Fine Scale MR Expo 2016

[velotrain]

On Friday and Saturday I went to the Fine Scale Model Railroader Expo in Danvers, MA, which focuses on craftsman structure kits.  There are Clinics during the day, as well as Contest and Vendor rooms.  I was surprised at the distance many attendees had traveled - a fellow had driven from Alberta, and many had flown in from California.  There were bus trips to George Sellios' nearby famed Franklin and South Manchester - widely considered one of the best layouts in the world - a search will get many hits, including videos.  I had seen this in the fall of 2013, when the Expo was at Pittsfield, MA, and had plenty of photos from that occasion, so didn't feel compelled to go again.

 

Yesterday there was a self-navigated layout tour, with a half-dozen high quality layouts.  I went to four located in SE New Hampshire, including Tom Oxnard's B&M layout, which I haven't seen before.  When I walked in, the first thing I noticed was an absolutely stunning scratchbuilt woolen mill, which I had seen the day before as a display exhibit in the Contest room.  I can't begin to imagine the tens of thousands of hours it takes to build a layout like Tom's, where every detail seems perfect.

 

In particular, he does one thing better than I've ever seen elsewhere - blending the 3D scene into the backboard.  He uses prototype photos that have obviously been labored over in terms of point of view, perspective ("diminishing" factor), and appropriateness for the adjoining structures.  All of the backdrop images are photographs of New England landscape.  I was so impressed with his layout and carefully detailed structures that I exhausted my camera battery there, so have no images of the last two layouts.

 

However, many of these layouts participate in the annual "Tour de Chooch" on the weekend after Thanksgiving, so I will be back in seven months.

 

Rather than clutter up the server here, I've created an album on Flickr:

 

 

https://www.flickr.com/photos/29724621@N03/sets/72157664470934824/with/25963322090/

[toc36]

WOW!  

[tossedman]

Nice, thanks for sharing!

[velotrain]

Here's a video I just found of the Contest entries - you can skip the first 55 seconds.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sZdou4okde4