How would WALLY WORLD like it if the vandals struck thier giant logo out front?
I fail to see the big problem here. If you don’t like it, don’t buy it it’s that simple. Speak with your wallet. Personally I believe the decision to buy these cars is a judgment call the parents will have to make on their own. If you think your kid is smart enough to realize that running around vandalizing other people’s property is a big no-no o.k. buy them. If not sit them down and explain why vandalism is bad. It’s not wal-mart’s job to raise your kids it’s yours. Don’t ruin it for those who are mature enough to handle it. I think the world would be a better place if more people took this approach. It’s time for the parents of the world to step-up and take responsibility instead of blaming video games, toys, movies, or music.
If these cars are supposed to be so hip and modern, then why did the company not make the investment in Post-1980 Locomotives and Freight cars for this set?
I know they want to make a quick dollar on old tooling, but printing the apparently “modern graffiti art” on pre-1960’s style cars is a bit like the stiff and rotund old people trying to dance to modern hip-hop.
This is embarrassingly un-hip.
Andrew
Have you seen this rapid transit set with snap together layouts?
crazy stuff including a graffitti version
art imitating life.
couldn’t find any at my wal-mart in fremont, CA…
You are lucky if you don’t find them. The models are 1/130 scale, not N!
the cars are too large & heavy for N. they are diecast metal with a strange horn hook truck. WM sells them very cheap.
BTW they are in the same diecast section as the 1/144 scale tanks that are good for Nscale WW2 modelers. Nice M4 Sherman & Helcat tanks.
In the same section’ look for the Norscot Mini Construction Cat equipment. Nice selection of Cat D5 dozer, 906 wheel loader, 420 backhoe & 315 excavator.
Saw them yesterday in Wal-Mart in Roseville. The cars looked too big for N scale and too small for HO. I couldn’t remember TT scale at the time but that seems about right. The graffitti is a fact of live. Most of it I’ve seen does avoid the reporting marks because it gets removed it it interfers with them. Some of it is quite stylized and artistic. I’ve got graffitti decals and one of these days I’ll put them on some box cars.
I agree with you Azure, that is a hell of a thing to portray to our children as being acceptable to vandalize someones property. I have a son just turned 3 friday have to keep him clear of this stuff.
I have some HO freight cars with graffiti on them, but it’s tasteful and I put it on myself. I don’t intend to sell them.
Now I did buy some of that mini construction equipment. The dozer can pass for a small HO scale dozer. As for the front end loader, backhoe and track hoe, I cut the cabs off them, reworked the drivers area and now they look like mredium-heavy equipment people rent to use in their yards.
Mine either…
Tracklayer
Well, for those that care for a bit of enlightenment on the subject of trains and the graffiti that covers them, otherwise you can skip past this explanation and dwell within the comforts of your own ignorance and prejudices. But, lets just say i know a guy who knows a guy who is an expert in the subject.
First of all, the graffiti that you are seeing on trains have absolutely nothing to do with gangs. Perhaps 2% of the graffiti you see is from gang members, and THAT gang graffiti is indeed trash. A way you can tell the difference is gang graffiti is usually only one color, is not “filled-in” and usually can be described as “old english stick letters”.
The graffiti on the Enamolized models, and most the graffiti you see, is done by “graffiti writers”. Fellows that engage in the underground culture of graffiti which started on new york city passenger trains in the late 70’s and early 80’s.
As silly and blatantly egotistical of a motive it may seem, the goal of graffiti was (and is) to become famous by forcing your alias in front of the face of the public over and over again, until, like paris hilton, rather you like it or not, you know their name. As the streets of NYC became saturated, and well… pissing people off… the general public was repulsed and the only people that seemed to like it where other writers and influential kids “thought it was cool”, thus a small group of mostly nerdy guys (much like you rail fans *wink) began to “geek-out” on things like letter structure, color schemes, how well rounded a writer was, how much he was up, etc… and rather you agree with it, accept it, hate it… a culture was started. The nature of the culture is of course illegal… some writers have personal rules about what they will and wont paint, but for the most part, it is indeed anti-social and rebellious by nature. So I understand why “the world” doesn’t like it… and if they did… well… it wouldn’t be near as cool 
Oh yes, back to train graffiti 101
In the 80’s, the fascina
I have to chime in on this one. First off let me say that I am an artist. I do all types of art work, from pencil, charcoal, airbrush, to painting drivable vehicles. Although I have never done any illegal graffiti. I have been hired to do some graffiti work for some people simply because they like that sytle of art work. I do not tag rail cars or any thing that I do not have permission to do so. Graffiti is just another type of art work to an open minded artist. When they tag a rail car I am sure they think of it as a traveling art mussem. I have seen very few rail cars with graffiti over any names, numbers or warning lables. They have been done on the base color of the car!
On the other hand, I bought 2 last week and I also intend on collecting them all! I will also be painting (using a detail brush & or my airbrush) and painting some graffiti on a few of my rail cars also.
Thanks for the space to speak
Baker
On the Canadian National-GTW Freight Trains that roll through Michigan, much of the Tagging and Graffiti Art is painted on top of the important reporting marks, road numbers, weight ratings, and dimensional data. There is almost no masking or placement consideration.
To remedy this, the paint shops have done patch painting to restore the important data.
Andrew
I seen a rail car today that the artest had painted over the road # and so on. But the cool thing was when they repainted it today they masket off the Graffiti to repaint the important data!
I stoped to ask his opinion on rail Graffiti while he was painting on data. Here is what he said.
" I am XX years old and have worked here for XX years. I enjoy seeing Graffiti on rail cars. It goes to show you don’t have to let your art sit in the bottom of your closet and never be seen. I just wish they did not paint over what we need to do our job. Most of the time the do not though!"
Just thought I would post this real fast.
Baker
Not to get a reputation of a bad guy around here, but really, WHERE
do half of you people come up with your facts about graffiti writers?
GANGS? NOT (well, like Phill said, at least 2% of freight graffiti is gang related)
and whats up with that comment about graffiti not being art?!?!?! ARE YOU
SERIOUS? Earth to Azure: Graffiti is the application of a medium to a surface,
and what my dear Azure, do graffiti writers USE to create their work on train cars?
PAINT. not only that, but art is anything that a human can produce using structure and form,
using geometrical shapes, line, color, dimension, composition,on a canvas.
what is SO wrong with painting on trains? Yes, I know that SOMe writers who do not know what
they are doing paint over important info that workers utilize, but I know that the ones that DO know what they are doing are concsious of things like these. Also, did you ever think that maybe graf writers are doing the railroad a favor by painting train cars, which in a sense help keep the cars free from rust for a few extra years? Phil nailed many points that I wanted to talk about, so I guess all I can say is please try not to be so judgemental of writers. They know what they are doing, (most of them anyways) and take the necessary precations in following safety rules of the railroad.
someone also mentioned what will graf writers do when they run out of boxcars to paint, they will start painting on tankers. hmmm… NO. why? they are considered to be in the same catagoory as
coal cars- they get beaten up on pretty bad, but tankers contain hazardous material and just the overall shape of them make them hard to paint, and when someone does paint on a tanker, their piece usually comes out looking retarded. People have been writing on things since the beginning of time guys and gals, dating back to greek and roman civilizations. I don’t know how true this is, but I even heard that people who were opposed to a cer
I grew up in the city and though I’m no kid, I’m a little younger than the average model RR. I know about this stuff.
There’s three catagories of “writing or marking on a publicly-visible surface with areosol paint” (for a neutral definition):
Gang Graffiti: This is monochromatic (one color), usually black or in the gang’s color. They use it to mark their turf. It includes the name of the gang and the gang names of some of its members. If a particular gang graffiti is X-ed out, it means a rival gang wants to kill or attack them. Another interesting fact (if you live in an area that’s prone to gang graffiti): Gangs have a hierarchy. It is almost always sprayed by
the newer or lesser members of a gang and assigned to them by the gang’s leader.
The members go out, spray their mark and leave. Later on, the leader comes by to inspect it. If it’s not done, or painted out, someone’s gonna get in BIG trouble…
Tagging: These are done by either “tagging crews” or individuals whose sole reason for doing it is to get their name out there. A crew would resemble a gang on the surface, but they rarely engange in violent activity. They just want to spray their name(s) all over the place. Individuals do it because they can.
Graffiti Art/Aersosol Art: These are done by artists who use different colors of paint to do what they call a “piece.” This is what you usually see on rolling stock, since it’s rather impractical for a travelling vehicle to mark gang turf when it travels far away from that turf. Ususally there’s a social/political message conveyed in the piece, or it would revolve around oversized letters stating a certain word or phrase. In some cities (Some parts of NYC and LA’s Venice Beach), there are designated walls for aerosol artists to do their pieces. They make their piece, take pictures of it, then later it gets painted over by another piece.
I abhor gang graffiti and tagging, but I tolerate aerosol art. Sometimes the more gifted aerosol artists are commissioned by busi
OH boy. I won’t even retort. Keep beliveing this way. hahaha. Go find some books
on graffiti, you will clear up all your misconceptions a bit more. BUT- you won’t learn
everything there is to know about graf. Writers have TONS of secrets and they are bound
to an oath of secrecy when they join a crew. The crew becomes their family, not in the gang
sense that you see on TV like on COPS, or in the movies, but more like a tight knit group of
friends. Many writers are starting to form their own religion too, which is based a bit on a
certain type of magic. This magic is more of a guiding force for the writer whenever he or she
(yes, there are females that write too) gos out to paint. the writers pray to a higher power, that
sometimes thake the form of an animal, kind of like a jackalope (little rabbit with small deer antlers).
This might seem REALLY crazy and way out form left field, but it’s true. Regular crews won’t hurt anyone, and they are not violent. Sometimes there is confrontation- like when another writer goes over another, the two crews call each other up set up a date to try and talk out the situation, and if
ALL ELSE FAILS, then it resorts to a fight. in the fight, there are many rules and codes that each writer MUST follow. If not, he/she could face possibly being removed from that crew. All I really
know about the fighting tradition is that the writers have to square off and do a 2 minute ceramonial dance, then lock right hands and fight until one gives up or until the crew delegates decide the fight is over. Man, if you think American writers are bad, YOU GOTTA see the European writers. those guys are CRAZY1 but what it all comes down to is that a writer just wants to paint his name on a train car. I saw a comment above early on in the thread where some one was sugesting that graffiti-ers should paint more engines. Thats just great- actually that is one of the STUPIDEST things a writer can do.
Re: All the detailed explanations of the how and why of this graffiti…
You forgot to say, “And it is all 100% illegal.”
Good call.
I guess some of these folks wouldn’t mind someone coming and trespassing on their property in the middle of the night and painting up thier houses and cars without permission. But it is an “artform”, so it is OK, right?[%-)]
It absolutely amazes me that folks would come on here and seemingly endorse trespassing and vandalizing private property. Cut and dry, it is no more than that.