I am in the process of designing an industrial switching shelf layout and am wondering if there is any scenic advantage to having buildings on the backdrop having any thickness to them. I initially started with the buildings that would have rail sidings be up to two inches thick to have them stand off from the backdrop which would also have printed buildings on them for depth. I am not sure if the effect would be just as good if these customer structures were building flats. If I can gain an inch, or so by making the structures flats, I could use that inch or so elsewhere on the shelf. I have seen pictures of both methods, but not in person, so I’m looking for some feedback from those who have been down this road already. Actually, I’m looking to use that reclaimed inch for a street elsewhere on the layout. Thanks.
Hi Jamis,
I’m actually in the same boat as you. My shelf layout is about 18 to 28" large. In most of the case, I can manage 2" for my buildings. A few places I have enough room to make them 3". From experience, I find buildings flats not convincing at all. Their flatness is Okay if you look to them in front, but most of the time, you’ll be watching them with a slight perspective. If you wants to make photographs, they turn out unconvincing. I think you should try to avoid building flats. Lance Mindheim made very neat buildings about 2" thick for his Miami-based shelf layouts and they are quite convincing structues.
However, I think the real answer is somewhere in between, according to the situation. if you have to use flats, I would suggest you to frame them with relief structures on each side to hide the facts they are flats. That device would allow you to maximize space were your sidings run along building and still keep good perspective angles. By exemple, I’ll take the warehouse I’m actually building. It is going to be 1" thick, however, at the end of the siding, the office building is 3" thick and helps to kill the flat apperance. Even small relief differences between buildings will greatly enhance the overall look without impeding your track-space needs.
Matt.
Jim,
The first question would be whether you are focused primarily on operations, visual appearance, or a combination. If you you are solely an operator then it really doesn’t matter. You could just label a piece of paper with the industry name and spot the cars there. Nothing wrong with that if it’s what you are after.
If appearance is what you are talking about then it’s the HEIGHT of the structures against the backdrop that is more important than the thickness. Tall structures tight against the backdrop can be jarring at the point where the side of the flat meets the backdrop. The taller the flat, the more the problem stands out.
Reducing the height of the flat or running flats entirely along the backdrop with no joints at the side where you can see the sky helps with this.
Lance
Either will work, the advantage to the shallow buildings (as opposed to flats) is that it allows you to vary the positions of the buildings with regard to the tracks. With just flats you get a “wall” of buildings. With shallow buildings you can vary whether there are loading docks or loading doors. Its purely visual. It has no operational difference.
For city scenes I use more flats, because on urban strets the building fronts are ususally in line at the width of the sidewalk. For industrial areas I prefer shallow buildings because in most cases, especially older areas I am modeling, the buildings had different depths, so the shallow buildings makes more sense.
One advantage to shallow relief structures which are just an inch or so deep, but nonetheless somewhat 3-D is that sometimes they can be wide enough to just squeeze in a track that goes into the building, often in situations where it might otherwise be hard to think of an excuse for an additional siding. I have seen those combined with a backdrop that other wise consists of lining flat brick sides with windows against the wall.
The most effective examples seem to involve toning down or unifying the paint color used for such against-the-backdrop structures. A slight overall graying of the tone seems to keep the eye from focusing on them too much which I think is the point.
As far as realism goes, I have seen those (over) familiar commercial paper backdrops but with selected buildings cut out and mounted on black foam core to stick out from the flat backdrop by a 1/4" or so just to give some variety and perspective. I can’t say it looks wonderful (since frankly most of the preprinted commercial
"I am coming to the conclusion that the best backdrops are the ones that are either actual photographs and thus very detailed — that might seem to contradict my prior point but it doesn’t because they are not distracting, maybe because your brain is not busy thinking “boy, that’s fake looking” or “jeez, I just saw that same backdrop at the prior layout I toured”). Oddly enough the next best backdrops in my opinion are almost near-silhouettes in shades of tan or gray with little or no detail whatever and nearly uniform in color, almost like stage sets, and thus not distracting because they barely register on the brain other than a vague notion of “there are buildings over there.”
These are of course just my own opinions but as Mark Twain once said, in all matters of opinion my adversaries are insane.
Similarly attempts to paint very detailed rolling hills and fields seem less satisfying than very simplified outlines of hills of a very subdued hue. I don’t know the psychology at work but I think it has to do with the brain being troubled by the combination of detail and lack of realism.
Dave Nelson"
I agree with Dave for the most part. And I believe he is close to the mark regarding the brain’s reaction to attempts at faux reality (especially photos with a perspective that must work from only one viewing angle). The basic fact, it seems to me, is that everyone knows that the backdrop is not real, that it is simply a stage set; therefore, let’s treat it as such and not detract from nicely detailed equipment, trackwork and 3-D scenery. My personal reaction to most of the backdrops I have seen is the old architect’s adage: “Less is more.” I have been designing attempts at a flat backdrop for my hopefully imminent layout and my current conclusion (nothing is ever set in stone!) is to use the silhouette approach in the various shades of gr
This doesn’t exactly fit your situation, but it illustrates a couple of points. I built this from DPM modular sections, and added an interior mostly based on photos:
First, the structure is involved with the railroad. The siding actually enters the building. In this case, it’s more of a shelter, but it allows the building to be larger yet include the the siding. You can see the cars through the arches.
Second, I placed this diagonally, not flat, against the background. The angled placement adds depth and interest.
Thanks everyone for the feedback. I think I understand better about how the thickness of the backdrop buildings play. Lance’s comment about height struck a point and I probably should have been a bit more detailed in my description of the layout design. The prototype for this layout is the NKP servicing the Warehouse District in Toledo, OH. The area served was about 10 blocks long by about 5 blocks wide with the dense trackage running pretty much up the center of the district and fanning out to serve the various customer sites. Most of the buildings were up to 7 stories tall with some of the outlying structures of shorter stature. Many of the buildings were taller than they were long or wide, as this area was directly adjacent to the downtown center and property was expensive even at the turn of the century when a lot of these buildings were built. There was almost no manufacturing here, just distribution warehouses for various business types. The layout design is currently set at about 51" off the floor and wraps around three walls of a spare bedroom. The U shape has wall lengths of 8’ 3", 10’, and 5’ 7" respectively, with 24" wide sections. Doors and a window dictate the extent of the layout acreage. The layout perspective is that of a trainman working in the brick canyons of the warehouse district in the post depression/pre WWII era. In this case, I think the tall buildings will be the major aspect of the backdrop (Sweethome Chicago comes to mind). This means the entire backdrop is planned to be buildings of pretty fair heights. The corners would be filled with stepped buildings to fill in the corner spaces. I like the idea of constructing buildings and the urban scenery of this area, but I also want to be able to operate the layout in a prototypical fashion for a long time while I create the urban backdrop. The operation aspect is the subject of another post though.
Suggestion in case you decide you prefer detailed, realistic backdrop flats vs. the silhouette/suggestive concept: Take a look at Kingmill.com for photographic flats and shallow structures. No 2d perspectives here that are unreal when viewed from various points. They may not have enough variety to suit your situation, but you’ll get a good idea of the approach.
Dante
I am building my first layout and it is a shelf layout with industrial switching. I am going with the false front buildings rather than the flats. One main reason is that I like to detail scenes and plan to have a lot of lighting worked into the layout. I haven’t seen anyone effectively light background flats.
It seems to me that “thick” backdrop buildings from people like Walthers are relatively expensive… So I buy complete buildings and carve slices off them… that is a re-align the walls. One building will usually stretch to three times its original length.
I too like the idea of setting buildings at an angle. It is also not unusual for sections of a building to step in, out or both. This also adds depth. Modern - and some older - buildings also have a tendency to follow the property line… if this is curved with the RR track then the building gets curved… sometimes older buildings got round the curve by a series of steps… these weren’t always made of right-angles.
One thing to think about with older buildings is which way the roof or roofs run. This applies more to “north Lights” in saw toothed roofs.
[8D]
im pretty new to this as well, but what about putting the building on about a 30 degree angle or there abouts?