[PRCo] Re: Steel & snow

[JacksoRE at STVINC.COM]

Thanks Fred.  You sort of have to be nuts to be driving from NY to Chicago
in January to watch N. Shore 's demise.  It was 15 below on the Sat. Night.
To start the car I had to wire the regular car battery and the battery for
the tape recorder in series.  With a good voltage I did get it started, and
never shut it down the rest of the day.  Coming back was brutal, as I was
following the storm. I stayed over in Pittsburgh.  It was all I could do to
get over some of the hills in the W. View area on rte 19 coming down from
the turnpike.  It was below zero that night in Pittsbgh, but I got it
started and headed East.  I had enough film left for a couple of shots on
rte 56. From Harrisburg east on 22 it was sheet ice, and cars in ditches
all over.  Just hours of driving on ice ruts and corrugation.   I remember
the front wheel wells being so packed with ice that the car had little
suspension travel left.  Fortunately I passed the rain/snow line around
Allentown, and it became easier going.

I remember in Ottowa making the mistake of going indoors to change film and
watching the camera become a mass of moisture.  We jumped back outside and
let the cold dry air get them fit to use again. Lesson learned.  I recall
in Quebec we stopped the car, jumped out and were running into a field to
get a nice pan shot of  an inbound car seen across a field of white when I
stepped into an invisible ditch and fell flat on my face.  I had to dig the
camera out of the snow. Would have been a fine shot.

For some of the Philly stuff I remember walking about a mile and a half in
snow to get to Flushing and the #7 IRT, as the buses that replaced NY&Q
traction in 1937 were not to be found.  Got to Penn Sta., took the Pennsy
to Philly, took my films, worked my way back to Flushing and walked the
mile and a half home since the bus service was still nonexistent.  Brooklyn
was gone by then; however I have some earlier good B&Ws, including
sweepers.  But I have always kicked myself for not doing movies at that
earlier time.  Same can be said for Queensborough bridge. (but no sweeper
there, however I can remember as a kid coming out of the Manhattan terminal
and seeing a sweeper stored on the siding tracks that would later become
the shops of the Queensborough Bridge Railway.)

I was amazed when Carl said that there were films of sweepers in DC, and
Dick Kehm should get a round of applause.

regards,  Russ

____________________Reply Separator____________________
Subject:  Steel and Snow
Author:   "Fred W. Schneider III" <fschnei at supernet.com>
Date:          1/18/02 4:33 PM


Just bought a new VCR so that I could look at Carl Schult'z new VCR "snow"
tape.  Now I'm not sure if any VCR tape is worth $105 for a new VCR, but
this one comes really close!

Dick Kotulak was frothing about how great the tape was ... after I saw all
the Washington DC scenes on routes 20 and 82 in the snow, and the fleet of
snow sweepers marching around the capital, I understand Dick. The
Pittsburgh types will like the interurbans in the snow and the sweepers in
the East End.  And if that isn't enough, there's Ottawa, QRL&P's
interurban, New York elevated lines, PTC, PST, SEPTA, the North Shore in
the closing day blizzard.  Really nice stuff.  And most of it comes from
Russ Jackson, who was lucky enough to live next to the BMT or PTC and could
get out in the snow when the rest of us didn't have that opportunity. At
the risk of bringing Ed Lybarger down on me, it "entertains."

Nice camera work Russ.  You were the one who got the cold, wet feet. You
deserve Thanks.

And Carl ... the usual nice assembly job.  The picture of the Bullet
dashing over the Ardmore car did make a nice transition from the PST to P&W
scenes!

NOW, SOME QUESTIONS CARL:

I decided to squint a little longer at my smaller TV screen because of the
future of HDTV.

The dealer from whom I bought the VCR agreed that my logic was not overtly
flawed when I bought simply a VCR instead of a VCR/TV combination because
HDTV is so close.  He explained that there isn't much being broadcast in
high definition right now but that most if not all shows will be high
definition in about seven more years and that duplicate analog and digital
signals will be phased out in about ten years.  He said that conversion
boxes will be sold ten years from now to enable people with old TV sets to
convert the HDTV signals, but he thought, as I did, that the cost of the
converters will be very high to force you to buy a high priced television
set.

Now with all this in mind, and with the idea that my VCR table library is
going to soon be out of date and possibly not even usable,

1.  What are you doing to convert your output to digital disc format?  Will
the digital discs last longer than VCR tapes and is the quality really any
higher when made from
8mm home movies?  What do you view as the reasons for and against?

2.  Do you plan to go the high definition route, or is it simply not worth
it with all the unsharp 8 mm film out there?

Thanks for your time Carl.

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