Tokyo-area Train Interiors

[KenS]

I'm working on adding interior lighting and passengers to my models, which are mainly of modern Tokyo-area commuter trains (E231/531/233 with a few 209-series), and one thing I want to do is paint the seats, which are about the only part of the train visible from outside. 

 

That's particularly important when adding lighting and figures, as that will draw the eye to the inside of the model, and Kato's beige plastic is both incorrect from everything I've seen and highly reflective, which isn't always good.  Some models (MA in particular) use blue, but while I've seen blue seats in serveral photos, it's clear that it's not always the correct color either.

 

While I can find a few photos of interiors online though Flickr, Wikipedia and Google, information on the interior design of any train is hard to come by, and I've never been to Japan to have experience for myself.

 

So my question: are there specific upholstery colors associated with particular lines/trains? I've seen a couple of examples where the seats seem to mirror the signature color of the line.  I've also seen examples where "green" (reserved/premium seating) cars have different colors than other cars on non-commuter inter-city trains, but no pictures of any of the suburban green-car interiors.

 

And if anyone has train-interior photos of their own, I'll encourage them to post to this thread.

 

BTW, I made the topic of this a bit focused.  But if people want to discuss other locations I don't have objections to doing so here, or we could start additional threads for other regions.

[Guest Closed Account 1]

I would think the only unique interiors you'll find are local one of productions made for a city contract.

 

Does wiki help?

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Train_interiors_in_Japan

[cteno4]

ken

 

i expect to see you paint the seats the frame color then do little seat pads the appropriate color for the upholstered areas!

 

jeff

[bill937ca]

I would try Quashlo's thread on Skyscraper City. You will probably have to dig! Time does not allow me to dig out the particular trains.

 

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showpost.php?p=79719850&postcount=3768

 

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showpost.php?p=79784976&postcount=3771

 

http://www.skyscrapercity.com/showthread.php?t=194709&page=189

[CaptOblivious]

I would think the only unique interiors you'll find are local one of productions made for a city contract.

 

Does wiki help?

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Train_interiors_in_Japan

 

Wow, a whole category on Wikimedia of nothing but Japanese self-propelled upholstery. I love it!

[KenS]

I would think the only unique interiors you'll find are local one of productions made for a city contract.

 

I'm not sure what you are saying here.  All the JR East commuter trains are made uniqure to each line, and that's mostly true of their inter-city trains as well, but that's all done by JRE, not the city government. Even Tokyo Metro, while owned jointly by the city and the Japanese government's MLIT ministry, appears to operate as an independent company.

 

Does wiki help?

http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:Train_interiors_in_Japan

 

Yes, quite a bit.  And how did I ever miss that page in all of my wikipedia searches.  Wow!

 

From that, I can see that the E531 bilevel green cars have blue seats on the upper level and red seats on the lower level, which matches the plastic used by Kato on their model. It doesn't tell me the E233-3000 bilevels (which I'm currently working on) are done the same way, but it's a strong hint.

 

For single-level cars it shows dark blue used on an E233-3000 car, which is very helpful, and teal sets (which can appear as light blue or green in some photos) used on Yamanote E233-500 cars. But while that would seem to suggest an attempt to replicate the line color for the Yamanote line, so far it's the only one there, and the blue on the E233-3000 seems wrong in that sense (the cars are marked green/orange externally).

 

There's one photo which doesn't say clearly what it's of, which is used with several others to illustrate the Japanese wikipedia page as an interior of a Sobu E231-0. And it's using blue seats, rather than yellow.  That may simply be because light colors are avoided (so they don't need to be cleaned as often/as throughly), but it undercuts the "mirror the line color" argument, and suggests blue is just being used generally.

 

I've separately found photos showing blue used on a Keihin-Tohoku Line E233-1000 and a Joban Line E233-2000, which could be seen as matching the trains exterior, or as a generic use of blue as the default. That "blue as default" theory is strengthened by a Keiyo Line E233-5000 (red cars) with blue seating.

 

Although I had turned up an interior of a Chuo E233-0 that replicated the orange color used on those, and as noted above the Yamanote train uses teal, somewhat matching the line's light green color, which makes the counter-argument.

 

So I have several examples of specific trains I can use for my modeling, and a feeling that dark blue can be used where I don't know the answer, as well as the sense that there's no global "seats mirror the exterior" rule on the JRE commuter trains. But that leaves me with a lot of unknowns yet.

 

Bill, thanks for the suggestion of the SSC thread.  I'd turned up a couple of examples there though Google, but searching the whole thread is a bit of a daunting proposal.  I was hoping for an answer with less of a brute-force search, but it's looking like that's going to be needed.

 

Jeff, my approach to interior painting is more of the "one big stroke of color", rather than any degree of precision.  You can't see detail through a window very well.  I'm not likely to put a pizza box on a seat, either. 

[cteno4]

Jeff, my approach to interior painting is more of the "one big stroke of color", rather than any degree of precision.  You can't see detail through a window very well.  I'm not likely to put a pizza box on a seat, either. 

 

aww common while you are at it might as well do the colored, textured seats! even though you might no see it you know it will be in there!

 

not only the box but the slice of pizza left on the seat as well! newspapers, etc as well! but less of this on japanese commuter trains than you see here in the us thats for sure! at least some shopping bags!

 

;-p

 

jeff

[Densha]

I just stumbled across this book on HS:

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10153902

I don't know if it helps and every train interior is featured but it can't hurt dropping the link.

[KenS]

Cool.

 

That one's from last year, and sold out.  But there's a new one for this year:

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10195083

 

Going on my purchase list real soon now.

 

Now I just need a version of Google Translate that works on paper. 

[Darklighter]

Now I just need a version of Google Translate that works on paper. 

 

"With Google Translate [for Android] you can:

• Translate text between 65 languages

• Use camera to take a picture and brush text to translate (available on Android 2.3 and above).

• ... "

 

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.google.android.apps.translate&feature=nav_result&hl=en

 

Haven't tried it yet though.

[200系]

Ken,

 

Don't know if you've already looked at them, but the Japanese Wikipedia pages usually contain quite a few interior pictures, as well as showing the (interior) difference between the different sub-types (including green cars).

 

might want to take a look at the following:

 

231系

http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/JR%E6%9D%B1%E6%97%A5%E6%9C%ACE231%E7%B3%BB%E9%9B%BB%E8%BB%8A

531系

http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/JR%E6%9D%B1%E6%97%A5%E6%9C%ACE531%E7%B3%BB%E9%9B%BB%E8%BB%8A

233系

http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/JR%E6%9D%B1%E6%97%A5%E6%9C%ACE233%E7%B3%BB%E9%9B%BB%E8%BB%8A

209系

http://ja.wikipedia.org/wiki/JR%E6%9D%B1%E6%97%A5%E6%9C%AC209%E7%B3%BB%E9%9B%BB%E8%BB%8A

 

hope this helps,

 

Sander

[bill937ca]

I just stumbled across this book on HS:

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10153902

I don't know if it helps and every train interior is featured but it can't hurt dropping the link.

 

I've got several of these books. The JR books have more interior photos, but the photos are small.  I think you still get better coverage on Wikipedia and other online sources and sometimes you can expand the photo.  But these are good books.  Interior photos are less common on the private railway versions.

[KenS]

Don't know if you've already looked at them, but the Japanese Wikipedia pages usually contain quite a few interior pictures, as well as showing the (interior) difference between the different sub-types (including green cars).

 

I had seen those, although I think the page for E233 changed since I last looked at it (some time ago) as I don't recall the bi-level seat photos being there. The text there seems to imply that the design is identical with the E531 bi-level down to the seat colors, and the images linked are clearly labeled for the -3000 and show the same.  So that answers my question about those.

 

Darklighter; unfortunately I don't have an Android phone.  Now if only they'd do that for the iPad I use for my railroad's technical manuals, but I suspect their feud with Apple is going to prevent that.

[Densha]

Darklighter; unfortunately I don't have an Android phone.  Now if only they'd do that for the iPad I use for my railroad's technical manuals, but I suspect their feud with Apple is going to prevent that.

After some googling it appear the program "Word Lens" uses the same method, but unfortunately doesn't support either Japanese or Chinese, it appears to have something to do with the recognition of the complex characters.

 

I think though that that many and many interior photos are available on the internet as mentioned in the posts above. But you would think there is some Japanese being no-life and creating a website with them, at least there is for express trains: http://www62.tok2.com/home/tsubame787/seat.html

If I have to believe wikipedia "鉄道列車内部画像" (but google translate says "列車内部") means train interior and that gives a lot of results with google. Including the link above and this one: http://photozou.jp/photo/list/2436427/6831689. It's just that there are so many not organized pictures. :(

[disturbman]

Maybe a bit unrelated (and probably not my place to say this) but, having read your last musing Ken, I'm wondering if you are not engaging yourself into a slightly too perfectionist adventure here. At least your approach to the subject seems a bit too perfectionist to me. Painting some seats should be simpler than that. ;)

 

That said, I quite enjoy the discussion.

[Guest Closed Account 1]

I'm not sure what you are saying here.  All the JR East commuter trains are made uniqure to each line, and that's mostly true of their inter-city trains as well, but that's all done by JRE, not the city government. Even Tokyo Metro, while owned jointly by the city and the Japanese government's MLIT ministry, appears to operate as an independent company.

 

Ok I understand now.

 

I thought that if a city wanted a particular interior they would get it. Then the contract would reflect the custom interior.

 

For example, California further subsidized their TGV so that they can have a blue/yellow theme and probably a unique interior as well.

[KenS]

Maybe a bit unrelated (and probably not my place to say this) but, having read your last musing Ken, I'm wondering if you are not engaging yourself into a slightly too perfectionist adventure here. At least your approach to the subject seems a bit too perfectionist to me. Painting some seats should be simpler than that. ;)

 

You may well be right. I do tend to obsess over details. In the end, it doesn't have to be perfect. But if I can find out what the right color should be without too much effort (and I think I have), then I would prefer to paint the seats that color.

 

What I don't want to do is leave them beige. Aside from it being wrong, it's too reflective and makes the interior too bright. My goals here are two-fold: first, to make the train look better than a string of empty cars when looked at closely or photographed (mostly by adding figures and interior lighting, but also seat colors), and second to make it look "reasonable" when lit (I find too-bright an interior to be very distracting, and my experience of Kato is that out of the box they're too bright on a beige interior).

 

I thought that if a city wanted a particular interior they would get it. Then the contract would reflect the custom interior.

 

That's probably the way it works, substituting "JR East" (or other railroad) for "city". It's just that each line's cars are the result of a unique order (e.g., the Yamanote E231-500 isn't quite the same design as the Sobu E231-0, and the Chuo, which uses an E233 design, is even more different). That includes mechanical differences (like traverse/lateral seating, number of cars per set, inclusion of double-deck or six-door cars, motor count, and ATS systems), but extends to both exterior paint (the per-line color schemes JR East uses) and cosmetic trim and, it appears in some cases, interior decor.

 

Densha, thanks for the links.  More reading material for me.

 

Back on the original question: the E231 Japanese Wikipedia page (as linked above by 200系) includes a sentence that says that all trains use blue seats, except the Yamanote line and priority seating. Although you have to take sweeping statements on Wikipedia with caution, all of the exceptions I found were for E233 trains, so it seems like blue (or teal for the Yamanote) is indeed the right answer for my E231 trains.

[bikkuri bahn]

*nm