I admit, this picture is more than a week old, but I haven’t had a lot of time to work on the layout, or take pictures.  I’m posting this just to demonstrate that I do work on the layout from time to time, mainly to give my brain a break. I don’t want any comments on that!

Anyway, I’ve been working all over the layout from Derwin’s Drop to Chappellton lately.  I’ll concentrate on the mine area in Derwin’s Drop in this post.  As you can see in the photo I have created a bit of a hill with one of the mine structures (I’ll call it the “Head Building”) built into it.  I had a few stone retaining wall castings on hand that I decided to use around the building.

There will be an access road in front of the head building to the tipple. I’ll need to build a platform and add some steps to get to the door in the side of that building. I hope to be able to put a couple company houses in the area to the right of the head building.  I also hope that I can add a realistic conveyor from the head building to the tipple (it’ll be curved so can that be realistic?).  It will require lots of wood supports and should make an interesting addition to the mine complex.

There’s still some plaster work left to do around the smaller structure before I can get on with painting and scenery.  I’ll have an update on this area in a week or so.

Scott

My flash arrived the other day.  Surprise, it has a remote mode, and so does the camera!  The flash can be anywhere within a certain distance of the camera and it will trigger with the camera’s built-in flash.  So I had some time this afternoon to play with it in the train room.

For this first experiment I rested it, flash pointing down on a ledge behind the valance.  The results were interesting so I took a few shots around the layout just to see what the effect would be.  I was able to create some fairly realistic mid-day brightness and shadows. 

The first test was in Derwin’s Drop at Standard Electric. The remote flash is almost directly overhead.  The angle brings out some details you can’t see in the other pictures of this building, like the two signs bulging out (ugh!).  I’ll have to get those attached more securely.

I’d say it’s about noon as Fred and Bill are winding up their conversation.  Small town gossip has a way of getting around, especially when Albert, the mail man, overhears something good.  I’ll bet he can’t wait to get to Bessie’s place to fill her in on what he’s heard!

The next stop on my photo experiment was the freight shed.  Again the flash is almost directly overhead.  Notice how close the shadows are to vertical.  It’s a very bright day!

Chet is just returning from lunch as Tom and George are enjoying the rest of their break.  They’ve emptied 5 box cars so far and they have a mess of creates to put away.  The afternoon’s going to be tough, but thankfully there are no more arrivals expected.  You never know though, the West Bound is due through at any time and you never know what Derwin’s going to drop off for them (neither does Derwin, usually)!

The last photo in Derwin’s Drop is at the cabin.  I like how the flash highlights the leaves on the trees.  I had the flash pointed straight down on the scene judging from the shadows.

It’s hard to tell from this photo, but Bentnose Willy always wears a hoody with the hood up to cover his face.  He has to protect innocent bystanders from seeing his face.  It is not a pretty sight.  It’s not his fault, of course.  He’s lived so close to Chemical Hazards for so long God only knows what he’s ingested to cause his deformities.

The back lots of Stevenville was the subject of the next couple pictures.  This photo reminded me that I have to finish weathering some of my buildings.  Either that or I have to put up a cleaning crew scrubbing the bricks.  The trees in this picture cast some interesting shadows.

Edwin arrives home for lunch.  He lives in the upstairs apartment of this old building.  The basement used to be the warehouse for a long abandoned business.  Now its loading door is bricked up and it’s just used to store junk.

This photo was taken looking across the Stevenville Station platform.  Because the flash was overhead it lit up the scene across the tracks but left the platform in shadows.

Big John yells over to Jake to come help unload his new bathtub.  Even though it’s hot Jake doesn’t mind helping.  John’s tub has been broken for almost a month and Jake can’t stand working beside him any longer!

The last test was taken at the parking lot beside the department store.  The whole area is quite evenly lit but I see I have to clean up some loose grass.

Even though it’s a hot day the boys can’t resist a smoke and a bit of conversation.  I’m sure there’s more than one lie being told!

Well, that’s it for my photo experiments.  I hope you enjoyed the post!

Later!

Scott

The other towns on the BS&T seemed to almost fall into place as far as building and street locations are concerned.  Once those things are determined the rest of the scenery just happens.  Chappellton, however, continues be a challenge.  It has gone through many changes since the layout was constructed as I tried to find track and street arrangements that I was happy with.  I am happy with it to this point, but I wanted to try something different here.  I wanted to have part of the town raised above the railroad with the station building on the raised portion and the passenger platform below.

So, I’m trying some things to see how I can go about doing that, but they all lead to one fact.  I have to move the tracks, yet again!  There is not enough room between the main line and the station siding for the walls and other structures required to support a raised section of town.  So, one of these evenings when I go into the room to do some work I know I’ll be tackling that project.

If you’ve been a very observant regular reader of this blog you might notice there are several “new” structures in Chappellton (the row of buildings just left of center in the first photo).  I was lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time when we were at the Truro train show a few weeks ago and bought several structures from Dara at a great price.  These will certainly help to make the town look a little less barren.

The second photo shows two other structures (the large brick and the sand colored building near the center of the photo) that were built for the 5th Street Industrial District UMG modules.  They may as well be on my layout between shows rather than collecting dust somewhere.  Plus there’s a greater chance they’ll get finished than if there were packed away.

Next time I’ll have an update on a recent operating session on the BS&T.  Until then…

Scott