For Railfans

Hello. Welcome to my site.

You are welcome to view all of the publicly available material on this site. But, please understand that, first and foremost, this is a site aimed at informing clients and potential clients about my photography and writing business.

The Web site

Though I have a strong interest in transportation and railroads in particular, this is not a railfan site, though much of the content will be of interest to railfans. (On the remainder of this page, I'll point out items of particular interest to railfans.)

Note particularly that captions of the transportation images shown on this site are aimed at a more general audience and not at railfans who may be interested in more technical aspects of what is depicted.

My primary clients are general book and magazine publishers, and, to some extent, companies in and associated with the transportation and travel industries.

Though I am best known for my coverage of transportation, particularly railroads, these are not the only subjects that I photograph or write about. While I do occasionally contribute material to railfan publications, these are not the primary target of my business efforts.

Publishing

On the other hand, my publishing efforts are aimed at the railfan community. As of February, 2002, I have available three works in a series of handbooks of railroad and transportation data.

• The first, America's Classic Railroad Places, a directory of some 200+ noteworthy locations and routes, was published in late 1998 and well received by critics. It is still in print. Work has begun on an expanded and updated edition to go on sale approximately summer, 2003, (a revised date from previous projections).

• Next came a guide to The Powder River Basin. This guidebook helps you explore remote parts of Wyoming and Montana which host some of the densest and most exciting freight railroad operations in North America. This book is now available.

If you have not already done so, I highly recommend a visit to my Powder River Basin picture page.

• The Basic Railfan Book, published in 2001, is an introduction to a variety of technical aspects of railroading (operations, equipment, signaling) and aspects of the railfan hobby (railroad photography, train travel, model railroading) for new railfans. The book contains many pointers to more in-depth sources of related material. Though aimed at new railfans, more experienced railfans may also find much of the reference data useful -- and may find it a good gift for new or young railfans.

Sample text from this book that is available on this site includes an important chapter on safety. That chapter focuses on both safety around railroads and on reporting possible safety problems to railroads. To read this safety chapter, click here.

• The latest addition, Understanding Intermodal, came in late 2002, and focuses on the entire intermodal picture, going well beyond railroads. However, railfans will find much useful information on how railroads fit into that bigger intermodal picture.

To learn more about any of the books described in the preceding paragraphs, click on the title links in those paragraphs.

• Though not specifically about railroad photography, my photography workshop book, Getting Serious about Photography, may also be of interest for railfans interested in improving their photographic skills. While the book focuses on general principles of photography, applicable in many situations, it does use a few of my railroad images as examples.

The pages describing each of these books include one with quotes from published reviews. All of the above books have drawn positive comments from reviewers.

Railroad calendars

Copies of the annual Railroading color wall calendars published by Tide-Mark Press, containing a substantial number of my photos, are available directly from me at a discount. Click on the above link for a description an overview pictures. (The 2003 calendars are already sold out and no longer available.)

Ordering

For an overview of currently available published items, please see my printable Retail Order Form. Please note that because I do the vast majority of my business with corporations, I currently do not accept credit cards. And, to keep paperwork to a minimum, I require a check with all personal orders. (I do accept corporate purchase orders and will bill these organizations.)

Other recommended pages on this site

The single most popular page on my site is my introduction to intermodal containers, the Intermodal Container FAQ (answers to frequently asked questions). This page has drawn strong praise from industry insiders and covers a lot of ground, from explaining how intermodal containers came about to how they are used.

The Transportation section of my site includes a page with data on the longest railroad tunnels of the world. And, that section includes a page of useful off-site links related to transportation, as well as pages with commentary on transportation issues..

Pictures by category

My Pictures by category page provides access to sample images in many categories, including several pages of sub categories of railroad and transit images. For those willing to consider transportation outside the United States, be sure to check out the several pages of railroad images in Austria. And, looking beyond railroads, the above-cited page also provides access to general travel pictures from North Carolina, Virginia, and Austria.

A final reminder

I license the use of my photos as a business. All of the content of this site is protected by copyright. Therefore none of the content of this site, including neither photos nor text, may be re-used in any form without specific written permission.

Railfan safety As part of the pages describing my book project, The Basic Railfan Book, I've included a sample chapter on this site. This chapter focuses on railfan safety and reporting hazardous situations to railroads. Even if you do not contemplate purchasing this book, I hope you will look at this important safety information by clicking the safety link in this sentence.

If you have your own site or want to mention one of my illustrations in a discussion list, you are welcome to provide a link to my material. However, please note that basic Internet courtesy calls for the link to be to the page containing the photos, not directly to the picture itself. By linking to to the page containing the illustration, viewers are able to see the image in the context in which it was intended to be seen, including all caption information.

All other use of use of illustrations on this site without specific written permission and the payment of appropriate fees is a violation of copyright and will be treated as such.

[Rev. 2003/01/28]

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