Looks at my bush!

Bit of a bumper update for Catcott, with yesterday seeing a few trees finished off from copper wire originals.

Bend wire > solder joins > cover thicker bits in masking tape > cover in Humbrol Dry Clay (might as well use it up) > paint in thick PVA to strengthen > add a fine gossamer of Woodland Scenics microfibre > spray a mist of matt black and grey primer over whole tree > spray microfibre with photomount > dust on Anita Decor & Silvia 'tree foliage' scatter > adjust colour with 'Ford Laural Green' (Halfords) > Place under layout lighting > realize looks too emerald > adjust with diluted biege/greeny matt emusion PVA mix through an artist's diffuser > have a Westons Cider. Gottit?

Other growth (much still loose, just positioned for appraisal - only rear fixed so far), scatter coated seafoam, rubber nag's hair (what happens to the horse, is it still alive, dog food or a 'plat du jour' in Paris? Guess we'll never know, let's not think about it...) and some Heiki tree foliage. Re-coloured as per the trees. Have another cider.

Still much to do, should really sort out the gate targets, just working out how to get a really round (really round!) and clean mask when adding the white surrounds to the red centre. For the sceptics, everything you see here is 'as is', no sky photoshopperrrtrickerypoos......... It's interesting how the little Canon compact makes the backscene appear bluer over the more subtle Nikon DSLR. Of course one could match them with Photoshop, maybe when the layout is finished. Lots still to do....maybe another cider and some sleep first, there's no rush.........

Oh yes, forgot to say, added the climbing rose to the cottage.....

Want to find out more?

More hairy Bits

Catcott, 16 May 2008, added the hairy bits to the right hand side, a mix of hanging basket liner and Silfor, in turn colour adjusted with this odd greeny PVA mix I made up some years ago which has been used on both Arne Wharf and Cement Quay, stippled on with a 1 inch brush. Before setting, the fibres were brushed upwards with some L shaped tweezers. The grass was then finished off with a buff colour matt emulsion just on the tips of the blades. This way the Silfor and hanging basket liner blend quite well. Still some tidying up of stray hairs to do.

As per the real structure, there was a water butt, this is simply a tube of corrugated plasticard wrapped around 1/2" chopped off the end of a pencil after failing to find anything white metal at Expo EM today. In the event scratchbuilding only took a few minutes. One of the shots shows just how close the front of the cottage was to the running line (as was the real thing). There will be a little low fence from old sleepers in due course between the cottage and the railway and probably some other standard Exmouth Junction style sheds etc.

To replicate the very fine chicken wire on the gates, I dug out some gift wrapping ribbon (gauze with 0.5 mm holes), having decided that the supplied gauze was way to course (scale 6 inch holes, probably OK for gauge 1).

Still much to do, one of the bigger jobs being trees and some signals to protect the crossing. One will be a LSWR latice (bought today from Wizard Models at Expo EM), the other, a tall wooden S&D post maybe, like the one at Bason Bridge. The low relief shed will look better when the end has a bush there to hide the transition to backscene.

The muddy area in front of the cottage, will be a vegetable patch/allotment soon.

Radstock's Finest!

Another 24 hours, another snap, this time showing the beginnings of the grassy bits on the left hand side of the layout. There will be a bank of willow in front of the image with the telegraph pole in the distance to mask the Highbridge side of the layout's exit. The goods shed roof is still loose (and it shows too), pending that there will be some internal detail before being fixed into place. I could say that the reason for the shed's slight lilt to the right is because it's sinking into the bog, it's simply that it has not been bedded into the ground properly yet (I fix all my buildings to layouts - less things to pack up after a show and hopefully no gaps around the bases)...................

The loco is a weathered Bachmann one, renumbered to reflect one of Radstock's finest or worst, depend on your viewpoint. On the former S&DJR, these engines were mainly used as bankers, the 3 link rather than screw coupling being correct for this particular engine. They did make the odd sojourn down the Highbridge Branch from time to time.

The photographer's spanking new Austin A30 Countryman (Springside) contrasts well with wheezy LMS heap which is performing a spot of shunting (Parkside Dundas LMS CCT). The area just to the right of the car is likely to be a small coal dump.

Deepest, remotest, most rural Somerset....

The pic to the left of Catcott Crossing Halt, shows the attack of the hanging basket liner earlier today. It will be trimmed, using small scissors and a vacuum cleaner to make it stand up. It will then be sprayed (a brush will be used upder the platform) very lightly with a highly diluted PVA/yellowy/browny/greeny emulsion mix using a toothbrush. Then, with an old vacuum cleaner it will be vacuumed again whilst wet to make sure the grass is still as upright as possible. The grass under the flatform will be left messy, the grass at the rear will be trimmed more so it looks less like the mower has been emptied. The glue/paint mix ultimately sets hard and stops the shreds of hanging basket liner breaking off and going everywhere it shouldn't.

The courser ballast is sand from the Solent strained through a fine sieve, something I've been using for years (Combwich). I did a test section the other night with some Green Scenes stuff but it didn't look right, it looking like old tea leaves in colour once dry. The beach sand is tiny pebbles, being almost round, the grains literally roll into place. It also takes PVA well too, in fact alot better than granite or whatever it is that the scenery suppliers give us.

‘Anglicizing an Austrian’

'Anglicizing an Austrian’
aka ‘transforming a smart Austrian, into a rusty, old & possibly English style leaking wheezer geezer’.

Having thoroughly enjoyed the feature by in a recent 009 Socielty Newsletter on how to anglicise the Bachmann Liliput HO Zillertal Bahn 2-6-2 a couple of months ago in 009 News, I remembered that I had one of these locomotives hidden in the garage collecting dust.

It was from one of those spur of the moment purchases a couple of years before, probably because I feared it was going out of production.

Anyway, back to the conversion, I followed the instructions as in 009 News closely as possible as my spare parts box allowed, using plasticard to deepen the body and to revise the cab windows to something more British is style.

I then had to improvise, not having a suitable smokebox door, I removed the flat head from a drawing pin, this becoming the door! A hole was drilled into the middle to take and old handrail knob from a Kays kit (there must be hundreds of these dreadful kits never finished?) and a pin head to act the lever for opening it.

Further handrail knobs and bits of brass wire were used for the cabside handrails. British locos have less in the way of steam spaghetti than their foreign counterparts, so some of those bits were removed (I’m non technical, I know steam locos use coal, fire and water, that’s about it!). Some thin beading was added along the edges of the side tank tops from fine plastic strip. Then, some coal rails were added at the cab end of the tanks, after seeing a picture of the Former Welsh Highland Railway loco ‘Russell’ in a book of ‘The Railways of Purbeck’ by the late R.W. Kidner. The little loco then had a couple of ‘buffer beams’ added out of some spare girder section from a Walther’s Cornerstone building kit for that real DIY bodged repair often seen on industrial loco’s. I’ve always liked industrial grot over twee pretty engines, I think it would be true to say that it has been achieved here!

That’s just about it, the loco was then sprayed matt black from an aerosol, had brass elliptical maker’s plate from a Class 52 Western of all things! It was then weathered up in my usual fashion using matt colour washes and dry brushing, until it started to look suitably decrepit.


Whilst I’m not sure it looks totally British in style, it maybe could pass as something UK built for export to the colonies. My story is that it came back from war torn France after the Great War.

The loco, after a good couple of hours running round and round Arne Wharf (where it really looks the part I hasten to add), runs beautifully. The only problem is that due to the large overhand and my tight curves, most stock, irrespective of which way around the loco is facing, tends to get pulled off the rails on the bends! Oh well, better build another layout!

When steam goes in the wrong direction

In the good company of RPG members Mr Wright & Mr Brunt, 34067 'Tangmere' successfully hides the Queen of Scotts rake of vintage carriages, as it blasts through Walton on Thames with a private birthday charter from Weybridge to Canterbury on Saturday 19 April 2008.

Canon G9 appraisal

Canon G9 review. As long as you don't expect this camera to perform like a DSLR, for a small carry everywhere camera it's great. Saying that, with careful technique and with the right subject, shooting RAW at 80iso comes pretty close. Build quality is quite assuring with the cool metal body. The lens is the weak link I imagine, just have to look after it I suppose, after all it is an electronic item not really designed to be thrown about like a football. My fear is that I might turn the camera on whilst it’s in my pocket, Would it break? Or would it simply not extend the lens with some kind of built in protection? I’m not trying it out.

If you want to be serious with it, Adobe RAW in CS3 does a very good job removing the slight chromatic errors towards the edge of the field with high contrast subjects. The output to 400 iso is very manageable if shooting RAW, the Adobe N/R being very effective in controlling excess noise without losing too much detail. OK, it won't compare to a DSLR but a tiny sensor is never going too. The images, especially at the lower ISO settings do have a nice quality about them, with well rounded tones, colour and white balance.

The real bonus for me (I’m old school, I like total control here) is easy to use manual exposure control backed up with the live histogram so one can keep and eye on those all important highlights. If you do blow them in an important area, when shooting RAW the Adobe converter reclaims lost information quite well – better than I thought it would after reading the review on dpreview. Being able to set a custom white balance off a white sheet of paper is very useful too when shooting JPG, which offers less post production adjustment than with RAW.

Downside, well, very few as long as one understands the limits of a small camera like this (not as small as some, but on par with a compact 35mm film camera – remember them?).

The screen, wonderfully large and sharp, my only grip is that it is far too saturated and contrasty, leading one to believe that shadows might be clogged and highlights blown when in fact they aren’t. I’ve learn to rely on the histogram when reviewing images on the screen, after initially not believing it. Not the end of the world now I understand.

If shooting action or one needs high iso performance I’d be using a DSLR, there’s no argument there, it’s silly to think a camera like this is going to be anywhere close to a DSLR in this respect.

If I had the chance to wind the clock back and had the option to decide whether to purchase this camera based on user experience gained, I wouldn't think twice about buying it again!!

Streak!

Captured between rain showers, LNER A4 Class 4-6-2 no 60019 Bittern, powers away from Virginia Water with a private charter Euston-Staines-Guildford-Redhill-Victoria) on Friday 11 April 2008.

Silfor grass

This morning's work on Catcott Burtle(about 45 mins), saw the rhyne bed painted a darkish grey emulsion colour, then coated with a thick layer of PVA (first of about 4 or 5 coats). A couple of patches of Silfor were added to gauge effect. The area with the rails etc is still bare cork with the grey/red primer mix, the ground cover and ballasting yet to be done (modelling clay for general surface including siding, fine granite or such on the 'mainline'.).

PVA is just white wood working glue, I guess you can get it world wide. Some brands dry clearer than others. I use the one in the dark green bottle, either Evostick or Unibond (cannot recall, not being anywhere near the bottle at present - well the glue bottle anyway). I've often thought that that varnish is too shiny (odd thing to say I know), it showing up any dust present and being more the colour of best bitter rather than mucky water. I've never seen rich blue water either apart from in the Med, around the UK it's gerally shades of grey with hints of brown, depending on how much mud is in it (the nearby Thames the other week was the colour of tea with all the mud in it after the heavy flooding rain). Any blue, will just be the reflection of a blue sky.

Cold and wet..............

Having just crossed over from the down slow onto the down fast, Merchant Navy Class Pacific No.35028 'Clan Line' proundly displaying 'John Bellamy 1931-2007' powers away from Weybridge with 'The Southern Sunset' steam charter from Victorian to Salisbury, on a wet and bitterly cold Saturday 22 March 2008.

Shark Attack!

Posed on Cement Quay, a modified Hornby 'Shark' departmental brakevan, a recent release from the Margate company. Modifications include, door opened up (knife and glue job), weathering and the addition of a couple of Preiser orange clad railway workers.

Rural Industrial Grot

A recent shot of the new dried peat transfer shed on Catcott, my 5'00 x 15" '00' diorama/layout of Catcott Crossing which in my parallel universe turned into a halt with siding to serve the local peat works.

The End of Printed Matter?

Spurred on by a current thread on RM Web, I felt an over due ramble........

Like many, in my world, increasingly far too much time is spent in front of a screen, be it a computer, mobile device or television.

Despite this, people are frequently discussing whether the printed page will be around for much longer. For me, there's nothing like having a good read during the daily ablutions or sitting on a train from a device that doesn't need batteries - I don’t think I’m that unusual in this respect? Having a coffee with my wife whilst casually browsing through a paper magazine or newspaper, is somewhat more sociable than reading a virtual version of the same thing on a laptop.

We're all different and have differing needs I suppose, and because of this there is an increasing requirement for electronic versions of their favourite printed media for those anti social desk tied animals. So, back to the question, does this mean that printed media will die out? No, my feeling is that there'll always be a place for the printed page for a long time yet for reasons already mentioned.

To put this a different way, in the 1960’s, it was thought that we would be living under round or in ‘space age’ high rise flats, wearing space suits (the ‘shell-suit’ never did really catch on), popping food pills. Of course what happened is that people like to touch the past, they love their Victorian villas, they like organic food and nice traditional wooden furniture, olde worlde pubs, steam trains and country walks. What happened to the high rises? They’re pulling them all down and frequently replacing them with lower more traditional looking structures – well they are where we live!

However, things do change, and in the long term of course publishers will have to embrace different and newer formats to run in parallel if they're to remain in business - like it or not. Whether an electronic clone of their current publication is the only route to take is another matter, with people increasing turning to the internet for breaking news, publishers may have to consider a more topical newsy downloadable or web version of their magazines. This would leave the printed magazine for less immediate stuff like 'layout features' and 'how to do' articles etc. The biggest problem ahead will be getting people to part with cash for similar material that may be free on another web page, this I fear will be tricky, albeit impossible. Sponsorship and advertising may be the answer along with a subsidy from the printed version.

Something that could happen right now would be for publishers make back issues available electronically as a PDF (or suchlike) for download or CD for a slightly lower rate than a paper reprint. Like many no doubt, recently I had to recycle dozens of magazines simply due to lack of storage - which is such a shame.

Sunny morning at Midsomer

Tuesday the 26th February, we had a chance to pop by Midsomer Norton. The Somerset & Dorset Railway Heritage Trust have been very busy putting on the finishing touches to the recreation of the famous signalbox.
Since our last visit, the running in board on the up platform has appeared too, this looking very smart on the Southern Region Green it would have worn in the 1950's.


Winding the clock back to around 1972, 6 years after the line closed, for what was thought for good. The B&W image here shows the original signal box shortly prior to demolition. Who'd have thought just over a generation later that S&D fan would be able to enjoy 'Midsomer Norton South' signal box again in all its glory, albeit a replica. Hopefully soon a Fowler 2-8-0 S&D 7F will soon be able stand next to this fine recreation of one of England's favourite signal boxes.

The rest of the images from Tuesday 26 Feb 2008:
http://sdjr.fotopic.net/c1465954_1.html

Pictures from the past 35 or so years:
http://sdjr.fotopic.net/c1118990.html

I was bored......

ViTrains 37422 & 37403, again used as a test bed for the new baby camera. Here we are looking the other way to normal.

Another test shot

Another test shot with the little Canon G9; this time from a little further back, we see 60026 crawling along through the weed ridden tracks pulling a short rake of MEA wagons out from under the stone hopper on Cement Quay.

This as before, was shot with the available mixed lighting and converted with Photoshop CS3's own raw convertor (Adobe RAW 4.3) rather than the supplied Canon software (which I haven't loaded).

There is some slight barrel distortion visible with the overhead metalwork, not really any more than from any other camera of this type. Next time I'll use the Photoshop correction tools to remove this. Chromatic aberration is minimal, with just the slightest of fringing on high contrast edges at the periphery of the field. This was removed fully and very easily during the RAW conversion stage - good reason to use Adobe RAW over the Canon software which is unlikely to have that facility.

Point and shoot

Most of my magazine work is carried out with a digital SLR. Sometimes though, it is desirable to place the camera actually on the layout to get an unusual angle. This I normally achieve by resting the camera on a purpose made bean bag. This is all very well, space allowing. For tighter areas I've been looking at the possibilty of of using a smaller pocket sized camera. Drawbags until now with small cameras, have been limited manual settings, a lack of RAW for serious image capture, and a native file size that will be good enough quality for a double page spread.

Canon's recently introduced G9 may well fit the bill, it having full manual controls that are not deeply embedded in clanky menu layers, a 4000x3000 (12MP) resolution, and the all important RAW capture. There is also the added bonus, mainly due to the tiny lens focal length and tiny sensor, that pictures taken on the G9 have an enormous depth of field - something we model photographers are always striving to achieve.

Whilst my trustee Nikon D200 will still be used for the bulk of my work, the little all metal Canon G9 looks like it will be there in the camera bag for those awkward shots. The little camera also doubles up as a holiday and travel camera too!

This above shot of 47145 captured on Cement Quay, was taken with the camera simply resting on the layout. The shutter was fired using the 'self timer' to avoid camera shake. I didn't use any additional lighting as would be the norm, the train here being simply illuminated with the layout's own flourescent lighting. The white balance was left in 'auto', with any final tweeks taking place during the RAW conversion stage using Adobe RAW 4.3/CS3.

'The Valentine Express'

WCRC 47826 & 47804 power through the outskirts of Egham with the Doncaster to Portsmouth and return 'The Valentine Express' on Saturday 16 February 2008.

Tasty Tractor!

Recently I acquired a couple of the new ViTrains Class 37/4 to play about with. To make this one look a little more lifelike, it's had a dose of the airbrush and some extra details added.

Here we see 37422 'Cardiff Canton' shunting some MEA's around Cement Quay........

SR Concrete Platform & Shelter

Over the Christmas period, using various scratchbuilt elements & castings from Monty's Model Railways, I knocked up this shelter based on Stourpaine & Durweston Halt.

We've never had it so good?

Like many, in 2000 I came back to the hobby after a break of 15 or so years. There is so much more for the modeller these days. We moan about the output from the 'big 4', models wise, they really are seriously impressive compared to 20 years ago, being well finished, run a treat and are generally accurate. I know the Heljan Western has its failings - but hey, what a beast! I'll buy another without thinking about it!

Highly detailed RTR stock has replaced often kak handed kit construction (that's me, I've never been able to get a motorised kit chassis to run properly - just not my thing! White metal, brass or plastic loco bodies and wagons no problem - just the moving bits evade me. One day I'll get that Comet chassis for my 22xx to work properly). Recent RTR offerings looking so much better than ancient white metal kits and the popular thing at the time of mounting them Wrenn chassis with no underframe detail. I have a few of these, the Wrenn body going in the bin - think what they would have been worth now!

Scenery is generally better, with proper textures replacing lurid green sawdust and bright green rubbery lichen. There were of course the exceptions in their day with the likes of Chiltern Green and Pendlebury springing to mind. I think Barry Norman's 1986 vintage book (plus another that fails my memory) and new scenic materials have changed this. I remember when Woodland Scenics launched their range in the early eighties, people were gobsmacked, especially with the foliage material. They've sadly dropped behind with the likes of Nock and Silfor eclipsing them with ground textures (personally I've never seen ragged green bath sponges in real like pretending to be grass. So, come on guys, do your own fibrous grass at half the price of the Germans and you'll scoop the market).

For buildings and infrastructure, we have all these wonderful plastics to replicate stone, brick, tiles etc. In the 'old days' many would have used the printed papers that used to fade green with time. The more dedicated would (and still do) stick in individual bricks, slates, tiles and carv their own stones.

Trackwork looks better, back in the eighties we had Peco 100. SMP had just appeared on the market with their scale bullhead flexitrack, though for points, blobs of solder were the norm for chairs. I remember some of the finer layouts used the correct bullhead rail on rivetted track, though with no chairs it often looked like a contractor's light railway. Now, of course we have Exactoscale & C&L hopefully making good looking point construction a doddle (well I hope so, I have two C&L's to make).

However, one thing that cannot be bought, is vision, design, concept and creating that most difficult thing - atmosphere!

Engineering or art?

If people stood back from their layouts a little more and squinted at what they had created, thus taking in the 'feel' rather than concentrating on fine detail, there would be some more inspiring work out there. I think of layouts as a bit of theatre or a moving painting. Composition should be such that the viewer's eye is contained within the scene, if the eye wanders 'off set', then the builder has failed.

Capturing atmosphere has nothing to do with the correct number spokes or whether a rivet is 0.5mm too low (or maybe high - heaven forbid!). Composition, colour (a major problem) and overall design are so frequently missed by a country mile, I suppose it's down to that fact that many modellers, whilst mechanically highly skilled, lack the ability to 'see'.

We're all different, the hobby would be very dull if we were all striving for the same thing. We need the engineers, the impressionists and I suppose the dreamers too?

'00' or 'EM'?

In an ideal world, If I was to start all over again I would probably opt for EM, however with 25 years of toy trains under my belt, Personally I wouldn't want to be running two standards, so will stay with '00'. I like to swap stock around between my two (soon to be three – excluding Arne Wharf which is 009) standard gauge layouts anyway. Certainly with 'modern image', EM appears to be a doddle (I guess from reading here), for historical reasons it’s not for me simply due to inter-changeability.

In the defence of ‘00’, like many, I have limited time (model railways are not my only interest), so any time I can save by not re-gauging and re-wheeling locos and stock can be put into the concept, design & scenery instead.

In defence of scale track, the Peco points (mixed with SMP bullhead) on my latest 'trainset' were an experiment (I can and have built my own track), whilst they're far from ideal, they can be made to look quite effective. In hindsight, with the modifications needed to make them look better and work properly, I don't think there was any time saved over building them myself – for this reason it’s unlikely I will repeat the exercise. I do believe that the Peco points with bolt/rail fixing for a modern themed layout portraying flat-bottomed track do look a lot better than rail soldered to copper paxoline (without cosmetic bolts that is). My next ‘trainset’ will use C&L components for this reason – albeit in ‘00’ (another side on shunting plank).

There are a lot of other things which are as important when it come to 'realism'; design, viewing angle (avoid head on viewing angles in '00', not such a problem with a shunting plank) and colouring are very important too. Colouring being a real issue, just because it has Woodland Scenics or suchlike on the side of the packet it doesn't mean it's correct.

I think in this country, many model makers are engineers rather than artists, and there's nothing wrong with that. I get a couple of foreign magazines and it's interesting to see the different approach they take the other side of the various ponds, with many modellers being 'railway modellers’ rather than 'locomotive stock and track modellers'. At a guess, a lot of this is down to the fact that we've been way behind the rest of the world 'ready to run' wise for so many years (until now); this meaning that we've had to spend our time building stock, whereas modellers outside the UK have been able to buy much of what they want off the shelf. With the rolling stock being better, passion and time goes into other aspects of the model railway like concept, scenery and structures etc.

At the end of the day, do what suits you, it's only a hobby after all. Most of what I write is total garbage too....

Rant for Wednesday

Embracing the overall scene and the British misconception of what creates a realistic scenario.

In the USA and many parts of Europe, many railway modellers are still way beyond us on the realism stakes (just look at the content of Voie Libre and Model Railroader magazines in particular), they embrace the overall scene with equal passion. Sadly in the UK, many modellers are still totally obsessed with correct number of spokes, then they'll use bright green lichen and sawdust, which looks nothing like the real world to create their landscape! But, because the loco has the correct number of spokes, things are deemed (by them) more realistic – ‘finescale’ even (whatever ‘finescale’ is).

A good test, is to get somebody to judge a layout who has no interest in railways or even modelling. They will make their judgement, not on the correct gauge or rivet detail, but whether the scene looks and feels like the full sized one they see everyday or remember from their childhood days. Do the trees look like trees? Is the grass fibrous rather than scale green bath sponges? Is that road surface smooth and pale, rather than black with 6 inch square boulders masquerading as tarmac? Is the eye kept within the scene, rather than being attracted to something ugly like a row of houses right on the front edge of the baseboard (with no road or anything separating them from a 4 foot fall), or a siding that again runs just millimetres from the front baseboard edge? Finally, where far too many go wrong, is the colouring of the scene, with many aiming for colours that are far too harsh. I bet they paint their engines the right colour though.

A question for many finescale modellers, I’ve been wanting to ask this for some time: why do so namny of you ballast your steam era sidings with granite chippings and a hard shoulder? We all know it was ash. Look a old pictures of goods yards and sidings, they were even, smooth dusty places. Things like this totally ruin the fact that you may have the correct GWR c.1884 vintage two bolt chairs. Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against detail, however I feel so often it is completely lost when the rest of the scene has been totally neglected. To enjoy detail, you need to be drawn into the layout in the first place, the closer you get the more you explore, a bit like a good bottle of wine where the flavour and nose develops the longer it lingers. Get it all wrong and you won’t even get to the stage of looking at the detail – however good it is.

OK, rant (almost) over! We are slowly getting better, the likes of Pendon have been enormous inspiration to many modellers over the years. Still sadly, there are too many layouts (often P4/S4 too) out there, where it's pretty obvious that the builders have not looked at the overall scene they’re trying to create. Instead they have, as already mentioned concentrated on the fine detail far too much, at the expense of the bigger picture like the initial design. This then results in a layout that may be ‘finescale’ but doesn’t look at all real. I have a feeling that many model makers look at other layouts to base their model making on rather than the real thing real or looking in a book?

Post rant and inspiration.

Recently I had the honour of photographing two different layouts for the printed page, one of them a large circular 'traditional trainset' and the other, a West Country scenario based on more 'realistic' practices. The 'trainset' really surprised me, especially due to the fact that 95% of what I saw was ready made and out of the box. The modellers however used many of the buildings, thinking particularly of the street scenes, in such a way that it was totally convincing if captured from an angle to hide the roundy-roundy nature of the layout. Basically, they have vision based on looking at the real thing, which is far more important than those wretched GWR chair bolts.

The 'West Country' scenario, whilst like the ‘trainset’ didn't use 'finescale' track (something which we judge layouts by far too much here in the UK), everything was spot on from initial design, track layout and buildings, right through to scenery, and in my book, most importantly the colouring. Again you could tell that the modellers got out and observed the real thing, absorbing the feel and look of a real world. They then put all this together in miniature and have created something quite special. I passed a few of the pictures of these two layouts in front of a couple non-railway modellers the other day, and their words were "is that a model or the real thing".

Flame suit now on.................