interior. Let me know what you need them for and I might be able to help you out.

RussNelson wrote:It's very hard to take a good photo of the interior of an engine. First, you have lighting issues. Second, you have focal issues. Third, you have field of view issues.

Fourth, 99% of train photos are taken by railfans who can view the outside of the locomotive, but don't have access to the inside!

Scot

Mr Vscimone,

We have a locomotive cab thread, it's the only sticky kept here.

If your photos are already hosted someone, please go ahead and link some of the urls in that thread. Please don't upload them directly, railroad.net is not a webhost service. Mike, Jessy, and Otto sometimes have to pay for the bandwidth.

WSH wrote:I'm a photographer and don't buy the "its hard" excuse. I know it's not as simple as point-and-shoot but it's not that difficult.

What excuse? The space in most cabs does not make it easy at all to take a shot of the entire cab. It would require a special lens. You are not going to do it with a simple auto focus digital camera most people own. You answered your own question, you are a photgrapher so it might be easy for you. But to the vast majority of people who are legally allowed to be in locomotive cabs, we are not running around with professional camera and lens setups. In fact, on many railroads it is against the rules anyhow.

NV290 wrote:But to the vast majority of people who are legally allowed to be in locomotive cabs, we are not running around with professional camera and lens setups. In fact, on many railroads it is against the rules anyhow.

In today's world this is a key issue ... in an operating railroad environment (e.g. - not parked, shutdown, and/or on static display) any kind of personal electronics -- including digital cameras -- are now banned by the FRA (for crew use). There are only two types of devices allowed -- one is a laptop/notebook type device specifically for rulebook purposes, another is a push-to-talk cellphone type device (think NEXTEL) used in liu of a 2-way radio ... if used AS a 2-way radio.

The text of the emergency order can be found here : http://www.fra.dot.gov/downloads/PubAff ... rder26.pdf

There is a provided-for exception to this ... a non crew authorized person in the cab, who has by prior approval (and briefing) by both the railroad and the operating crew, been granted permission to use his/her equipment.

For instance, let's say that you're a scenic railroad, and you offer cab rides. You have to 1) authorize that non-crew person to be in the cab in the first place and 2) with prior knowledge and approval, grant them approval for their personal electronic device/digital camera.

The Emergency Order allows for this specific type of exception, but it's very very restricted.

- litz

litz wrote: There are only two types of devices allowed -- one is a laptop/notebook type device specifically for rulebook purposes,

While the FRA is OK with that, individual railroads have the option to make any FRA rules more strict. Alot of railroads do not allow laptops in the cab for any purpose.

litz wrote:another is a push-to-talk cellphone type device (think NEXTEL) used in liu of a 2-way radio ... if used AS a 2-way radio.

And to add, this must a be a company issued device, not a personal device.

But you bring up excellent points about cameras in the cab.