Night Stalker Photo Works, LLC.

01/17/2024

I’ve had a few emails recently asking why I’ve had no new productions. Among other things my real job has kept me very busy. But, the real draw on my time has been a very large model railroad that I’m building. I’ve been exclusively focused on it for more than 2 years now,

Once I get a little further along, I fully intend to get back trackside again. I miss the solitude of working at night along the railroad.

In the meantime, here’s a video update of how the layout construction is progressing.

12/19/2021

Got out to shoot the first 1309 revenue trips on Friday... this was what I thought was the nicest of the evening's take. :-)

WMSR #1309 (ex-C&O 1309) on one of its first revenue runs since 1956 when it was retired from coal service by the Chesapeake & Ohio Railway. After sitting in the elements for 65 years, it's found a new lease on life hauling tourists along the Allegheny Highlands Trail and former Western Maryland Rai...

02/18/2021

Little blast from the past I’d forgotten about... the photo of the theatre automatically loads from WHSVs page. 🤷‍♂️

It's been 60 years since photographer O. Winston Link captured history in the Shenandoah Valley.

02/16/2021

When CSX pulls a rabbit out of its hat and sends all 3 of its "Pride In Service" engines through on a nighttime train. It probably behooves you to make time to get a shot, and what better place than Ashland, Virginia in front of Tiny Tim's Hobby Shop right in downtown?

In a rather unexpected turn of events, CSX pulled all 3 of their "Pride In Service" units out of storage in Waycross, Georgia and put them in charge of Q410. A daily manifest that runs from Waycross to Selkirk, NY. As one can imagine, a train with unique engines like this tends to get lots of attent...

02/15/2020

Scratched the "Wig Wag" at Delhi, Colorado off my list of things to shoot at night. Too bad Amtrak sent an engine that looks like it had a few too many runs across a minefield.

The former Santa Fe between Trinidad and La Junta, CO sees exactly two trains per day... AMTRAK's Southwest Chief. Along this line is a relic of a different era known as a "Mechanical Flagman" or more commonly a "Wig Wag". This particular Wig Wag has the distinction of being the last one in the Unit...

01/30/2020

Our youngest Night Stalker spent most of her time at Maggie's Clown shows and getting amazing balloons from Balloons By Blake at this years Amherst Train Show in Springfield MA!

We would love to see how your new artwork looks hanging on your walls! Feel free to post your photo on this post!

01/29/2020

Yours truly has to be in Clovis, NM for his real job in about two weeks. Are any of the semaphores still in place along the TRANSCON?

01/27/2020

Thanks to everyone who stopped by to visit and chat at The Big E this weekend. We all had a great time meeting new friends and talking trains. lots of requests for calendars this year, so I’ll be looking at options for a 2021 edition.

01/11/2020

Springfield is 2 weeks away! Anyone gonna stop by our spot in the Mallory Building to shoot the breeze and check out some of this year’s newest pieces I’ll have for sale?

10/06/2019

Paid my first visit to the Strasburg Railroad last night. I'd never been there before this little event. Here's a shot of the 611 in the backshop area venting its steam reservoir.

No sadistic banana republic terrorists were harmed in the production of this photograph.

Lighting provided by Lerro Productions.

N&W 611 vents its steam reservoir as part of a night photo session hosted by the Strasburg Railroad in Pennsylvania in October 2019.

09/28/2019

Here at a very small show in Massena, NY. It was a good excuse to come visit my grandparents. 😁

09/22/2019

Nobody Calls Me Yellow - Despite the appearance, this shot was one of the more tricky ones to setup. There is at most 20 feet of clearance between the rails and tree line on either side of them. So that means your lighting is exceptionally close to the tracks.

To make matters more challenging; the location only lends itself to the ubiquitous 3/4 "we**ie" so you have to be able to spread light at least deep enough to fully illuminate the side of the train.

How do you overcome this? It's not easy, but in this case, you're looking at the product of only 5 speedlights, all at 1/2 power or less and angled up from the ground nearly 60 degrees to avoid the washout look of flash in close proximity.

In this instance, I slightly missed the mark on the end of the lead unit as evidenced by the darker area by the radiators; but it still works to remind the viewer that this is nighttime after all.

The original EMD SD70 was first introduced in the mid 1980s with CONRAIL. In 1989, when NS and CSX broke up their respective shares of CONRAIL, they also took over the pending locomotive orders. Interestingly, CSX had already been favoring AC-traction and agreed to keep its share of the order as SD7...