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Shillingstone - occupation crossing

Barry Ten

Entry posted by Barry Ten

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Ballasting is now complete, track weathering has begun and I've taken another look at the occupation crossing on the spring module. I'd originally placed the pillbox in front of the railway line but I found I was always moving it whenever I wanted to take a photo. The solution was to relocate it toward the background, on the other side of the line, and fill in the ground it occupied with a bit of hanging basket liner. The pillbox is now just plonked down on the existing scenery, making it easily removable.

 

Last week I added some red flowers but while these add a welcome splash of colour, I think they detract a little from the spring atmosphere I'm after, so they'll have to go, to be replaced by dandelions, daffodils, buttercups etc, and/or perhaps some bluebells. Modelling a specific season has had me paying a lot more attention to old railway photos, no bad thing really as it adds another dimension of interest to much-perused railway albums.

 

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If it's spring it must be close to summer as this 7F has been rostered for passenger duty on a rake of MK1s. The coaches have been close-coupled using the Keen system, which is very easy to fit - one of those excellent products which does what it says on the tin.

 

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buffalo

The 7F must have been pressed into passenger service rather too quickly as the crew haven't had time to change the headcode...

 

I agree about the flower colours, though. Yellows then blues in spring with reds waiting until high summer.

 

Nick

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BlackRat

Dunno about high summer, we have poppies in a field not a mile from here, quite a few to.

 

The field runs alonside the Cornish maniline but we do get the seasons a bit earlier here.

 

People tend to forget the various colours, on a walk today we spotted various hues of blue, pink, yellow and white and even 'copped' an early purple orchid (we know of 4 flowering within a cpl of miles).

 

I think the colour looks great, and draws your eye into the layout.

 

The trees and scenery suggest late spring/early summer so I would say just leave it and add a bit more colour ;)

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buffalo

Ah, but we didn't have all these mild winters to confuse the poppies back in the fifties. I would have thought late-May/early-June at the earliest even for Cornwall in those days. That would be a month or so before their normal appearance over much of the country. We've also have things flowering very early over here on the opposite side of the country. Some bluebells have been giving it a go since early March, whereas now would be a more normal time.

 

Nick

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Barry Ten
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Too late now! I ripped out the red flowers this evening and changed them for some purpley bluey white ones which look a bit like bluebells.

 

The red ones will look good on the high summer module, though.

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buffalo

Before we got distracted, I was going to ask what you are using for the flowers.

 

Nick

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Barry Ten
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The red ones are just some old coloured scatter I've had for donkey's years - maybe Noch or something similar. I've also used some MiniNature tufts and Noch laser-cut daffodils here and there.

 

Agree with you about the headcode, by the way :-)

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Captain Kernow
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The whole configuration of the accommodation crossing in relation to the surrounding landscape just looks spot-on, Al, it is completely convincing, the first photo particularly is really nice (and I also liked the red flowers, but if you've saved them, they can live on to enhance the Summer module!).

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Barry Ten
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Thanks, all.

 

I'm having some trouble with getting "punch" into my photos here, not sure why. They tend to look a little underexposed, even though I'm using aperture priority, tripod, timed shutter etc. I don't have the same problem taking shots on the N scale layout, which is only 18 inches lower than the S&D one. I wonder if the fluorescent tubes are somehow messing up the exposure, even though they're not visible in the frame when I compose the shot? Perhaps I need to spot meter off the loco/scenery - could it be that the large expanse of sky backscene is confusing things?

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