I went down to the railroad this morning to try to get an image that was different than just a train. Even these beautiful old engines blowing steam out in a huge cloud is less exciting the more you see and photograph it.
I missed the blowouts anyway so I was talking to this man who was working with oil and grease and what impressed me was that his clothes were as clean as in a Tide commercial. All I could think of was that he probably embraces clean living unlike the characters in the cult classic Trainspotting.
As one of the junkies in the movie said: “We start off with high hopes, then we bottle it. We realise that we’re all going to die, without really finding out the big answers. Basically, we live a short disappointing life; and then we die. We fill up our lives with shite, things like careers and relationships to delude ourselves that it isn’t all totally pointless.”
If only they did less heroin and ate more vegetables their attitudes would probably be completely different. Or not.
Photography OCD 
Terrific photo Mike. 😀
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Thank you Cee. Of course you and I both know about the hundreds of less than terrific ones that end in the recycle bin. Mine anyway.
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Great shot and I do like the subject. It’s so easy to photograph a train, but to spot some finer detail like this takes a bit more imagination and creativity.
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Thanks Vicki. I live close by there and over the years found that shots with people in them are much more interesting. When I saw the old oil can I felt it had potential. Practice and taking hundreds (thousands) of shots that end up getting deleted seems to be the ticket to getting a few good ones.
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I agree with the practice and taking of thousands of shots, Mike. I used to take 1000 a week years ago, but now much, much less as I’m a better judge of light and holding the camera still.
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I think it helps to be less of a perfectionist. I delete photos that are probably pretty good but slightly flawed in some way. Not 100% sharp, need to be cropped or less than amazing light. Probably the most important thing is to ask yourself why you want to take the shot or F.A.R.T as Ken Rockwell put it. https://kenrockwell.com/tech/fart.htm
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