Tiger Steam

Tiger Steam is a CD containing over 1,000 colour images of (mostly) steam trains in South East Asia. It has been compiled by Ferro-equinologist Rob Dickinson, but also contains the work of a number of other photographers. The highlight, for me, are the 100-plus images of The Malayan Railway, taken from the late 1960s onwards. This period covers the last years of steam and into the Preservation era. There is a smattering of vintage diesel traction, but the vast majority of pictures are of Pacifics, 4-6-4 tank locos, and MacArthur 2-8-2s in ordinary service. As a bonus, there is even some industrial steam. This is an exceptional archive by any standards, and it's only a shame that Rob hasn't been able to unearth any earlier material.

Apart from the Malayan images, there are extensive collections from Burma, Cambodia, Fiji, the Philipines, Taiwan, Thailand and Viet Nam. Most of this is real, working steam, not just in sugar plantations, but also lots of genuine mainline action. There are some real gems, including mainline steam in the Philipines (long extinct), and Garretts in Burma. The CD is organised into convenient sections, each with an introduction and maps. Each image has a full caption and, in most cases, the exact date.

The quality of each image is exceptional, especially when you consider that many are over 30 years old. The software package detects your screen settings and displays the pictures at the sharpest possible resolution.

At £15.99 this might not sound like a cheap package, but consider what you get. An Ian Allen colour album at the same price would contain around 80 images. This CD pack 1,200 high quality, full screen images. If you are remotely interested in South East Asian steam, then make sure you get this CD.

Click this link for details, Tiger Steam - or take a look at this sample image.