The Little Rock Line

[Bendtracker1]

Otto,
Yes they are and I'm not one to get upset if you would have said that, providing you'd say it in respectful tone. 
It's always good to hear what others think and get inside their minds, well most people's minds that is.
But looking back and now, seeing what I have, I can't argue with you.  It is kind of distracting.  But you don't know till you try.
I've had folks over and I've gotten mixed reactions from them, but nothing heavy one way or the other.

This isn't the first time I've went with a plan only to be unhappy with it and changed my mind, lol.   

Like I said, at the time I thought it was a good idea, especially after seeing JD's layout, it seemed practical.  He had, IIRC, all black and used yellow stripping.
Maybe the three colors I used wasn't a good choice and they might have been wider strips than what he used?
Maybe the adage "Less is More" even applies here as well?

So in the end, I'll probably go with all black, maybe add some simple town names tags and be done with it?
I'll keep the printed schematics up for now, or at least until I get some major landmarks installed, like buildings with signage.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts Otto!

[Philip H]

Even if you tank the track diagrams, station names would be helpful. Perhaps you can find a RI station name image online somewhere and a close enough font and do some photoshop magic to create prototypical signs. Print on high quality photo paper at high resolution and off you go.

[Bendtracker1]

Years ago I did just that Philip.
I drew these up with CorelDraw so they'd fit on Avery Address labels.
They worked pretty good, but the labels were old and didn't stick for very long.
I plan to redo these with better labels and maybe laminate them to styrene and screw them to the fascia?



I did these with black names on white background because the fascia is black.
The real signs are white lettering on black.



These are a couple of the town schematics (2 to a sheet of paper) and I just cut and tape them to the backdrops for now.

[John]

Otto,

So in the end, I'll probably go with all black, maybe add some simple town names tags and be done with it?
I'll keep the printed schematics up for now, or at least until I get some major landmarks installed, like buildings with signage.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts Otto!

Simple schematics in a town are helpful to a guest operator, especially if you have multiple industries and tracks to spot cars ..

[Philip H]

Years ago I did just that Philip.
I drew these up with CorelDraw so they'd fit on Avery Address labels.
They worked pretty good, but the labels were old and didn't stick for very long.
I plan to redo these with better labels and maybe laminate them to styrene and screw them to the fascia?

I'd print on high quality photo paper, cover them using self adhesive laminating pockets, and attach those to the layout. Strikes me as less work and a high quality product.  Either way they do look good.

[Bendtracker1]

I'd print on high quality photo paper, cover them using self adhesive laminating pockets, and attach those to the layout. Strikes me as less work and a high quality product.  Either way they do look good.

Thanks Philip, I'll look into some of those.

[Cajonpassfan]

I use heavy weight photo paper as well attached with double sided tape, and so far there's been no need to cover it with clear plastic. Nice and clean. And if a sign does get damaged at some point, it's a simple matter to reprint it and remount. YMMV.
Otto

[Bendtracker1]

Another good option, thanks Otto.

[Bendtracker1]

Over the last week I've working on terrfoaming the section from Ruston to Winnfield. I've been cutting and fitting the foam into place and gluing down a few sections at a time. The sheets are about 1.9" thick but I plan to carve them down quite a bit so they look like rolling farmland. The edges along the tracks I'm hoping to make them look like an eroded cut with a tree line to help define the edges of the farmland.







At the time I painted the clouds I didn't give it much thought as to how high the foam would be, so I just painted it and moved on. But at this point, until I get it terraformed, I'm kind of planning to redo the entire backdrop, meaning repaint it blue and redo the clouds and repainted tree line.

One driving factor to this decision is the clouds.
They turned out OK for the most part, but after looking at them and comparing them to the clouds I did on the other side of the backdrop, these turned out almost too crisp and too bright. The clouds on the other side are more subtle and airy and not near as bright. Once the foam is carved and painted, I'll probably take another stab at them.

[Bendtracker1]

I've stopped working on the foam for now as I wanted to get an idea of how much space I'll need for the some of farm buildings before I start terrafoaming the area.
I recently picked up a 3D printed house from eBay along with Delony's Barn kit from Showcase Miniatures.

I started working on the barn but set that aside until some glue I ordered arrives.  In the meantime I started working on the house.
I plan to make this an abandoned farm scene so I wanted the house in a state of deterioration.

Here is what I started with.




I cleaned it up and started adding a few details to it.



Then I painted the first layer with several shades of gray so it shows through when I start the chipping process.
Also added a couple of holes in the roof.



Then shot it with a base coat of white and light gray for the shingles.



Tonight I started the chipping and peeling process and added some light weathering.







I still have more work to do to it, but the glue for the barn is here so I can get it built and then I can get an idea of the space that I'll need so I can working on the foam.

[OldEastRR]

That house looks great. As for your "terrafoaming" one thing I noticed when driving the backroads of the Midwest was that the farmland was lower than the dirt ROW of the road -- right at the fenceline. This of course from decades of plowing, disking, etc the soil for crops meant lots of that topsoil blew or washed away. Very striking. The ROW of course was still the same height as when the road was laid out way back when.
Don't know if the same thing happens where the RR ROW and field join.

[thomasjmdavis]

That house looks great. As for your "terrafoaming" one thing I noticed when driving the backroads of the Midwest was that the farmland was lower than the dirt ROW of the road -- right at the fenceline. This of course from decades of plowing, disking, etc the soil for crops meant lots of that topsoil blew or washed away. Very striking. The ROW of course was still the same height as when the road was laid out way back when.
Don't know if the same thing happens where the RR ROW and field join.

For the most part, that is not caused by land sinking, but by building up the right of way for roads (just as is done for railroad roadbed) so that the road does not flood in heavy rains. Of course, sometimes rains are so heavy, or river levels so high, that everything (roads, railroads, basements, whole houses) flood anyway, particularly if the property is not elevated much over the local lakes and rivers.  Through much of the Midwest, you will see farmhouses sited on small hills, which may have been created for the purpose, or just selected from the natural land contour, to get the house higher for precisely the same reason.  My 100+ year old Midwestern farmhouse is a good 6-7 feet higher than the road (the basement floor is approximately road level). Putting the house on a flattened hill or mound has the added advantage of raising the septic field above above the level of saturated ground during light flooding, or heavy rains.  It's one of the things one looks for when buying real estate in these parts. 

[thomasjmdavis]

@Bendtracker1  -
The old house is a great job- looks a lot like one a mile or two down the road from me.  One thought would be to add partial panes of broken glass in just one or two windows (on the house down the road, almost every window is broken out, but there are a couple with partial glass), or a tattered bit of moldy curtain. For whimsy, you might add a raccoon poking its nose out of the hole in the roof.

[Bendtracker1]

@Bendtracker1  -
The old house is a great job- looks a lot like one a mile or two down the road from me.  One thought would be to add partial panes of broken glass in just one or two windows (on the house down the road, almost every window is broken out, but there are a couple with partial glass), or a tattered bit of moldy curtain. For whimsy, you might add a raccoon poking its nose out of the hole in the roof.

Thanks Tom.
I do plan to add some glass in those upper windows, broken and intact, along with some other minor details before I get it planted in place.
The curtains would add a nice touch, didn't think about that.

As for the remarks about the location of the house, it and the rest of the buildings in the scene will be placed on the highest area of the land (foam).
So I want to get the house, barn and the other outbuildings assembled so I can see how much area I'll need before I start working the foam down to the ROW.
I'm not planning on it to be an agricultural farm, it was for livestock but the current owner has no interest in farming...

[mu26aeh]

That farm house looks like $@#^. 

On that note, you nailed it