Northlandz

Another destination to make it to. This one is US based, however, so the chances of me making it are better.

NORTHLANDZ
http://northlandz.com/
495 U.S. 202, Flemington, NJ 08822
908.782.4022

A friend passed an article on Matthew Albanese shooting a miniature with the new Sony QX100 lens-style camera - a nice, cool bit of tech!   That was cool in and of itself, but the subject matter was also right up my model railroad alley!

http://studioatgawker.kinja.com/this-miniature-landscape-photographer-shoots-model-trai-1516617117

NORTHLANDZ is a giant model railroad in New Jersey. While I'm not really in the market to travel to NJ any time soon, family on the East Coast makes it something that might happen. It says it's a 3 hour drive from Maryland, so maybe I could work something out with a train.

At any rate, Northlandz looks like it's a place to venture to for sure. While they might need a new website :::grin:::, the railroad looks like it would be a lot of fun to visit and photograph.

Take a gander.

Ground replacement

Man, I did a simple replacement of the Harbor Area ground and it made a huge difference.
I had this green foam in and it was...not what I had in mind. Placeholder.
I sprayed some foam core and dropped that in and it's FAR closer to what I was wanting. I'm going to go back in on it and detail it a bit - drawing in lines to suggest large, cement blocks. I'm really liking the look.

I did the same under a block of shops and the Shizuka city area and it ties things together well.

Simple. Quick. And getting me fired up over the layout. :)

I'm currently working on the Temple area mountain and thinking through another "hill" area for the Shizuka side that can have some buildings and a road running up and into it.

After working out the Temple hill / mountain, I want to work on the water in the harbor. I'm going to shoot for this sort of coloring and depth coloring - showing some shades under the water surface like there are items deep down under.

And...I might need more boats.....   :)    

A great East Bay rail fan spot

I was heading to my Mother's house today and found a cool rail fan spot to see trains with my daughter. (I've been grooming her. She's three and loves trains!)

Point Richmond has a spot where the tracks are right on the street. We parked and a train went by 20 feet from us. Made my daughter's day...and mine, really. :)

For Bay Area folks, you may want to roll by and check it out. There are several spots that provide great train viewing.  Wright Ave off Cutting Blvd was great! The other train yards are cool as well.

Wright Ave

Wright Ave

A bit hard to get to, but cool

The BNSF yard is way cool as well. Easy access

Another scratch build building

I've made a few scratch build efforts in styrene so far, but I have not taken the time needed to REALLY do things correctly as of yet. So, on my next build I'm going to try to raise the bar a bit - taking more time and being more careful all around.

I've been looking at this Sankei paper structure for a long while. I love the design, but I've worked with these Senkei kits before and the complexity of it will pose several "I WANT TO BURN THIS KIT!!!!" moments based on what I've done previously. :::grin::::

 I love the overall design and I think I can manage to create it from styrene even though I'm no pro-builder for sure. I think it will make a great addition to both my layout and my skill set if I can pull this off. I'm going to simplify some aspects of this design as well. All in all, it will be a fun challenge.

I think I'm going to try my hand at this simple parking structure first. Again, it seems simple, but I'm sure I'll find some issues once I start building.

 If I can start building structures instead of buying, my layout and my wallet will benefit!

As always, I'll post progress photos as I go along.

Cheers!

~M~

Shizuka - January 2014 Update

Shizuka is coming along. I've rethought a few things and it's all making more sense to me now.
For a minute, I was thinking that Shizuka was a larger city space. A huge area near the smaller tourist spot that shared the benefit of the fishing industry being so close. However, I've flipped that script a bit, making Shizuka a smaller city space that is there primarily due to the Temple and Village spaces - not the other way around. This is making this a bit easier from a "what I want" standpoint. I can have cool city things going on, but I don't have to make it a major city center with a huge populace. 




I had a larger, flyover station located dead center, but the way things play now is that it will be further out and to the back of the layout, if it remains at all. A much smaller modern station may take it's place and the flyover may get boxed for a future module.

I've set down the new way the streets will run, removing several Unitram panels and replacing them with a simple (placeholder) sheet of foam board. I was able to angle the buildings to emulate the new angled street and it's MUCH more interesting to me. The angle not only provides an interesting viewing arrangement, but gets away from the building area just being a series of squares.

The idea I had about having a track dedicated to shipping and another dedicated to the tram didn't work out. It might have if I put more effort in, but as it stands now, it's not going to happen. I'm ok with it based on the "what do you REALLY want?" mantra I've had of late. The mantra that reminded me that what I REALLY want to get into is the scenery and the train aspect - while fun - is secondary. So, I have several "dead" lines that look like they go somewhere, but really go nowhere. I'll flesh them out with a cool background that makes it look like the line goes off somewhere. I've seen it done and it's very effective.

And so, Shizuka is ready for things like the streets being worked on, sidewalks and other base items as next steps. I can't wait to get into the smaller detail work on it. It should be fun crafting little parking areas, vending machines and the like.

I'll be adding more advertising elements to the layout as I go as well.

Scenes like this will be hidden around the layout for sure. I love these little "slice of life" areas

Yes, this copter WILL be hung from the ceiling over the layout! :)

 Thanks for reading!

Soyokaze Village: New Track design

Meanwhile, in Soyokaze...

:)

I have a new track layout going and I like it. The changes make things a little more interesting visually and make sense in the grand plan.

Things are not running as high as they were. I've dropped everything down to the deck and I've raised one section of the village area for now. It may actually go higher, but I'm good with the height for now.

The station area will be fun to run pathways to and from with people waiting and walking from one point to another. There may be some street vendors set in this area - welcoming tourists to Soyokaze with the smell of fresh food and trinkets to buy. :)

The track is a simple loop with a switch that takes the tram to the little station track. I can "park" the tram there and switch over to the Harbor train for some cargo and "operations" stuff on a micro level, moving things around on the two Harbor tracks and into Shizuka for fun. It works well for me. I have some switching going on without getting too crazy with it.

The bridge in the front of the photo above will be set over a small ravine area. I may also have a roadway running between it and the village with another running around the very edge of the layout. It might be a fun little design. There would be a road bridge crossing that same ravine area in the front.

 The Temple area was unaffected by the track change. I think the whole of this area may be raised "mountain style", taking it up another two inches from where it is now. This will give me a huge view block for the Harbor area.  I want to get more foliage and trees in around the area and pack it with tourists walking around and taking photos. Something like...

kiyomizu-dera

kiyomizu-dera

I'm looking forward to some great photo scenes. :)

Thanks for reading. Comments welcome!

January 2014 Video Update: Temple and Village

Note: Photosynth did it's best with this image, but failed in several spots  :)

Well, I'm posting this video because it was already done, but yesterday I ended up changing the whole village area around. I'll post photo updates at a later date.

These videos were fun to produce, though I rushed them a bit. (...as usual)  Busy busy most of the time, so I fit things like this in where I can. :::grin::: 

I like having the back area open so I can get behind the layout. I found myself wanting to have all the buildings facing out and into the room, then realized that having some facing back towards the wall will open things up for additional photo opportunities. I can't wait to get the background in so I can stop seeing that wood panel nightmare behind my scenes! :)

As usual, comments are welcome.





NRAIL Jan 2014 Update: Temple and Village from Malcolm Johnson on Vimeo.