Photography

The cold temperatures have made it quite uncomfortable to work in the basement for any length of time.  The one reprieve we have had I used to get all the outdoor Christmas decorations taken down and put away.  I also used the time to place a few odds and ends on Craigslist (non-railroad items) to continue to clean excess out of the basement.

I also enjoy photography and am getting into post processing of images.  I have started learning to use Adobe Light Room.  It is not only useful for making adjustment to images, it also helps create a way to tag the images with information such as names, locations and quality of the image and so on.  GPS information can be recorded here if you have a cameras so equipped.  I also have a scanner to bring in many older, analog images.  I built a small work station to make working simpler, and to keep material from getting scattered around my dinning or living room.  I used an old table I have from the old apartment living and added casters to the wheels so I can roll it around the basement to keep it out of the way.  I us a lap top, so I use an older but nice external monitor, as size does matter when working on images.  The scanner is an Epson V600, it can scan prints, negatives and transparences.  I added a keyboard and a mouse and I have a nice post processing work station.  The real nice part is I already had all the bits and pieces, other than the casters.



Here is my "Digital Darkroom"

Happy New Year

2018 is here, a time to review the year gone by and look forward to a new year with new goals.  I am about one month from the one year anniversary of my blog.  It started off well, but work on it as well as my modeling has trailed off as the year progressed.  A change in where I worked along with a busy time around home led to the slow down. 

In 2017

• I have been able to get the portion of layout I had built function, added the south end staging and started to work on structures.
• Finished my Conrail caboose, and started several other cars and locomotives.
• Set up throttle panels

For 2018

• Finish the Thermos Company structure and scenery.
• Ballast Track
• Install more DCC on locomotives
• Finish more structures
• Create photo backdrop
• Start prepping the rest of the basement

I hope to be spending more time in the New Year working on the lay out so the blog should also be updated more often.

Throttle Panels

I was originally going to call these control panels, but I think they are too simple to be called control panels. I put one in on each end of the yard area of Norwich.  The labels help get a location and direction for people when the see the layout.   This also helps me keep thing neater and from knocking the throttles on the floor.

NHRHTA Reunion

On September 9 I attended the New Haven Railroad Historical and Technical Association Reunion at the Valley Railroad in Essex, Ct.  It was a beautiful day and a great time was had by all.  I went to dinner with friends at a Pizza place in Old Saybrook along the Northeast Corridor.  The night was capped off with an ops session at Chris Adams Valley Railroad layout.

The American Thermos Comapany

The American Thermos Company was a major part of Norwich from the 1920's through to 1986 when manufacturing finally ended.  I am using Walthers' Water Front Warehouse to represent the main building.  I will have some smaller ancillary structures as well.  I have also started to paint my track before I start on scenery.  I am using  camouflage brown as a base and then will weather the track later on in the process.

Progress

I have been able to spend some time working on the layout each night this past week.  I have been able to finish building the lift out bride, lay all the track and install the wiring for the south end staging. The only thing I have left to do is to install the plugs to disconnect the wiring for lift out section.  I am using trailer wiring extensions I picked up at my local Tractor Supply.

I will cut the extension in half and wire them to the DCC Bus lines.
They are only $3.00 each.

I have named the south end staging yard New London as it i the next major station south of Norwich as well as base for a local that traveled to Norwich.

New London

Photo Backdrops

Photo backdrops are in vogue now rather then painted or printed back drops.  I plan on doing one my self and there are various blogs and YouTube videos on how do do one.  I have found a great web site by Mark Roberts on the process of taking the pictures and things to do to make sure the images will look good and blend together when you stitch them together electronically.  He does not mention one soft ware program, ICE by Microsoft and the best part it is free.

Here is the web site:

http://www.robertstech.com/panorama.htm