Monday 2 April 2012

2012 MR Railroad Planning

An inspirational special issue
from Model Railroader

About a month ago I picked up the 2012 MR Railroad Planning, a special feature of Model  Railroader magazine. The current Model Railroad Hobbyist Magazine has done a review on the web of this special issue magazine.You might want to take a look.

Bernie Kempinski's O scale Civil War layout is featured. I had a chance to see this layout in person last fall and I was really impressed. A link to Bernie's layout is in my blog list seen to the right of this feature.

Since I have Photoshop I was interested in the article by Jim Six which explains test fitting structures.

For me the highlights of this issue are two features. One by Paul Dolkos that highlights the inside perspective or a different viewpoints for a layout. The other is expanding a layout potential by Mike Confalone. Mike is a New England modeller, and his scenes are very inspirational. As I am a barn lover...the scene with the curving road, the train in the foreground and the barn up on a hill really hits the heart of what rural New England is all about.

From my point of view a barn built with little else around makes a great layout scene. This is how I see rural New England. One should consider adding a similar scene when planning a New England layout. Seen below I came across two structures surrounded by fields and meadows that gives one additional inspiration for future scenes. Trains in New England should run though small pockets of structures, such as a mill town and lots of open space. The open space is what makes the train the focal point of the scene and pleasant to view...till next time...George

This scene is along the Central Vermont near Hartford, Vermont. I pulled over just after I passed under the railway bridge that carries the CV over the White River. This photo views just the tops of two barns seen over the cut fields in an early October 2011 scene. Views like this one, or the barn scene found in MR Track Planner are options one should consider in planning a layout.

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