Keith Walker's Steam Trains

I have always had a passing interest in steam trains. As you probably know, steam disappeared from our national rail network in the late 60’s, but reappeared thanks to some good luck and the hard work of a band of true enthusiasts in the mid 70’s. This was in the form of ‘heritage’ railways, using parts of lines closed by the Beeching Report.

As a project in retirement I decided I would try and recapture railway photography of old using the Heritage railways, and I am lucky in that two are close by, and my favourite Severn Valley Railway is accessible.

These railways run one or two enthusiast gala weekends every year when an intensive timetable is operated, and provide good photographic opportunities, although engines are much cleaner than they were in BR days and ‘high-viz’ jackets have to be avoided!. Suitable locations have also to be ‘found’, most often through talking to other photographers.

Railway photographers back in the day would not have had the advantage of auto focus and zoom lenses. Therefore I was determined to use (digital) Leica M rangefinders and lenses. All the images here were taken by pre-focusing. I processed them using Lightroom Classic. Black and white