I’m curious who here has used a mirror/mirors on their layout to give the illusion of more space and/or scenery/buildings/streets etc?
It’s something I’ve considered ever since seeing Gerry Leone do it in one of my books.
If anyone has pictures please share!
I did it, will post picture later today. I hope.
I’ve used mirrors in two places on my layout. The mirror shown below is set behind half of a Walthers arched bridge to simulate where one major roadway crosses over another. The bridge structure is set into the backdrop with the mirror set against the the rear edge of the arch. The mirror does fool a lot of layout visitors until they try to look under the bridge and see themselves looking back.
I have another mirror in a corner and framed by a pedestrian bridge crossing over a roadway and parallel railroad track running into the backdrop (and mirror). This mirror works much better as viewers cannot get close enough to the mirror to see themselves and the road and rails really do look like they continue into another room. It’s funny to see visitors rush to find the next room only to find that there isn’t one.
I’ll have to take some more photos as most of the ones I had are being held for ransom by Photobucket!
OK here it is, nothing great. The mirror is between the two buildings and under the employee walkway (out of sight in the photo) going between the two buildings.
Notice the red and blue Ford truck cabs and the Branch trailer.
The mirror’s bottom edge can be seen between the Blue ford’s box and the Branch’s box. There is only one CF trailer docked on the left side of the photo but looks like two trailers docked there. Seeing the track in the background looks kind of stupid to me. So this scene no longer exist.
Hi PC101,
Very clever! It took me a while to figure out how you had done the trucks. I hadn’t looked at the other pictures yet.
Dave
Very well done illusion. I had a similar thing using two busses glued so it had two fronts, but it was less convincing than your box trucks.
-Kevin
I did not change the steering wheel in the red cab to a right hand drive because I’d figure no one would see the steering wheel is on the wrong side in the mirror.
The Branch box has a Branch roll up door on the end and a white rollup door on the other end.
This is an N-Scale Bus. I was at a Timonium Train Show maybe 5-10 years ago looking at an N-Scale module layout. I do not know who’s group it was. I see this guy’s normal Bus on a street facing into the mirror…looked liked a head on about to happen. So I go home and send two Buses to the ‘‘chop shop’’. Thinking next time I get to Timonium I will give my double rear end Bus to him. Well I do not know why that never happen.
Now you have me thinking, where is the bus with the two fronts?
Judging by the browning of the paper towel this Bus was wraped in, it may be 12 years ago.
Unfortunately, C&O Fan, Terry, has not posted here for about two and a half years but his site is still up, he used at least two mirrors, one at the end of the Thurmond Yard. Here’s a link…
http://conewriversubdivision.yolasite.com/
Cheers, the Bear.[:)]
Here is a mirror on my layout. Just looking at it, the building on the left is one building divided by the mirror. I think its a nice look.
These are great examples! I love seeing how people are extending the illusion of space. I like the trucks and the track in PC101’s pictures - very clever. I just wonder what the transition between the top of the mirror and the backdrop looks like for those who have put in larger pieces of glass?
My backdrop is painted in sky colors and goes to the ceiling; not sure I’d be able to install a mirror that is any taller than my tallest background building and make it somehow blend into my previously painted sky… hmm. [:^)]
PC101, That’s really neat. fun seeing how mirrors can add some depth and enhance a scene.
Regards, Peter
Roger’s is very reminiscent of Port Plastics and the yard on John Allen’s layout.
Peter’s reminds me of John Armstrong’s scene except he has a fish market instead of the diner from the Nighthawks painting.
I’m thinking I will have quite a few mirrors similar to Peter’s to make the city side of my layout look deeper than it is. (Or will be, as the case may be - haven’t gotten that far yet) The trick will be to coordinate them all so that the ‘cross street’ that shows int he mirror looks like it could be one continuous street behind the block of foreground buildings.
–Randy
Just out of curiousity, how hard is it to clean, or keep clean these mirrors?
PMR
This totally reminds me of a scene from Goodfellas - or any other Scorsese film! Great vibe.
The 1/16" thick acrylic mirror was installed in 2018 and yet to be cleaned, something I find somewhat remarkable considering the layout’s less than ideal location. Attached photo was taken today.
Btw, thanks Andy, but the missing Caddy kinda spoiled the "Scorseseness’.
Regards, Peter
Please forgive the crude sketch.
This is how I used the mirror on SGRR layout #4. The roadway went down and toward the backdrop and beneath a railroad bridge. The mirror was under the railroad bridge. This sure looked a lot better than the road just crashing into the backdrop.
-Kevin
Here’s a sketch of a portion of my N-Scale layout. There are two areas where mirrors are placed to expand vistas and (appear to) enlarge structures: the upper center and the upper right.
The center mirror is used to allow the 4-lane highway to continue toward the horizon and beyond a gentle curve that appears to be about 20 feet from the viewer. At the intersection is a ubiquitous prompt service restaurant across the street from an equally ubiquitous gas station. From the aisles, the signs and whatnot read normally and identify a Dairy Queen and a Texaco. On the rear of the structures, the signs are printed in reverse and read Burger King and Amoco. One intersection, two eateries and two places to get gas.
The upper right area in the corner of the layout has two mirrors placed at right angles to each other and was inspired by an exhibit in the Air and Space Museum of the Smithsonian in Washington, DC. The exhibit shows the Saturn V engines, but it is composed of only one full bell and one quarter-bell. Mirrors on the floor and wall allow the viewer to see the entire five-engine array. Very clever layout. Here’re two photos showing the exhibit:
I am impressed with how everyone has used mirrors to add depth to their scenes. My layout is free standing so I had assumed that mirrors wouldn’t be of any use, but I’m going to give it more thought.
Dave
I used a mirror at the end of a tunnel to try to show the track as going off in the distance even though the tunnel ended in a wall.