How do you make a photo backdrop?

[Chris333]

Plus the more blurry it is the less detail the models need 

[Dave V]

Yeah, you'll get a better picture with a new DSLR.  Better camera = better picture.  But you may not want "Shorpy" resolution for your backdrop.

I can only vouch for what works for me, but then again I'm a hack who muddles my way through.  Even a blind squirrel finds a nut now and then.

[ednadolski]

What are you going to use to print the final image?


Ed

[Dave V]

Experiment.  Take as many photos as many different ways as you can, then bring them home and stitch them together as best you can.  Then don't worry.  Everyone will have an opinion but only you have to be content with your results.

[RSWController]

Where is the best place to get them printed?

[wm3798]

I prefer to trim the image away from the sky... and paint the sky on a continuous surface.  It just looks cleaner to my eye.  You can also do little theater set tricks like mount the mountain range on a piece of 1/4" foam core and stand it off the back drop a wee bit, and even put a wash of LED lighting behind it for sunset effects...

Mostly I've done urban settings, though, and you just can't beat 3-D flats for that, or good prints of model buildings...  Blends in nicely with the actual models in front.
Lee

[wvgca]

i went -slightly- different ... in the back and on the top i used a generic sky background ...  trimmed to match at the top, and extremely inexpensive from the auction site .. i think forty feet [by three feet tall] for less than forty dollars ..
on top of that i layered hillside / mountain eight and a half by elevens [generic background photos] to hide the lower edge of the layout [trimmed to fit well]   .... i added plastic / fake trees to the lower edge to hide the difference there as well ..

[dcarrell8]

All camera work aside, where do you have these printed and what is the cost for printing?

[rray]

Summer of 2018 I was a passenger driving through Cascade Idaho, and the sun was shining on the pine treed mountians, so I though I would snap a bunch of pictures using my Oneplus 3T phone as I was passing through. So while I was looking at the pictures, I found that either Google photos, or my the camera app, had done 2 things. One, it made a movie for me, and two, it stitched together several photos and made a few giant backdrops.

The quality of the shots were 16 megapixels each, and the panoramas it made look fantastic. I think because the sun was so bright and the day so clear, that the phone's camera was able to take all those shots and keep up with fast clicking enough to produce backdrop suitable panoramas.

[freedj]

Im finally coming back around to this and tried stiching together some of the images I took on my trip.  I ended up using hugin to do the stiching and so far it seems like its turning out well.  These panos are from stiched together iphone stills.  I havn't gotten the images off of the DLSR yet to try those.

I am not sure how to handle the dead trees and foreground trees the first image.  The second image has brighness issues because its 280* of a lake.    I think I want to cut the sky off of the horizon and use  painted sky.  The last image seems like its pretty solid but the trees in the foreground make it difficult to find a bottom edge that doesn't look dumb.  Some retouching might be required.

You can right click and open in a new tab to view the full size image.

[MVW]

Those look great! At least there's nothing that can't be cleaned up by the judicious application of the clone tool.

Jim

[Maletrain]

Depending on how you print it, I think the buildings in the third photo might come out larger than a full sized model in the foreground.  When that happens, it makes the scene look weird.

I have the same problem with trees in the foreground - they tend to dwarf the model trees I am going to use for transition.

I am now looking for cleared hilltops with nice panoramic views, where I could take a very wide sweep without getting anything in the foreground, and only very distant buildings, if buildings cannot be completely avoided.  Not that easy to find such locations in the eastern mountains where my layout is modeled.

So, if anybody finds such a hilltop, please share.  Unless you want your backdrop to be unique, of course.

[NtheBasement]

I'll third the question: how do you go about printing the image?  Did you take it somewhere?  What kind of paper?  What did you use to paste it to the backdrop?

[Maletrain]

I'll third the question: how do you go about printing the image?  Did you take it somewhere?  What kind of paper?  What did you use to paste it to the backdrop?

I remember another thread, somewhere, about backdrops and who prints them, commercially.  One place in my bookmarks is https://www.trainjunkies.com/trainjunkies-modelrailroad-backdrops-just-corn-3.html .  I don't have time to search for that thread or other bookmarks right now.  I will look later when I get back, if nobody else has done that by then.

[CRL]

It would seem using wallpaper paste would be a good way to attach backdrops as long as the ink isn’t water soluble.