Feel free to send any and every additional peice of information, correction, etc. about anything that appears in this site. Your support is appreciated.
All photos were taken by Paul Novarese or David Kudrav, unless otherwise noted.
Films used are (typically) Kodak Gold 100, Kodak Gold 200, Kodak Gold 400 (Max), or Kodak Gold 800 Max for color; Kodak Tmax 100 is used for black and white photos. There are a few photos shot on Fuji 100 and 400--when you're chasing a train, you buy whatever the nearest store carries. (The Max films work very well but do not replace 100 or 200 speed on bright days).
Not only do I tend to buy American film, but I also get the best color results from Kodak film processed with Kodak chemicals onto Kodak paper. I have tried Fuji film with Fuji chemicals and paper, I have tried Kodak film with Fuji chemicals and paper, I have tried Fuji film with Kodak chemicals and paper, I have tried mixing Fuji chemicals with Kodak paper and the reverse. Nothing is better than the all Kodak process.
All photos were printed on either Kodak or AGFA paper (maybe 1% are on Fuji paper). Please note that I am very dissatisfied with AGFA paper and chemicals as bright colors (especially green) never come out quite right. The local photomat formerly used AGFA exclusively, but have recently converted to Kodak.
Camera's used include a totally-manual late 1940's Pentax (50mm manual focus lens), a Minolta AF101R (point and click), a 1980's Nikon (a large assortment of autofocus lenses), and a Canon Eos Elan IIE (generally a 28-80mm autofocus lens, with occational longer lenses).
Photo's were scanned using a variety of flatbed scanners available at the University of Alabama. Adobe Photoshop, Paintshop Pro, and MS Photo Editor were used to crop, enhance, touch up, etc.
Frames suck. These pages do make use of Server Side Includes (SSI), which makes them easier to maintain; the viewer of these pages (you), will not notice the SSIs.
The trains in these pictures were either stumbled upon, sought out, or found with the assistance of radio scanners. Perhaps someday we'll have radio frequencies on these pages... (they are available else-where on the net or .... in books! (Radio Shack carries a book with all kinds of frequencies in it and it has proven most handy)). Structures were either stumbled upon, common knowledge, or we were tipped off to their locations by kind citizens and/or railroad employees.
Paul Novarese and David Kudrav advocate the safe photography of trains. Do not go arround down crossing gates, cross fences, ignore warning signs, or step too close to heavy machinery in your pursuit of happiness. It's generally easy to get permission to go someplace to take a few pictures (especially with a camera arround you neck)--don't tresspass.
And when you hear someone yell "Hot Rail!" get off the tracks cause a train is coming!
Paul Novarese is a former resident of the Mallet Assembly, and currently works for Compaq-Digital in Atlanta as a network administrator. He has a degree in Mathematics from The University of Alabama. David Kudrav is a current resident of Mallet Assembly, The University of Alabama's Men's Honors Residence Program. David is majoring in Electrical Engineering.
Shout-outs goto Jeff "the Axe Murder" Robertson (aka "the Renegade Robot"), Ryan Langford, Jason Parham, the North Alabama Railroad Museum, Don "the Godfather" (former Yardmaster, Tuscaloosa Yard, KCS), anyone else who has ever gone railfanning with us, and the kind employees of any and all railroads who have ever tipped off, helped out, or provided information to railfans.
