I saw it right away. Take a close look and see if you see one thing John was good at doing. Look close and you can see it. I couldn’t see one in any of the other pitcures.
Mike
Can you see the mirror in the background. You can follow it. Look at the 2 Gondola’s, bridges, ect.
An even more impressive use of mirrors by John was in conjunction with his “world’s largest parking garage”. Look that clever device up, if you can. [;)]
CNJ831
Thanks for telling us what you saw. I’m not a subscriber, and it may be a while before I get tho the LHS to get my copy (LHS is 50 miles away).
John Allen used mirrors in a number of places to make his layout seem larger. In one case he made an underground parking garage that only had two cars in it, but with some creative painting and mirrors it looked like it contained dozens of cars.
Look at MR December 1981, I was just looking at it a fews weeks ago. G&D layout spread with an article by John Allen on his use of mirrors and includes a picture of the “world’s largest parking garage”. Very impressive work.
Keith Baker
I dont have the issue in front of me but I think I get what yer saying, all I can say is two words:
Professional Photographer
The man knew all the tricks to make his layout look larger, including using reflected images on mirrors. Heres a couple more examples of the use of mirrors while photoing his layout, theres a dramitic picture of a train crossing a large high bridge over I believe Ryan’s Canyon taken from below looking up at what appears to be about a couple hundred scale feet!, well the base of Ryans Canyon was the basement floor, not easy to get a pic from unless you want to dance the worm doing so and Allen was not a “petite” figure, so Allen placed a large mirror on the floor, then use a tripod mounted camera pointing down into the reflection to take the pic!
Also Allen used in 2 locations I beleive, very large mirrors placed high up behind the scenery in lieu of a painted backdrop which were angeled to reflect parts of the upper layout on the other side of the room, so it looked like the trains and scenery just went on forever!
Clever fellow! The man didnt just snap pics as trians went by, he must have spent hours - if not days -setting up lights, the camera, and the trains for the shots he ended up taking.
The town of Nika never existed on his layout it was simply a reflection in a mirror of the town of Akin (Akin spelled backwards is Nika.) He also built half a building, the Teaby (sp?) Fire Extinguisher Company that was burned down and pushed up against the mirror. He painted the smoke from the smoldering remnants on the mirror, and placed a grain of wheat bulb IIRC painted red in the rubble to simulate glowing embers. The was a reason he picked up such nick names as the Wizard of Monterey and the Great Poo-Bah.
So, it’s just an optical dillusion…
Here is a link to see the Fire Extinguisher Company. http://witt-family.com/gorre-and-daphetid/MR-19520100-018-300_70.jpg Edit: I tried to make it clickable and it didn’t work, could I get an assist from one you guys? It’s also not letting me hit enter and start a new paragraph. It’s kinda aggravating.
There you go - clickable.
Thanks Shay.
HERE’S THE PICTURE
Yep, by diluting your senses into thinking its real, just like every other good model railroad layout on the planet.
[swg]
He also had a subway station with a curved track and platform, about a foot long, with a mirror at each end…and a train that never came.
Isn’t it time that Kalmbach published a book abour John & the G&D? It’s got my vote!![:)]
They could just re-print the Westcott book.