Today was the annual exhibition of the March and District Model Railway Club.
My first exhibition of the year, March in March 🙂
It was a good day out. A nice ride on the train through the flat and strangely beautiful fens, a good exhibition and the last slice of a very tasty Victoria sponge cake. Result!
The modelling was of a very high standard. On my favourite layouts, the modellers had spent hours making lovely rolling stock, modelling detailed buildings and creating super view points.
One thing did surprise me though. Some of the layouts with the best modelling didn’t have backscenes and you could see all of the exhibition clutter behind the layouts. I realise it’s the exhibitors personal choice and they can do whatever they like with their layout. For me, as a visitor, it was a bit of a distraction from the great work they had put in to creating the layouts.
There are advantages though. When you look at the photos you can play the ‘spot the…’ game that we often see at exhibitions. Can you spot: The bums of the people operating the neighbouring layout? the lady on the yellow chair? the controller? the can of coke?
Many thanks to the M&DMRC team for organising an enjoyable exhibition.
Here are some pics. (Click on a photo for a larger image. If you are using the Safari browser and don’t get the larger images, go to Settings and apply the option that says – clear cache and cookies. WordPress tell me clearing your cache may solve the problem. Let me know if it does).
Steve's Narrow Gauge Adventure 
It’s a really interesting point about the lack of backscenes. I totally understand the approach and it is one I will likely use myself – i think in the larger scales, it is very difficult to achieve a realistic depth of field and cut off for the backscene, so sometimes not having one is better than having a bad one. I am working in G9 at the moment and there is no way I can have a realistic backscene in the depth of baseboard I have. But I agree about the 1:1 people stood behind the layout!
I think a good compromise might be a “theatre blackout” approach, where you don’t attempt to blend a backscene in but you instead have black borders and a black viewpoint behind the layout, maybe only slightly higher than the layout so as not to block access? The Totternhoe Mineral Railway used this technique to great effect and even used it to subvert traditional square baseboards. Well worth a google.
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Hi Christian
Thanks for your comment. Good points, well made. It is more difficult to do realistic backscenes in larger scales.
I’ve seen Totternhoe Mineral and I agree a ‘theatrical blackout’ could work well in larger scales. Perhaps some on-layout scenery (bushes, hedges) just in front of a plain pale blue sky (perhaps with a hint of clouds) could work too.
Interesting that you are working in G9 how are you finding that? Are you running passenger stock? I’ve always wondered if G scale figures on such a narrow gauge would lead to ‘top heavy’ stock….
All the best
Steve
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If I’m honest I’m finding it a bit of a challenge.
I haven’t had any problems so far but then I’m midway through building my coaches so I haven’t really tested them yet – they’re low slung 3D printed bodies dropped between bogies so the weight is as close to the railhead as possible. I’m using fairly expensive bogies – GraFar y25, about £12 for 2! – with the theory that they will be very free-rolling and smooth. I’ve got several varieties of figure to experiment with – heavier grey resin, lighter peach flexible resin, and my friendly 3D printer has printed me some hollow plastic ones too which are very lightweight and surprisingly well-detailed. I may end up running a strip of something heavy along the centreline to make sure weight is concentrated over the middle of the axles just in case.
So it will be an experiment for sure. I’m confident there will be a solution but it may take a while to get there! Or I’ll soon discover why noone else has done G9 passenger trains… 🙂
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This sounds great. I like your approach, I think it gives you the best chance of success. I have used Grafar bogies and they are indeed very free running and the metal wheels are really good.
Good luck, please let me know how you get on!
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