 Hello, I'm Ken and I'm Dino Coombs and the March 2022 What's Neat starts right now The What's Neat show is sponsored by Lombard hobbies your value hobby shop for over 40 years of modelers helping modelers Big inventory value pricing fast shipping and great service Additional support is provided by Walthers trains everything you need to build a great mile railroad check out their website at Walthers com and by Bachman trains now, that's the way to run a railroad check out their website at bachman trains calm and Thank you for helping us support the best hobby in the world This is what's neat for March 2022 I'm your host Ken Patterson and this month. We do have a great show in that I've got a great interview with Andrew Bob is who showed up here in St. Louis with an absolutely immaculate beautiful modular layout depicting the Santa Fe railroad of 1959 this amazing layouts got the complete station of Topeka Kansas built on it as well as the Barstow Shops It's a real treat to interview Andrew for the show this month also in this video We've got some great drone footage in modeling ideas from above by Jeff Nelson He shared with us this amazing ship that hauls freight cars from Mobile, Alabama All the way down to Mexico this ship is amazing in that it's two decks It's ten tracks wide and I measured out nature scale It would be about eight feet long about 15 inches wide and what a magnificent model this ship would make for our layout Also this month I do a photography segment on how I designed and built the Bachman 2022 corporate catalogs photograph using this amazing HO scale Amtrak charger locomotive it turned out to be a photography segment in that we cover all the parameters have How to get a great photo f stops timing and so many other things so that you can also create that perfect photo contest winning photo for your layout Now this month Walters has announced a brand new program which I find absolutely amazing It's the Walters 2022 model railroad scholarship program And this is a great program in that it's designed for high school seniors and recent graduates that are active in model Rewarding and they are pursuing a degree in one of the steam programs either science technology engineering arts or math How wonderful Walters a family-owned company in our industry supports the youth in our hobby in so many different ways Including this thoughtful program check out their website for more information and details and criteria for qualified applicants Also, I'd like to say be sure to check out the what's neat this week show that we produce every month Keeping you updated on what's new in the hobby with special guests great interviews and a lot of information again Every single Saturday we shoot it except for the last Saturday the month keeping you informed in the best hobby in the world I'd also like to thank very much Lombard hobbies for helping us promote the hobby They've got a lot of new products on their website including this containers that are brand new out from Aurora models These are some of the most magnificently detailed containers I've ever seen and that I will show you photographs right now of the interior detail as you open the door these things are amazing They've got a lot of brand new products on their website including the new Walters proto well cars that have just come out The horizon passenger cars also a great array of brand new open auto racks from Walters You will recognize these they're absolutely beautiful and the Santa Fe full-length dome cars that are now available on the market A lot of great products for you to check out at Lombard hobbies out of Lombard, Illinois Check them out at their website at Lombard hobbies calm and with that. Let's continue on with the rest of this March 2022 what's neat? For this segment of what's neat I'm standing with Andrew Bobis and Andrew you have got the most brilliant looking Santa Fe layout Here at this great American train show. I want to tell you what? It's a real crowd pleaser a lot of people have really walked around it slow and appreciated your art I try tell me about your passion for this hobby I grew up next to the Burlington Northern train tracks in Lyle, Illinois My bedroom window is about 70 feet from the tracks. So I've been with it since birth Frequent visits to Chicago's Museum of Science and Industry layout Fueled my passion for it. They had a o-gauge Santa Fe based layout, which I have tried to replicate parts of and That's where my passion is. That's kept me going all these years now this modular layout at this show is pretty much Your deal. I mean you've got another helper here, but this is all on you explain to me why Why not right? This is my pinnacle of life after this. It's just downhill, but uh, no It's I enjoy sharing my hobby Okay, and you said that you're able to set up portions of this layout back at your home base Yes, just about third of the layout about a 20 by 16 foot layout is what I can fit This is amazing. Now the height is just right so that children can see it and parents alone Did you do that on purpose? It's actually the standards of the club that I'm part of back at home So did a lot of this has been built for that. So just stuck with it about what is the height of this layout? 38 inches so 38 inches high and what what would you guess is your minimum radius on your triple-track main line? 34 and a half is the minimum So that works well with all the passenger trains and all the freight's now it appears at your era is I'm gonna guess late 50s to 16 late 1959 So it's perfect very well as executed. So walk us around the layout Tell us about some of the signature scenes that you've built I obviously see the Barstow shops right in front of us, which I've shot Photos of but it also appears you've built full interiors in these structures I wouldn't say a full interior basic interior just to give the impression that there's more Okay, but it's very simple very basic again all about it looks like it but it really isn't Again, this was a building that was on the old museum layout. It was the last one I remember seeing before they tore the layout down It was fun to research it There's not really any plans anywhere that I've seen of the building I have is just a basic template and the rest I took pictures and guesstimate, you know known height of a locomotive Okay, the door is gonna be this high, you know, this is you know doorway Okay, average 36 inches, right? I just base it on that It's perfect. So all the grid lines on here are what the real one is And this is all scratch built. This is not 3d printed. What is all folks are doing? It seems like right? No, I'll scratch built the core is quarter inch plywood and then the rest of styrene No, I also see that you've lit this structure. Tell me about the lighting. Is that leds or just LED strip lights Got Amazon hooked them up plugged them in and there they are. That's very simple Now I also saw that you had modeled the Topeka train station. Tell us about that. That was also on the museum layout Partner actually went to the station is still there. We went and measured it You didn't know it, but he does now but measured every portion of it And then I came back with all my drawings or you know complete mess organize it and then built it It's nice. Thank you. So nice and it also appears It's got a lot of interior in it doesn't it actually it's just frosted glass So it's there's nothing in there The next structure that you mentioned was you modeled the Argentine Freight table again another one that was on the museum. It's not a full Full true to the real one. Okay, you know representation of it And again, I just thought it was a cool building and actually the original one one of my friend's own So I was able to measure it out and then make mine very nice and in between the scenes you I see desert Yeah, I see just a lot of deciduous Midwest and desert primarily structures I try to model what the Santa Fe went through from Chicago all the way to California That's quite an undertaking and so far from what I see all the viewers are gonna love what you've done here I mean, it's just amazing. So how many train shows do you do with this? This is actually the first one I've done with just my personal layout. Okay, this is numero uno But over the path with the club I do about seven to eight shows a year. Okay, so I'm not new to doing it So I had some idea what I was doing. What's the reception with the public what you expected? I would say it was more than I expected I wasn't quite sure how it would go but I've been touched. I've heard nothing but kind comments And that again, that keeps me going Now Andrew, I understand you said you have a Facebook presence so people can follow you building this lab do it's a Santa Fe all the way Mazur layout on Facebook. That's awesome And one last question I want to ask you is what are the overall dimensions of this? 20 and a half feet by 44 feet. It's amazing. Thank you Another thing you mentioned is described to me the type of track you used on this I just Atlas code 100 painted with spray paint. Okay, and just again very simple very durable Especially for a modular layout because this gets banged in a trailer. You know moved around a lot I want something that's not gonna break on me You know very quickly right now Andrew you mentioned that this layout is stackable for transportation Describe to us your design on that Actually again with the club we have a trailer and all the everything just it just stacks in a cart that was a custom built So very again very simple cart rolls out on wheels. I unload it put the cart back in the trailer It sounds if it sounds very functional with regards to being simple again We want to when we built the trailer for the club We want it quick and easy get in get out as quick as we can so to get all of this layout in took maybe Half an hour for everything to be inside the building not put up but in here Right now a lot of folks on their layouts on our Midwest Valley layout for example We didn't choose to have backdrops But you've got low backdrops that fit the scenery going around everywhere except for the yard And I imagine that so that you can have exchanges with the customers. Yeah, that is so I can get the trains on easier Is that right? Yeah, and did you paint these backdrops? They're all painted by me. That's nice, and they're made out of Yep That's amazing, and I guess those pop off before the layout gets stacked. Yes. Yeah, there's a whole mc clamps Everything here is there to me be made quickly simple quick and easy now. Tell me it looks like you use DCC on this layout What system do you use the power of this layout and see how do you like that? I love it? So I've had minimal issues with it more so look probably you know operator error more than anything else Okay, do you use radio units? Are you all plug-and-play? I have a radio and I have a plug-in one so both. Yeah This is commendable the viewers are gonna love this layout Andrew And I want to really thank you so much for sharing this with what's the folks from what's neat James your gears run a camera for us Thank you James. Thank you, and that is this segment for what's neat We're gonna do something that we did last what's gonna be incorporated into this shot along with scenery as you pan down You'll see what we have so far It's gonna be more of a technical shot of the three tracks and the brand-new charger locomotive that Bachman has introduced recently on to the market and as you pan back up Anna You will see that this shot is gonna be more of a technical drawing They've given me an example of what they want and what they're gonna do on this shot rather than it be all about the scenery It's really gonna be about the locomotive in the track Exposing a full beauty shot, which is normally what we do when we're doing shots like this We stack up all the scenery the mountains the trees and the various levels of scenery to make something very beautiful This time it's about the technical aspect of it This is what the client wants and they're simply gonna take what we shoot Crop it out to the middle and make it a real tight shot at a locomotive and the track So what I've got I've started out here with a great big sheet of four-way foam And I've laid it all out so that I'm only gonna be able to have on film what's gonna be seen in the shot There's no point in you utilizing the entire sheet of foam if we don't have to do that So I'm gonna take out this sheet as I've already cut out the shape of what we're left with is this scene That I will then zoom in tight on and I'll scenic out the side with regular scenery ballast dirt Trees and bushes to fill in the background and then they can take this shot and turn it into exactly what they want So let's see how this one turns out. I started the process of preparing the diorama Ground foam and dirt and all the scenic aspects by simply painting an earth tone color paint onto the foam This will allow the pink to not show through when everything's glued down and it also seals the foam It's a great thing to do when you're actually building a layout and you want the foam to not degrade as quickly by simply sealing it with latex paint The next part of the process was I glued down the Bachman easy track with the cement ties I use quick seal plus from damp. This glue dries Absolutely clear and it also allows ballast and glue to stick to it I waited down the track with some weights that I had in the basement just to keep everything firm for the About 12 hours that it takes for this glue to set up Once everything was set up I then sprinkled a little bit of ballast on the outside edges of the easy track Now I will put ballast between the tracks as per my instructions but for this part I put down dirt first of all and Then I put down ground foam two different shades light green and medium green woodland scenic ground foam And then I put the ballast on both sides of the main line just on the outside to feather an area Between the ground foam and the track. This makes the scene look absolutely prototypical Now if I was finishing this as a finished layout I would probably cover all of the easy track with the gravel on all of it I would literally just cover it all and then I would take my paintbrush And I would brush it in gently in between the ties and all around to finish the scene I actually did this when I created the original Bachman easy track add back in 2001 and it looked absolutely fantastic ballasted that way again I use a fan brush to ease the ballast brush it in make it smooth a fan brush is a very gentle brush And it makes spreading the ballast very easy with no lines and no imperfections Once the ballast is set into place I then use this woodland scenic scenic cement and I liberally applied it to the entire diorama Spraying all the dirt and all the ground foam with a very fine mist as not to a puddle now this this glue Actually has a wedding agent in it Which allows it to soak into the ballast without beating the ballast and making it kind of just look not so smooth It allows everything to go down and be glued exactly the way we laid it when we brushed it out with the brush Again the dirt the ground foam and everything is liberally wet with this glue for this diorama It only took one bottle of glue But as you can see I had a multiple bottles that just had a little bit left in them And so I shook them up thoroughly and then put them into the spray bottle and applied it with a fine mist Once the diorama was drying actually tilted it up on end Allowed the glue to drip off the edge onto into a trash can and everything is ready now for the trees and a final scenic As you can see here So now that we've got the basic scene built It's always important to do a test photo shoot with the diorama just to make sure that the Team of artists on the clients end are happy with what we've got so far and they've got something They know that we can work with so I'm going to show you the diorama. It's set up out here right now 230 at this time of the year shoot time. I've got the charger locomotive I've got three lines of the concrete track all set up And I've added just a couple of trees to the scene so that we can get an idea of what needs to be filled out in The photo and as you can see So far we've got something going really good here where it exemplifies and shows off the ties and also the bushes Just feather the scene on each side now What I'm going to do is add a lot more trees all the way around the diorama in order to fill it in and then they can change Things that they may want to change in Photoshop I'm also using a large reflector to light up the front of the locomotive during the photo shoot So right now, let me just share with you the test photo shoots that we've got the test shots This is the way it looks so far. This is the reflector reflecting the light of the locomotive as you can see the locomotives A little dusty. We still got to fill in more trees And they'd like me to put just a little bit of ballast in between each one of the pieces of easy track So we'll do that overnight and if I don't if I have good weather tomorrow We'll go ahead and finalize the shoot do another couple of photo shoots Send them the photos right away where the diorama still set up outside in the event that I need to do a third or fourth Photo shoot just to make sure everything's tweaked exactly the way they want to use it for their cover So let's move on and see what happens next So you've seen me do to test photo shoot that we did this afternoon And I've been working all night on various Projects for what's neat and videos and what have you and I thought why not get a great shot of the charger Locomotive with a beautiful sunrise going on in the background Now generally I like to shoot sunrises about 18 minutes before the Sun actually rises Because that's when I get my best colors in the sky the purples So I've set up the charger Locomotive on our diorama that we built to do the corporate cover photo with But I simply powered it up with DCC Which I've run outside here to the model and I've got my camera And I also have a total light set up here And what I do with this light is I light up the side of the locomotive for about one and a half seconds Which gives us just enough light on the side to light up all the detail and then the 45 second exposure with the camera At f22 which will bring the locomotive headlights and the clouds and the scenery in the background all into focus at the same time So I'm shooting again about a 45 second exposure on this and yet It's about 18 degrees out here with the temperatures have not affected the track or the model so far at this point So let me show you now how the final photography came out the added bonus for the clients social media or otherwise other ways to Expose a this locomotive in a different light, then you're generally used to it standard studio photography So as I said 18 minutes before sunrise is always the best time to get the colors But there's nothing that beats the actual moment The three or four minutes that you get during the actual sunrise. I've got the camera set up I've got the total light on right now full in that We've gone from 45 second exposures from the last photograph that I showed you down to less than 1.5 second exposures and what I did was I lit up the locomotive with the total light During the entire time of the 1.5 second exposure at f22 again on the camera The colors are magnificent. I can show you what the final photograph looks like But let's just enjoy this moment because sometimes this is when my job Actually feels amazing It's moments like this. You can't buy at any store That just makes for a a great photograph and be a great cup of coffee in the morning So now let me show you the final photographs that came from this That's so far what we've got now again. We're going back this afternoon to show Photograph the final cover shot for the corporate catalog which still has to be done The scene still needs to be filled in with trees and bushes, but 12 more hours and let's see how that one turns out So here we are outside doing the final shoot at least what I thought would be the final shoot for the Bachman 2022 cover. I'll show you what I've got set up right now The scene is set up with trees and bushes. Everything is lined out Just right the client asked for there to be ballast placed between the tracks And I'm experiencing about 30 mile an hour wind gusts out here I've already picked up the passenger cars off of the grass once already as they blown completely off the diorama and rolled off So and the ballast is blowing around because it's unsecured. So what I've got to do I've got to bring everything inside. I've got to glue down the ballast in these furrows here So that nothing moves and we're going to schedule a reshoot after the snows that we get tomorrow So this is going to drag on for a couple of more days trying to meet the timeline of less than Four more days to get this project completed, but that's just the nature of the beast. That's how this works I am also losing my son now to high clouds. So I don't have complete sun like I'd like to have anymore So I would call this a second test shoot. Otherwise known as fail But let's continue on and I'm also going to show you how I go about making all of these trees So let's continue on and see how this project turns out So here we are it's actually final shoot day for this Bachman cover Yes, we had a snow storm and I've a lot of couple days go by where it's all melted already But I'm set up with a good day not very much wind. It's actually almost 50 degrees out here right now Go figure that for January But the shot is all set up now the ballast is between the tracks the locomotivism position All of the bushes are lined up around the entire scene and what these are are This is a line of bushes at Bachman actually sells in their scene scapes line of scenery products and I take the wire armature bushes and I Create them all at the same time on a sheet of foam I put flocking on them and then ground foam of various shades of colors and they make very very great looking Bushes the bluff scene that I used to have on my layout in the house was covered with these bushes Because they are just the right height for the honeysuckle that grows wild out here on the cliff on the bluff of the Mississippi River Now I'm using a reflector here to reflect light onto the side of the locomotive here So that both sides of the locomotive are evenly lit, which is really important I don't want any hard shadows in this part of the photograph I want the shadows to be blended out and that's what the reflector does also on this I've got sagebrush trees and what do I mean by that? I take flocking and I put over sagebrush armatures and at some point I will do a what's neat Segment on how to do this. It's it's something that if you put on too much You can end up with cotton candy looking type trees another type of armature I like besides sagebrush is to just use wire armatures as you can see the tree in the background to me right here wire Looks fantastic. You don't have to flock it. You can make a great winter scene or you can put flocking over this Spread it out real thin and then put your ground foam onto that So with that What they're gonna do on this photograph is they're gonna take this final shot And they're gonna bring it into Photoshop and they're gonna drop in a city just above the trees in the background So it'll be a well-balanced photograph well lit. It should be a dynamite striking looking cover for the Bachman 2022 catalog this year. So with that, let me show you the final photograph that they have done They have done the photoshopping on this and what do I mean by that? I've already seen a mock-up of what it's gonna look like so I can show you now this final shot of the way It came out just an absolutely wonderful day a great photo shoot and make sure you pick up your copy of this Bachman catalog This year at a train show. It'll be great. And so with that that says photography segment of what's neat How to shoot a photograph both sunrises and of course the final shot here shooting at F22 quarter of a second eight different shots different angles of the diorama and let them choose what they want So that's a segment for what's neat All of the products seen on this episode of what's neat are available from Lombard Hobbies in Lombard, Illinois We'll order online at Lombard hobby comm Walthers trains supporting hobby retailers across the world since 1932 Check out their website and learn more at Walthers comm Bachman trains now. That's the way to run a railroad check out their website at Bachman trains comm