Taking photos inside a train?

Amtrak Unlimited Discussion Forum

Help Support Amtrak Unlimited Discussion Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.
I've been taking photos on the trains for years, often, not as good quality as what many users include in their trip reports here, but still, preserving a memory, be it of a train station at night in the winter, or the view from the window in the golden late afternoon light. Train photography is awesome and thankfully there are people who are better at it and who share their pictures.
No one has ever said anything to me. It might be because I'm not taking photos of people. I wouldn't want to be photographed, so treating others the same way.
 
I've been taking photos on the trains for years, often, not as good quality as what many users include in their trip reports here, but still, preserving a memory, be it of a train station at night in the winter, or the view from the window in the golden late afternoon light. Train photography is awesome and thankfully there are people who are better at it and who share their pictures.
No one has ever said anything to me. It might be because I'm not taking photos of people. I wouldn't want to be photographed, so treating others the same way.

Michigan Mom - your photos as old as they are might get better if you use a recent iPhone or a camera with software designed for best results. My iphone7 is very good but my iPhone 11 is incredible.

Composition is something software can not help with. It’s fun to choose subject matter

BACK OF TRAIN STUDY (June 2022)
St Paul EB (Wide and zoom)
Sacramento CS
Tucson TE
CB980D77-4ACD-405C-9E79-C56C2129CA1A.jpegD182C151-13F7-4B51-A708-72AA86B9C41E.jpeg

7E5508A7-384D-4903-9DD8-AF08DDF93684.jpeg
ED0A3F68-C031-4411-A0AC-E8576FA796BC.jpeg
 
I can't produce proof at the moment but it was common knowledge and widely reported for a number of years after the attack. I know of people stopped from taking photos in the subway and around the Pulaski Skyway around 2006. And in my post I did clarify with a "might be" correct.
I've been stopped for taking photos many times, rarely by cops but often by security personnel. Typically it turns out they don't actually want to actually stop me taking photos but are curious as to what I am doing loitering around in a location where people generally don't loiter. Typically showing them some of the train photos on my camera convinces them I'm a harmless crank and not plotting something.

Once such an agent even said, you need to be careful, this is a dangerous area. But don't worry, we're keeping an eye open for your benefit as well.

On the other hand I have on a few occasions been asked to move on because there were for example dockyard installations that I wasn't allowed to photograph without permission. They asked me politely and kindly and so I complied.
 
Those photos are just gorgeous Robert. I'm not crazy about the camera in my old iPhone, a regular old Kodak camera, or even digital camera, took better pictures at night or with lights involved. I know the newer phones are better but it will be a while before I upgrade. I miss Kodachrome.
 
I miss Kodachrome.
I do not miss running out of film, being gouged near anything photogenic, visiting a developer twice (or waiting weeks), manufacturing defects and processing mistakes, and paying thrice for every image (film, processing, scanning). What I find interesting is that most of what people seem to dislike about digital formats is that they fail to deviate from reality in the same way that their favorite analog format did, which presumably explains why filters are so popular.

Koda-chro-o-ome
They give us those nice bright colors
They give us the greens of summers
Makes you think all the world's a sunny day, oh yeah
I got a Nikon camera
I love to take a photograph
So mama, don't take my Kodachrome away
 
Last edited:
I do not miss running out of film, being gouged near anything photogenic, visiting a developer twice (or waiting weeks), manufacturing defects and processing mistakes, and paying thrice for every image (film, processing, scanning). What I find interesting is that most of what people seem to dislike about digital formats is that they fail to deviate from reality in the same way that their favorite analog format did, which presumably explains why filters are so popular.

Koda-chro-o-ome
They give us those nice bright colors
They give us the greens of summers
Makes you think all the world's a sunny day, oh yeah
I got a Nikon camera
I love to take a photograph
So mama, don't take my Kodachrome away
One of my favorite songs! A Paul Simon classic.
 
Those photos are just gorgeous Robert. I'm not crazy about the camera in my old iPhone, a regular old Kodak camera, or even digital camera, took better pictures at night or with lights involved. I know the newer phones are better but it will be a while before I upgrade. I miss Kodachrome.
Thank you Michigan Mom. Love to see your photos. There seem to be a slow resurgence back to film - the new vinyl. haha. The film to use is Ilford’s XP2 black & white a very fun and versatile film. My Dad got me started in learning darkroom in 1957 he did not like modern digital at all.

Much of the time I use the iPhone photo editor but there’s no “Kodachrome button”.

The shot below did not pop like Kodachrome as much as I tried with the editing feature

END OF TRAIN STUDY
LSL
in ALB - NYP train connects to BOS the onto CHI. This was my last trip LSL. (DE/LSL/EB/CS/PS/TE)

... not Kodachrome...

607A25B0-C055-4AF9-8126-8FAC315C1A55.jpeg
 
In this shot I wanted to get a female conductor assisting with couple the trains in Albany. I stopped shooting “the coupling” mainly because there were several cameras recording. Overkill.

In my professional video world I seldom got asked to omit a person(s) image. It was out of courtesy that I would. If doing a news story about female conductors I would have obviously asked ahead of time. People love to talk about the job or cause they work for. The Amtrak Guidelines for image/Video are good one separating amateur and professional.

In schools I sometimes had to have clearance beforehand and onetime a five year old was entertained in another room while I recorded elsewhere.

I enjoyed recording local sports teams - a rival hockey team had a fight on the ice resulting in a “pile/up” and clearing both benches. Kinda awesome. Out of courtesy we let the athletic director edit out the fight.


Once I was on a schooner crewed by youth convicts and found it a challenge not to use shots of faces other than staff. Again out of courtesy but we had no choice.

But the domain of obscenity and violence is different from Broadcast TV to the more lenient Cable TV. But as a former professional it is usually easy to know if someone minds having their picture taken - public or private. No big deal either way.
 
I have on a few occasions been asked to move on because there were for example dockyard installations that I wasn't allowed to photograph without permission. They asked me politely and kindly and so I complied

Never have had anyone object when I have taken photos on a train, but, I did have an experience that yours. Hilo: returning from a shore excursion, there was another cruise ship near mine that I wanted to take a picture. A security guard rudely told me if I did so, he would confiscate my camera. I didn't take the picture,, but, I certainly didn't appreciate his attitude.
 
This feeble effort is one of my favorites, although upon uploading the dimensions don't look like the same image, exactly. Anyway it's a station in Montana (Wolf Point maybe?) and taken with a digital camera I was getting used to at the time before it broke.
It is Whitefish.

Good luck getting that many trees to grow east of the mountains :)
 
Back
Top