A mixed day in the sunshine

I was out and about both railways yesterday and got some great shots of trains and sunshine, an unbeatable combination.

Here is some of the stuff I got on the WHR...

Here is a less sucessful shot I got on the FR...

Beer and flowers

Over the last weekend we had the beer festival on the WHR so I spent Saturday trying to capture a flavour of the goings on. people drinking beer is not the most fascinating sight so this year I've tried to mix in a good dose of hot train action too.

The way things worked out it meant that both Funkey diesels were in the platform at Waufawr and both facing Caernarfon with trains so I captured that moment and a variety of other Garratt worked services. Anyway you can see the results for your self...

This week the sun has been shining and so I got in the car and shot over to Bodnant Gardens in the Conwy valley to add a chapter to the Year in Snowdonia. It was baking hot but the sky was blue and the flowers were very... flowery.

This is the house and one of the formal gardens with its ornamental lake.

Blaenau 30 and a fish

It has been a busy week all round here at F&WHR towers, we've been getting ready for the celebrations this weekend of the 30th anniversary of opening the railway back to Blaenau in 1982... makes me feel old as my first volunteering was in January 1981.

Anyway, before I got as far as Blaenau I got sidetracked by the catering manager, Dylan. He said 'Come and look at this fish.' So I did and it was an enormous halibut. Chef Dave was about to prepare it for use in Spooner's and it seemed like a good opportunity to shoot something different and we even got to taste the finished product which was very tasty indeed.

The main work I've done with the video this week has been yesterday and today up at the other end of the FR. Lots of trains coming and going and a couple of rare loco sightings. The ALCO was dragged out of the shed in Glan y Pwll for people to look at as it was a favourite around the time of the opening to Blaenau. The other guest was visiting from the Statfold Barn Railway although it had been a resident at Boston Lodge for some years before its restoration, namely the Peckett now known as Harrogate but known on the FR as Volunteer. It looks great in shiny green paint and made a fine sight on the TYG- BL Ff shuttle with Palmerston. I got a nice shot at Groby Junction but could have done better and had better sunshine, one to remember for later in the year.

Did you miss me?

I've been very busy and had a week off since I last added anything here so it is time for a bit of a catch up. The last post had me off to film a sunset... it clouded over but I did get some more daffs and sheep to finish the spring section of 'The Year in Snowdonia'. This programme is coming along and I only have a few section left to shoot, unfortunately this includes some autumn leaves etc so it won't be finished until later in the year.

Sadly Alan Pegler passed away earlier in the year but some close friends and family took a ride on the WHR to mark the occasion and I chased the train as far as Pont Cae'r Gors, these are the results.

Another important part of my video making is the ability to make promotional packages, recently I've re edited and uploaded both the WHR Beer festival and Spooner's Boat which is the NRM, the boat and the DVD.

In the middle of March I chased 'The Snowdonian' up and down both railways in one day, some of the highlights of this trip can be seen here.

That was quite a day, I was knackered afterwards and had clocked up quite a few miles in the car too.

At the very end of the month I followed Palmerston to Carrog to the Llangollen Steam Railway. It shared a dual gauge track with Dolgoch from the Talyllyn, both were in steam on the Saturday I was there along with loads of standard gauge stuff too.

Coming up soon is Blaenau 30 and then the official unveiling of Hugh Napier, the installation of the new TYB bridge and the Beer festival... phew loads to do. I'm also keeping an eye open for those gnomes.

Dafs, sheep and the Square

The sun has continued to shine and so I've been out and about getting some generic 'spring' shots for the Year in Snowdonia project. At the moment daffodils and sheep are my main focus but while I was at Tan y Bwlch shooting the dafs  I realised that it was nearly time for the down train so I walked out towards Creau bank and got some nice shots of a stream and of the train passing, shot from below.

Here is a quick chop together of some of what I got. Now I'm back off to get some more, hopefully to include a sunset.

A Bridge too far?

This morning dawned bright and early and I was off to Minffordd yard with the camera to record the new Tan y Bwlch footbridge being transported. It has been sitting on a flat wagon in the coal road for some time but yesterday it was shunted into the main part of the yard in readiness for its trip today.

Four of us rode on the bridge which was propelled up the line by Hunslet diesel Moel Hebog. All went as planned and it was shunted into the short siding at the top end of TYB. After a cup of tea we returned to Minffordd dropping off some bricks and cement for the drains gang to use later this weekend.

I have done a quick edit which timed out at about fourteen minutes but won't upload this till the bridge is craned into place, however I've also chopped it down to three minutes so you can see what I was up to.

Shop Moving

Yesterday I spent the day following the container which had been the booking office and shop at Pont Croesor as it was taken to Blaenau. It was a long day but I didn't work as hard as the people actually doing the move. Today I've uploaded and edited a package which will be on You tube and will probably form a chapter in the Year in the life of the F&WHR 2012. It will get a re edit nearer the end of the year as there will be shots of it in action and so on to add.

Once I had loaded all the footage from the camera onto the computer I was faced with over an hour and twenty minutes of footage but I wanted the finished piece to be about ten minutes. The hardest part was telling the story of the move and selecting pictures which helped do this. To some extent it is obvious what to leave out; there was quite a lot of 'nothing happening but it is about to' footage from yesterday. It is easier to cut this out than to invent it after the action has started. E.g waiting for a train to come around a corner, it is much better to start the camera rolling before you see the train so you get the whole shot.

My first edit purely involved cutting out unusable shots and the above mentioned waiting. This got it down to about 25 minutes. The next process is to start making a few more 'artisitic' judgements and to cut out or cut down the length of dull shots. This got me down to about about 16 minutes; getting there.

The next process is to add captions, this really makes me concentrate on the 'narrative arc'. The more captions needed the less well I've captured the essential story in picture terms. I only needed half a dozen or so today so hopefully it all makes visual sense. Once I've captioned it, I watch it through again take out any more surplus material. This is usually starts and ends of shots. having done this I had it down to just over 13 minutes but I didn't want to remove anything else so this is its finished length.

Before I render it and upload it to Youtube I get Andrew Thomas the F&WHR spin paramedic to make sure my captions make sense and are puntuated and spelled properly, not my strongest suit.

See what you think.