Hi all,
I haven’t done any op sessions in the last few months because I’ve been obsessed with finishing this new business district across from the steel mill. I’ve included links to some photos. As Murphy’s Law would have it, the photos brutally highlight some flaws that weren’t so obvious while I was setting up.
I used a Merchants Row 1, Merchants Row 3, and a White Tower hamburger joint. I also had two other structures: a leftover City Classics gas station from my old layout which I’m modeling as being abandoned, and a generic 3-story structure that I picked up assembled - but unpainted - at a white elephant table during a GSMT show in Timonium. I setup some temporary props to make the pics look more ‘natural’, such as blue painted foam insulation board to hide the cluttered wall shelves, and a 20x36-inch foam slab painted roof-brown to cover the aisle - disguising it as a parking lot. Everything else is part of the actual layout.
I’ll list the photos in the same order as if we’re driving down River Avenue toward Gate 7 of the steel mill (blue guard shack in the background), listing the businesses from right to left. Here’s a wide-angled view of the Strip:
http://i39.photobucket.com/albums/e182/CSX_road_slug/merchants_row/RiverAvenueWest01a_1024x768.jpg
Next, a closer-up view of the same photo so you can read the signs and billboards. The structure in the foreground to the far right is a modified White Towers hamburger joint, modeled to look like it’s under new ownersh
Outstanding. I picked up some really neat ideas from your pictures. Thanks for posting, great scene.
Larry
I put the img tags in so everyone who doesn’t click on the links would see what they’re missing. Great modelling. How did you do the roads?
[:-^]
Morning Ken,
Outstanding indeed, Love your creativity and the town feeling it gives.
Also like the fact that your town is so prosperous that it doesn’t need “Parking Meters”
The juices are flowing for a double cheese burger at the “Shack” right now even though it is breakfast time.
The guard house at the end of the street looks right at home there. I spent quite a few months in one just like it at our refinery after my actual retirement.
Don’t stop now, “WOW” us some more. How about some more pictures of the steel mill?
Johnboy out…
Outstanding work, Ken. I love the streets. The shot with the mill in the background is spot on.
Thanks for sharing that.
Lee
Very nice Ken. Excellent work. You have really captured the feel of the neighborhood. It reminds me of the area near the mills here in Pittsburgh - a little more dirt and you would have it.
Joe
Very nice, Ken. That certainly does make the layout come to life. Feel free to post updates of any further work.
What caused the appearance of “flashRegistry.add('panelAdv);” to appear when I tried to post a photo on this Thread ? I can’t get rid of it! Bob Hahn
Well thank you everybody for the kind remarks! I wish I had time to respond to each of you individually, but I’m pressed for time, so I’ll focus on answering questions.
MrB - I used the Walthers Cornerstone Street System Concrete road kits for the main street (a.k.a. “River Ave.”), while the blacktop side street (“Avery St.”) is sheet styrene. Both were painted with a base coat of Rustoleum “Textured Plastic* - Sandstone”. Then the concrete surfaces were covered with my own homemade mix of concrete-colored PollyScale acrylic paints, and the asphalt was simulated by gray primer from a rattle-can. The travel lanes were then dusted with various colors of Bragdon weathering powder. The lines are decals.
- The so-called textured plastic is a finish patented by Rustoleum, I like it because it simulates the rough pebbled surface of most highways.
Johnboy - my original steel mill pix are old news, I’ve posted them on here so many times they’ve lost their shock value. Tell you what, I’ll PM some links to you later on…
Don’t worry Bob, I do remember a little bit of your original text before the server clobbered it: Something about you just finished a Walthers Ashland Steel Blast Furnace kit, instructions were good but numbered parts hard to find, etc… I feel your pain, I assembled the original version of their BF back in 1996. What I did was label each unique sprue with a number on masking tape, then I made up an Excel spreadsheet to cross-reference each part number with its corresponding sprue. It took a few hours to do the data entry, but made
Looks great Ken! Keep up the good work.
Nick
Nice work there, Ken!![bow]
I like how the street scene is blending into the mill area—
And the photos lighting give the area a brooding look-----
Very nice work, Ken. Your opening scene of the street is very impressive, especially the colours which you’ve used on both the street and the structures. It’s also nice to see a tree that isn’t the size of a shrub. Also, nice work on the blast furnace - the Walthers one is severely compressed.
And finally, in the opinion of an ex-heater foreman, I’ll bet that Friday nights are “hot” in the Soaking Pit Tavern. [swg]
Wayne
That “approaching thunderstorm” effect is actually a consequence of my neglecting to install an extra pair of flourescent ceiling fixtures before I started building the layout…
I was wondering if anybody would catch that little “eye-spy” detail![(-D]
Ken, the shots look great! Makes me wish that my “train room” was finished so that I could get started on all my building projects for my mrr.
