Modeling Dioramas |
SEPTEMBER 2003
There has been a lot of water under the bridge, so to speak, since my last Topic, and it is time to bring everyone up to date on modeling activities here. Firstly, despite opinions and inclinations expressed several months ago, I have not abandoned HO scale in favour of S scale; I am happily modeling in both scales. Some of the conclusions which I reached over a few months of deliberations may be of interest to fellow railway modelers.
As alluded to in past Topics, I have become a fan of 1:1 modeling, with no selective compression. Coupled with the fact that my main objective in the hobby is to re-create favourite scenes from my series of books, I believe I have found a direction which will work for me, and help keep my sanity at the same time. In literally years of scribbling plans and trying to fit too much (on paper) into a medium-sized layout room, I reached the point where I discovered that no permanent layout could ever satisfy me. My dilemma was whether to represent a portion of the Allandale territory or the Palmerston territory. The two just can't go together. That is, to faithfully model a portion of one, I would have to forsake the other. That was a situation I was not prepared to embrace.
I had looked at both Palmerston and Allandale, and Owen Sound, Harriston and Collingwood, for that matter, in S, HO and N scales. It did not take long to discover that even in the smallest scale, I could not faithfully model the entire Allandale or Palmerston yard in my available space! Moving upward to the largest scale became even more of a laughing (or crying) matter: even the most humble station such as Minessing on the Penetang Subdivision could barely be modelled along a 22-foot wall!
Adding to my chagrin was the realization that for me, nothing but 1:1 modeling will any longer suffice. I have devoted the past seven years of my working life to studying the Canadian National operations in Southern Ontario during the 1950s in detail. I have put every CN subdivision in that territory under a microscope far beyond the degree of most modellers. As such, I have become rather attached to the locomotives, trains, stations, industries and (most of all) scenes of that era. When I put my own motivations under the microscope, it became obvious that I only have one objective: to utilize the medium of scale modeling to afford me (and others) the chance to step back in time and visit some favourite places on the Allandale, Stratford and London Divisions. It became evident that I wished to see these places as the steam photographers of the 1950s did, from the same vantage points. I therefore discarded the option of selective compression.
What to do then? Fortunately, something else became evident from a study of the pictures in my books. Namely, there are only so many choice locations to which photographers flocked or to which I may have flocked given the opportunity. Disregarding the notion of designing a layout with logical operation as a concern, I quickly seized upon a few scenes which appealed to me. To put it another way, if you told me that tomorrow morning I was going to awake and find it June 25, 1954 for a day, where would I go? To the Palmerston footbridge; the Essa Road crossing at Allandale; the Allandale shop track; the Owen Sound engine facilities; the produce houses in the vicinity of Bradford station; and the Collingwood Terminals elevators. Applied to modeling, I discovered that it would not be necessary to model the entire yard or town in question, but rather only that portion which could be beautifully framed by the lens of a 4x5 Graphic.
At that point in time, the notion of modeling in multiple scales, which previously had the potential to be a curse, came to be seen as an advantage. If modeling is merely a medium, why limit myself to a single scale? Why not approach each subject individually? Solid ideas then took shape. My favourite aspect of Allandale was the Essa Road crossing, which could be modelled well in HO scale on a 2' x 9' section. The scene looking north from the footbridge in Palmerston to beyond Main Street (including the entire 650-foot freight transfer dock) could be done in HO scale on a 3' x 15' section. After checking the plan for the Collingwood Terminals, I decided that it would be an excellent subject for a shelf layout in N scale someday. Having purchased an S scale Mogul kit, it became evident that the Port Rowan or Penetang station scene would be a wonderful way to explore that scale.
Can you see what I'm getting at here? I am no longer thinking of model railroading, but rather railway modeling. Having grown weary of the exercise of planning a permanent layout, I have found exciting new possibilities in thinking in terms of scenes only. Thus, I am happy to relate that I can have my cake and eat it too. The Palmerston section has been taking shape for a number of months, with all ties down and rail starting to be laid in place. Next up will be the Allandale Essa Road scene. These two dioramas will be joined by several feet of flex track on bare benchwork (call it a "staging yard" if you will). Something had to disappear in the layout room of course, namely the former staging yard and the planned Meaford and Collingwood sections. The old Allandale, which did not resemble the real Allandale in any detail, will disappear to make room for the Essa Road crossing scene. The section depicting Bradford on the existing layout is a reasonable representation of the real Bradford, so it will be spared for a number of years. Should the Palmerston and Allandale sections be finished to a great degree, Bradford will be removed in favour of another diorama. In the meantime, I can devote my energies to modeling these favourite scenes, and running trains through them to my heart's content. I'm even chuckling over the fact that the Southampton Mixed arriving at Palmerston can roll off that scene and become the Penetang Mixed departing Allandale on the next! Likewise, a grain extra heading south out of Palmerston can become a train of empties heading for Collingwood.
It goes without saying that the new construction is portable. I have no desire to build a permanent layout in this home or any other. Instead, I will concentrate on modeling individual scenes. With a young family and my time otherwise devoted to historical railway writing, it is debatable whether I will even adequately finish the Palmerston piece over the next five years. I no longer feel the pressure associated with filling a room with benchwork and consigning myself to a dozen or more years completing a permanent layout which appealed to me at one point in time, but had the potential to be an undesirable obligation a few years down the road. If construction is more rapid than forseen, I can put a scene in storage or sell it to a fellow modeler. This approach may not work for many modelers. But if you are someone like me who is enthused by the concept of replicating 1:1 any scene from the series of books, however large or small, in whatever scale, I'd like to hear from you.
Ian Wilson
September 29, 2003
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