Goofing off

[altivo]

First things first, here's a photo of Sarah, the Polish Elkhound, early on Saturday morning when she was just waiting for us to get moving and give her and Simon their breakfast. Her priorities are usually quite clear. I'm well pleased with the little Kodak. It does very well for the price. This was taken only with dawn light coming through the north facing window, no flash, handheld camera, set to imitate a high speed ISO 1600 film.

Today Gary and I went with casey382 (Who is quickcasey on LJ) and rrwolf (see LJ also) to a show put on by the Rock River Valley Division of the National Model Railroad Association. I've been to a couple of other model railroad shows but this was the largest and most diverse I can remember. I took the opportunity to give my new camera some testing, with closeups of tiny (N gauge) trains in motion, and it did quite well in my opinion. I need to sift through the images before posting any, but I'll get some up in a day or two. N gauge models are quite small compared to the model trains of my childhood, something like 13 feet to the inch or so (160:1) which makes it possible for the models and scenery to be much better proportioned and for the trains to move at a reasonable speed in real time without seeming to move much too fast in relation to the scenery. You still need a lot of space for a realistically proportioned exhibit, but it's within attainability with one scale mile fitting into 35 feet or so of real space. Of course, even more than it was when I was a kid, this is a pretty expensive hobby. Locomotives appear to run from $60 to several hundred dollars, and you need track, control modules, and rolling stock as well. The realism you could attain, though, is amazingly close to Hollywood miniature quality. I'll be looking forward to the opportunity to photograph more of these tiny trains in appropriately scaled settings.

Afterward we had lunch in Belvidere and went back to the house where Casey gave us a demonstration of a t-trak (http://t-trak.org) modular setup of N gauge track, putting together a running loop on our dining room table top in just a few minutes. Track and scenery are assembled in interchangeable wooden modules about a foot long. I had seen these in operation before, but had not seen the assembly or dismantling processes. It's impressively fast and easy.

All said, it was a fun way to spend a day, with good company and doing something different.

Comments

[moonhare]

Great pic! It's amazing what can be 'emulated' in digital.

We never had 'n' gauge trains, only the 'O's. One of my neighbors set up a 'park train' in his yard, but I never had the courage to just stop and ask if the kids could have a ride (including the big kid ;o)

[altivo]

Yeah, we had some Lionel stuff in the family when I was a kid. No idea what became of it. The original trainset that belonged to my older brother would be collector stuff now, I'm sure.

There was discussion from time to time about HO gauge but that was very costly to get started at the time and nothing came of it.

[merik]

Ah, model trains. :-) Another of my favorite things that I don't get to experience much anymore, which is a shame, because I have love of trains, both real and model, in my blood from Dad's side of the family.

Dad used to have an O gauge layout (which started as a Lionel layout he build as a boy with my Grandfather) in the basement of our house in Ohio when I was young, then I got an HO layout of my own next to his. My layout survived family moves from Ohio to New York to North Carolina, and, once in NC, Dad went to N gauge. Alas, my layout got torn apart after I moved back to NY for grad school, but I have all the buildings, rolling stock and locomotives here with me. I did have a small N gauge layout here for a while, but it never went beyond the circle of track on a bare board stage. Still have all the components of that, too. One day, I'll have to set one or the other up again...

[altivo]

I could really get into the scenery construction part, I think. I like riding trains and watching them go by, but have less interest in building them or actually operating them. The tiny size of N gauge holds my interest much more than the larger ones have.

I didn't post the "wildlife" photos I took. One of the N gauge displays had wooded hills full of deer and one bear, as well as backpackers hiking through those areas. Guess I should edit and post a couple of those too.

I also like the opportunities for joking. We saw a train made up entirely of cars with beer trademarks on them. OK, I've seen those occasionally. But interspersed with the real logos, there were facetious ones like "Burp Beer" made by "Belcher Breweries" and the infamous "Tree Frog Beer" from the days the Fabulous Furry Freak Brothers comic books. I almost expected to see Free-wheelin' Franklin endorsing the beer with a paraphrase of his traditional quote: "Beer will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no beer."

(I'm not a beer fan. I generally prefer wine. But I still liked the jokes.)

[cabcat.livejournal.com]

Awww lookit her, I'm amazed she's so patient, I would've meowed your ear off :D

Hey now as to the trains, every hobby is expensive if you do it thoroughly or to fine detail.

[altivo]

Well, yes and no. Any hobby that hopes to attract kids to keep itself going after us old guys are gone has got to have an affordable entry path. As much as anything, that's what is killing off pastimes like model railroading and amateur radio. If it takes $500 or more to just get started, they're going to buy a game console or a computer instead and just forget that "hobby" stuff.

Photography, on the other hoof, has grown much simpler what with digital cameras and computer based "darkroom" procedures. You don't need a darkroom with messy expensive chemicals, supplies and equipment and you don't have to pay large amounts of money for film and processing. That's why sites like Flickr and all those Twitter-connected photo archives are growing so fast.