NYMR Steam Gala 2025 | Photography | Ant Smith

First off, here's a gallery of my photographs from the North Yorkshire Moors Railway Steam Gala 2025:

What I learnt from the Gala

The gala itself was a visual feast. I've never seen so many working steam engines in one day before - and I didn't even see them all. In fact, I totally missed the 'star attraction' (257 Squadron) and only got a brief glimpse of the beloved Lucie; but nevertheless, photographing 7 different steam trains over 2 days was a real gift. Thank you (especially the volunteers of) NYMR!

Here's what I learnt while trying to make sense of the trains I had seen - you can tell it's not a world I have been steeped in, but perhaps my naive overview will be helpful to other photographers interested in dipping their toes in this magical world.

Before this weekend I didn't know very much (or anything, really) about steam engines except that they are all of them hugely impressive pieces of kit. But they're kind of confusing, they don't all have names, and when they do the names get changed along the way. They do all have numbers, but the numbers get swapped about as well for various reasons... I'd read that 80116 had been given the number of a sister engine (80136) in honour of the last train to run the Middlesbrough to Whitby West Cliff route. I never saw 80136, but I did get a photo of 80119 which wasn't listed on the service at all! So which train was that? Surely there wasn't a typo when the number plate was ordered!?!! I *think* what happened was that 80078 was also renumbered in memory of a sister engine (80119) that also ran on the Whitby route. I think it's kind of sweet to run an engine under a sister engine's honourific number - it certainly helps to highlight parts of the history - but nonetheless confused me! I guess at least one can rely on the fact that the number you see will represent a locomotive of just the same class.

ex-Great Western stock was mostly unchanged in their (4 digit) numbers, and the ranges 1xxxx and 2xxxx designated diesel and electric stock respectively.

Sometimes engines are restored to their pre-nationalisation liveries and take their original designations (thus Repton is designated just 926, not with BR's 30926). And some engines (like Peggy, number 29) never entered the BR roster.

Leastways, all of the forgoing is what I've taken from reading around while trying to make certain I knew exactly what I had photographed. Hopefully its useful (perhaps even interesting!) at an introductory level, but I'm not claiming any expertise in all of this...

...which is perhaps just as well when you consider I hadn't even appreciated that 'steam engines' come in two main flavours: Tendered Locomotives, and Tank Engines. The former dragging a tender along with it to provide a bulk source of water and coal (or whatever fuel), presumably for heavy or long haul. Tank engines typically have the water supply in tanks that run alongside the boiler, with a more limited fuel supply behind the cab.

Tender locomotives don’t usually need trailing wheels (since the tender itself is on wheels!) - unless the firebox is large (e.g. Pacifics like Flying Scotsman, Mallard or BR's 7MT Britannia class)

Trailing wheels on tank engines support the rear-mounted fuel bunker and firebox, especially on longer wheelbase designs like the 2-6-4T.

Which brings that other set of numbers into focus, the wheel configuration: leading-driving-trailing. At the NYMR steam gala we were looking at 4 or 6 drive wheels. 6 drive wheels makes for a good all-rounder offering power for speed or for load (and gradients), but with a long wheel-base which hampers cornering. 4 drive wheels are good for speed thanks to a shorter wheel base. Repton's top running speed is comparable to the 6-drive-wheeled Black Fives (~90mph) - fewer wheels delivering the power, but they were ~10% larger and Repton itself was a lighter locomotive (perhaps 20% lighter including tender). Obviously the top speed is more a feature of the boiler's ability to generate power than of the wheel configuration itself, but the wheels do dictate what can be done with the provided power. These faster engines also tend to have more lead wheels, with a 2-axle bogie rather than a single axle pony truck, since these improve stability and offer better handling of curves.

In the 7 engines I photographed there were 6 different wheel configurations, kind of bewildering at first but they act almost like a signature: 4-4-0 fast & nimble; 4-6-0 fast & strong; 2-6-0 strong but sluggish; 2-6-4T: strong and sprightly (thanks to a bigger boiler I'd guess). Peggy, of course, with no lead wheels was never meant to be anything other than slow (perhaps 30mph max) but with relatively small drive wheels (higher torque) she sure could pull some load.

Oh! I also found that 'class' is an overloaded term, sometimes meaning 'design class' (e.g. BR Standard Class 2, or Southern Railway's Schools Class) and other times meaning 'power class' (as per BR's standardised designations).

How I took the pictures

Two-thirds of the images were shot at 105mm. This is perhaps surprising, close-field shots of large steam trains would warrant a wide-angle lens one might think. Certainly, that lets you get close which should help in avoiding the inclusion of the very many other people who were milling about on the platforms... But in practice, providing you can find a gap the longer focal length is much more successful at isolating the view. I had to switch to a wide-angle (24 to 35mm) lens to get full side-on profiles, but mostly the longer lens served me much better. In fact, the 1 shot I took at 16mmm (the last image, of number 29) I think is the least successful - the perspective is really quite un-natural. So, I definitely think a medium telephoto is the workhorse lens for this subject.

Most of the shots were also taken 'on-the-knee', rather than in a standing pose. Everyone around me was taking pictures from normal eye-level, perhaps even on a tripod. But by crouching I gave the trains more dominance in the composition, and it was easier to find a gap to shoot the view at knee level, since knees are typically narrower than shoulders! Sometimes it was worth switching platforms, to shoot the 'off side' of the train. The intervening (unoccupied) track providing much needed passenger-free space to see the train. Although the presence of others can add to the human story of the images, they add more than that. A surprising number of folk wear high-vis at these events and nothing ruins a shot more than a blob of bright orange in the background. Plus, in this modern world people can be less happy about appearing candidly in photographs, which raises all kinds of consent concerns if you want to then publish the images online. I haven't avoided all people in the shots (that would be weird), but those that contribute to the composition are typically the drivers or other staff (who surely know being photographed is a hazzard of the job!); and there are certainly no children included in any image - since that would absolutely require consent.

Most of these shots are platform-bound, since that's how our day went - we were taking advantage of NYMRs hop-on / hop-off tickets to experience the full line and all its stops from Grosmont to Pickering. Perhaps next year we will follow the trains and shoot them from afar; it isn't really popssible to do both so you takes your choice! I'm happy though, I think I got a nice range of images from this singular tactic.

Processing was largely quite natural, but with elevated micro-structure (texture) at the RAW stage to help create that 'metallic' look. I mostly shot at around +0.7EV on the exposure because I wanted to ensure I would have detail in the dark underbellies of these creatures. At times I had to drop to -0.7EV because it was a very bright sunny day by the afternoon and when I had sky in the shots the steam plumes and clouds wanted to burnout.

I kept the ISO at 800 and the aperture at f/8.0. This meant my shutter speeds were fast (from about 1/1000^th to 3/1000^ths of a second) for handheld shots of trains that were typically still moving (although mostly slowly) as I shot them. Because I was shooting at enough distance to frame the entire engine this aperture gave me enough depth of field even with a short telephoto lens. I perhaps should have shot with a wider aperture at times to get some blur into the backgrounds, but honestly once an engine arrives everything happens so fast there's little time for twiddling on with settings. In fact, I'd say for this kind of subject the main concern needs to be precision in the framing, more than anything else.

Lastly, in terms of photographing steam trains, I think the most critical factor is to ensure you photograph the steam! Otherwise one may as well be looking at them in a museum. The fact that they are working is a critical part of the story, and it is the steam that breathes life into the images. I think, anyway.

The Trains I photographed

I hope I got all of the above details at least right-ish, very happy to hear if anyone else knows better! Contact: me@antsmith.net