Everybody's Working Through the Weekend

Sorry for the title, but sometimes I can't help but love a bad pun.  Anyway,  PROGRESS!

I made a lot of great progress on my layout over the weekend. As I mentioned before, I wanted to get all of the exposed pink and floral foam covered in an initial base coat of scenery and I was able to get that accomplished!

I began by placing a couple of smaller N scale woodland scenics culverts where I wanted them to go. I had to go do some additional carving into the foam to make room as they weren't originally part of the plan for this location. I secured them in place using Mike Confalone's "Universal Mud" technique and shaped the hillside around them appropriately.

I then painted the surrounding area with dark brown latex paint and spread on ground foam while the paint was still wet.  Later, I secured the ground foam with diluted white glue.

Once that was accomplished, I turned my attention to the hillsides. These will eventually be covered in a variety of deciduous and conifer trees so I wanted to create the look of a forrest floor. Again, I borrowed a technique from Mike Confalone using dried leaves shredded and "pulped" in a blender to create the forrest floor.

I am extremely pleased with the results of this technique.  The look of the forrest floor is very convincing. (though honestly the leaf cover is quite oversized for HO scale) I'm considering adding a light misting of an appropriately colored ground foam over the leaves to try to add finer texture to some of the larger leafy chunks. Your thoughts or suggestions on this are welcome.

Overall I am extremely happy with the results!  Though far from finished, it is really good to get a base coat of scenery applied to the entire layout. Doing so was a kind of strange cathartic experience for me. It gives the railroad a certain degree of polish that wasn't present before. Now as I look at my railroad I feel much more relaxed and positive about the work ahead!

The End of the Steamboat Era

I love discovering old photographs that shed light on the history and people of the area I'm modeling! The image below features a steamboat navigating the waters of Box Canyon near Ione.  The narrow portion of the canyon in the background is where the future Box Canyon Bridge will be built when the railroad eventually comes to the area.

Below is the same boat heading south through the canyon returning from a trip to Metaline Falls. This photo really shows how treacherous the rapids could be! Later a dam will be built at the location of the photograph. That, along with the railroad rendered the steamboat a thing of the past.

An article about the end of the steamboat era read:  "old timers along the river welcomed the coming of the railroad, but many of them remember with pleasure the romantic days of the river boats. Many a big poker game and carousal were staged on [the last steamboat] in the days of her glory, and many well-known characters held the wheel and rode in her cabins."

Here is a link to more info on the subject.

Touching Up a Painted Backdrop

I made a 20 minute-long video showing a technique for touching up a painted backdrop.This technique is a bit unique in that I use matte medium to blend progressively darker layers of color together on the backdrop itself. It can be a bit messy, but mistakes become your friend with this technique. I'm pretty pleased with the results!

A Couple of Update Videos

Here are a couple of update videos detailing what I've accomplished over the past year and my plans moving forward. The first video is one I recorded back in January of 2015 where I show off the progress I've made on my cement factory.  These are really the very first plastic kits I've successfully assembled in my lifetime and I am pleased at how they are turning out!

The second video I recorded last night and details a few simple projects I'd like to accomplish quickly to add a layer of fit and finish to the layout and encourage myself as I work towards that ever elusive goal of "completion". (Of course we all know that no model railroad is ever complete!)

What the heck happened here!?

Let me take a moment and quote myself from January of last year:

"It's a brand new year and a chance for a renewed focus on model railroading! 2015 will be the year of the railroad.  I plan on getting a lot of work done on the railroad this year and I plan to update this blog quite often with all of my latest efforts.

 That didn't happen. I had good intentions, but like a squirrel with ADD, I found myself distracted by all the pretty, shiny objects around me. I started and quit a webcomic. (That didn't work out.) Then summer came and The Witcher 3 got released and I put about 300 hours into that game. (My girlfriend did not appreciate that one.) Finally I discovered RC multi-rotors and airplanes in the fall. (That one got expensive quick.) The entire time my layout sat lonely in the basement with no one to give it the love it deserves. Something should be done about that.
Yesterday I turned the layout on  and surprisingly everything runs fairly well.  A good cleaning would be helpful for sure.  I think my next steps are going to be getting stay-alive capacitors installed in my locos and continuing work on the scenery. I hope to have some new stuff to show on a timely and regular basis. With that, I'll leave you with the immortal words of Bart Simpson:

"I can't promise I'll try... but I'll try to try."

Shedding a Light on Operations

I've been fascinated for a while now at how layout owners and operators handle large ops sessions requiring many people to work together to simulate a days worth real-world operations.  I'll admit it's a part of the hobby that remains largely beyond my understanding. (Though I'd love to take part in a large ops session one day) That said, watching nearly two hours worth of operations unfold on Mike Confalone's Allagash Railway does a lot to shed light on how a well designed operation session unfolds.  Here is a link to a free preview of the video.

If this captures your interest, I highly recommend you subscribe to Trainmasters.tv. It's full of fun videos like this and the production is outstanding.

Layout Progress Video #5

It's a brand new year and a chance for a renewed focus on model railroading! 2015 will be the year of the railroad.  I plan on getting a lot of work done on the railroad this year and I plan to update this blog quite often with all of my latest efforts.  I also plan on updating my Youtube channel regularly with video content as well.

To start the year out, let's take a look at what I've accomplished during 2014 (SPOILER: Not a lot.) as well as a look at what needs to be done in 2015.