Maldon Winter Solstice - Chasing the Stream Train
Friday June 21 was the Maldon Winter Solstice Bonfire Night and I was out with a few Bendigo Camera Club members chasing and photographing the steam train.
First stop
Castlemaine railway station was the first stop to snap a few photos of the train and some passengers in full period attire before it headed on it’s 45min journey to Maldon. I did sneak onto the train to try and get some photos of the inside before it left the station with only a little fear of it leaving with me still on it without a ticket!
With 10 minutes before the train was to leave the station we jumped in the car and headed to Muckleford railway station to capture the train as it passed by.
Muckleford Railway Station
I’ve never been to this railway station before so it was good to get there and have a look around for a bit before the steam train was due to pass through the station on its way to Maldon. A nice sunset and full moon offered some photographic opportunities. I then spotted two puddles and straight away I wanted to try and reflect the train as it passed by in the water.
I did mess up the focus point and managed to get the train out of focus for most of the reflection images but did managed to make them look like miniatures! Always check where the focus point is to avoid focusing in the middle of the frame and not the subject in the background.
Maldon Railway Station
The train beat us to the final stop of the line in Maldon and with most passengers already disembarked and heading to the bonfire, access to the inside of the train was available with empty hallways and rooms ready to be captured!
The Bonfire at the Maldon Machinery Museum
A short walk in the cool night air offered views of the machinery museum from the Beehive Mine Chimney that stands tall over the area ontop a hill. With plenty of machinery and collection to look at on the way to the bonfire it was a great location to shoot!
A listening stop!
On the return journey from Maldon to Castlemaine the train was to stop at Muckleford and allow passengers to step of the train and experience a rare event. The train slowly backing away from the station in to the Ironbark Forest and then repeating the arrival in to the platform with a mix of steam, whistles and movement, all illuminated only by the steam train’s headlight and the full moon.
Knowing this I planned a few locations to shoot. First on the platform to do some long exposures of the train slowing on the platform. Once stopped and whilst passengers stepped off the train I went round the back of the train to get to the puddles I shot at earlier to try and capture hand held long and short exposures of the train as it reversed and then arrived at the platform again.
With so little light I ended up shooting at ISO 10000 just to get the shutter speeds fast enough to only blur the moving train a little. This worked about as well as I expected. I should have brought along my 17mm 1.8 to capture that extra bit of light I was unable to with the 12-40 2.8.
When the train came to a stop at the station to allow passengers to jump aboard again I grabbed my GoPro and tripod and ran around the back and up to the front of the train to get a shot before it left the station. This was a freezing run with the temperature at the time of 1’C.
End of the line
Another quick drive from Muckleford station to Castlemaine to beat the train back and watch it arrive at the station for the end of the journey. Now just after 10pm it was time to head home and get warm!.
A short video
An attempt at capturing some video using a GoPro 11, bad in low light and a little from my Olympus OMD EM1 MK3, enjoy.