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BBC Four - James May's Big Trouble in Model Britain


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21 minutes ago, Pacific231G said:

. Of course if you make your layout VR you may not want any fiddle yards. Could you I wonder get the VR to go completely virtual for longer stretches of main line between the actually modelled stations?

You could, but then how do you relate that to your own layout ?

the products are isolated.

that said if you gave your self space in the lounge to stand and felt the urge to shovel coal firing a duchess up Shap VR could let you (the data point size for a footplate would be quite small), it just wouldn’t have much bearing on your Hornby Duchess, which would be in the cabinet staring at you, as no doubt would be a few puzzled pets.

 

with AR however you could set data points to your layout, and then adopt scenes... obviously things like smoke etc, but you could have virtual scenes... it could be raining, night, day, snow etc your layout could be open country one minute, inner city another, or oddities.. your farm animals could be walking about, or go sci-fi and put Storm troopers on the platform. More importantly though, your locos and stock are part of the story.

(Yesterday I had a demo with Daleks and a hot tub in a £300mn IT facility using AR, just because I could).

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32 minutes ago, LBRJ said:

I never realised that such in depth Business Studies was such an integral part of railway modelling - Its more about small trains and stuff to me  :D

 

Nah mate.

Rivet counting is so yesterday; it's all spread sheets and market analysis now.

The Railway Modeller needs to catch up though (didn't they always?). 

What real modellers want to see today, is detailed forensics on the RTR manufacturer's annual accounts and investment strategy.

 

RMweb is proudly out there at the front of this revolution in the hobby.

It's where the modern 21st century modellers hang out.

 

Now, where's me calculator......?

 

 

 

.

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15 minutes ago, adb968008 said:

.....with AR however you could set data points to your layout, and then adopt scenes... obviously things like smoke etc, but you could have virtual scenes... it could be raining, night, day, snow etc your layout could be open country one minute, inner city another, or oddities.. your farm animals could be walking about, or go sci-fi and put Storm troopers on the platform. (Yesterday I had a demo with Daleks and a hot tub in a £300mn IT facility using AR, just because I could).

 

Wow! That's some heavy s**t you've been using.

Could you spare some of your stash?

 

.

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9 minutes ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

 

Wow! That's some heavy s**t you've been using.

Could you spare some of your stash?

 

.

The funny thing is, when I tell colleagues I have model railways as a hobby, they tend to say pretty much the same thing to me as well.

 

Between VR, AR and MR* Theres a normal world I must be missing somewhere.

 

* MR= model railways

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1 hour ago, Corbs said:

Well I do work with BBC factual editors and they are masters of it, so your commitment to the truth is admirable.

I'm not saying 'that scene is clearly false', I'm saying 'don't straight-up believe everything you see because in my experience most of it is made in the edit, and this programme is clearly playing the humorous drama angle'.

Every programme that's not live is made in the edit (live programmes are edited in other ways) and you can argue that what you film are just the raw materials for the edit. That being so, Take Nobody's Word for It is always good advice but, though like all documentaries it chose the aspects of the story to focus on, I didn't see anything in these two programmes that felt untrue. Unfortunately that's not always quite so true  

 

I had another look at the BBC's editorial guidelines (they're available online for all to see https://www.bbc.co.uk/editorialguidelines and they haven't changed significantly since I worked there.

"For news and factual content, unless clearly signalled to the audience or using reconstructions, we should not normally:

stage or re-stage action or events which are significant to the development of the action or narrative

inter-cut shots and sequences to suggest they were happening at the same time, if the resulting juxtaposition of material leads to a misleading impression of events.

Commentary and editing must never be used to give the audience a materially misleading impression of events or a contribution."

 

This is obviously a matter of degree and judgement. We all know (I assume) that the reporter apparently listening to the interviewee isn't, it's just a way to avoid distracting jump cuts,  but that's not distorting the truth; changing the reporter's question in the reverses wouid be though and some people do push it.

 

 

 

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5 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

Every programme that's not live is made in the edit (live programmes are edited in other ways) and you can argue that what you film are just the raw materials for the edit. That being so, Take Nobody's Word for It is always good advice but, though like all documentaries it chose the aspects of the story to focus on, I didn't see anything in these two programmes that felt untrue. Unfortunately that's not always quite so true  

 

I had another look at the BBC's editorial guidelines (they're available online for all to see https://www.bbc.co.uk/editorialguidelines and they haven't changed significantly since I worked there.

"For news and factual content, unless clearly signalled to the audience or using reconstructions, we should not normally:

stage or re-stage action or events which are significant to the development of the action or narrative

inter-cut shots and sequences to suggest they were happening at the same time, if the resulting juxtaposition of material leads to a misleading impression of events.

Commentary and editing must never be used to give the audience a materially misleading impression of events or a contribution."

 

This is obviously a matter of degree and judgement. We all know (I assume) that the reporter apparently listening to the interviewee isn't, it's just a way to avoid distracting jump cuts,  but that's not distorting the truth; changing the reporter's question in the reverses wouid be though and some people do push it.

 

 

 

 

John Krish was one of the Greats from the British Docunentary Movement (1930s-1960s) - most of us might know him from his glorious BTF film of the last week of London trams, “The Elephant will Never Forget”.

 

When the BFI released loads of his work on pristine DVDs a few years back they asked him about his approach to making documentaries. He clearly despised the modern version of a commitment to The Truth and gave an example from his famous short. He needed an elderly couple to film reminiscing on the top deck of a tram. But, he said, if you film any couple being themselves in that situation they’ll mostly just sit there in silence, not moving much, which would have been dull to look at and been the opposite of the point he was trying to make. So he got two bubbly people who’d never met before, stuck them on the tram together, and filmed them animatedly chatting and pointing things out. The “truth” of the scene was an emotional one for the audience, which would certainly have failed current editorial standards. 

 

Krish’s films are delightful and important cultural objects. “Truth” can take many forms, and be different things to different people. I’m not even necessarily arguing today’s standards are wrong. Though I’d be surprised if many of today’s documentaries are still being enjoyed half a century later, like Krish’s. 

 

Paul

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Well, I know an editor working on several reality shows in Hollywood.  Any story can be told for drama by judicious cutting, even to lifting conversations from one scene and adding to another......  The BBC may well have guidelines but many shows, e.g. the recent model railway challenge shows are made by independent companies.

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22 hours ago, Phil Parker said:

 

While I'm sure I'd be fascinated by a treatise on the labyrinthine history of the Hornby & Tri-ang names, the viewing figures would be lucky to hit 100. On the plus side, you could use the whole of Wagner's ring cycle as the background music, there would be plenty of time!

Has anyone suggested filming a treatise on the history of Hornby names?

 

What I would have liked to see on the Hornby programme would be a Tri-ang Princess train set in a glass case instead of a Hornby Dublo train set and a portrait of the three Lines brothers in a glass case instead of a portrait of Frank Hornby because this is how it all began. The only thing left from Hornby, as produced by Meccano, is the name Hornby.

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6 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

I had another look at the BBC's editorial guidelines (they're available online for all to see https://www.bbc.co.uk/editorialguidelines and they haven't changed significantly since I worked there.

"For news and factual content, unless clearly signalled to the audience or using reconstructions, we should not normally:

stage or re-stage action or events which are significant to the development of the action or narrative

inter-cut shots and sequences to suggest they were happening at the same time, if the resulting juxtaposition of material leads to a misleading impression of events.

Commentary and editing must never be used to give the audience a materially misleading impression of events or a contribution."

 

 

 

The show was heavily edited for entertainment value. Remember the scene where SK was talking to the Warley organisers about the Rails banners and we were shown queues of visitors waiting to be let in? Cut back to SK and he is walking past stands still being constructed. These scenes were shot hours apart but presented as contemporaneous.

 

This show was cut to generate a sense of urgency, immediacy, excitement and humour.

 

Having said that, it would be unsurprising if the Hornby staff were unimpressed with more changes. They must live in fear for their jobs every day!

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8 hours ago, The Johnster said:

2 episodes.  Only 2 episodes!!!  All that hype and froth for only 2 bl**dy episodes!  

 

 

 

 

That's nothing, just imagine if somebody had mentioned Bachmanns 94xx

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15 minutes ago, Robin Brasher said:

The only thing left from Hornby, as produced by Meccano, is the name Hornby.

 

Crikey, if they can't even get their own history right, small wonder that the best they can do is a corned beef Terrier! :jester:

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9 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

 

I did wonder whether SK's careful placing of the portrait of Frank Hornby was done for the camera but it's possible by now that everyone working at Hornby really do feel that to be their legacy rather than Tri-ang. The chap who'd been there for fifty two years would still have started after it became Tri-ang Hornby  in 1965 so, even though the product base originally descended from Tri-ang as did its presence in Margate (and the tension lock couplers),  there's probably no corporate cultural memory of it being anything but Hornby. Interesting.

 

 

 

Corporate cultural false memory is nothing new, rare, or confined to the model railway industry.

 

Interesting? I can think of words that might be more apposite. Such apparent reverence for a competitor ones predecessors played a major part in putting out of business might make for an interesting psychological study.

 

The truth is that the business that dealt the coup de grace to the Hornby trains of yore is the one that evolved into the Hornby of today. Moreover, there are models in the current catalogue that are direct descendants of Tri-ang products. By contrast, there is absolutely no physical legacy to connect the two Hornbys.

 

 

 John

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The argument about the true home of Hornby is fun but ultimately meaningless. Model trains were made at Binns Road for around 43 years but Dublo for only about a quarter of a century.

 

Tri-ang stated in Margate in 1954 and as Hornby from the mid 1960s. So with 65 years of history in Margate and all active staff, even good old Peter from the Visitor Centre, knowing no other base, I think it is reasonable for Hornby to argue that they are "coming home" even if it is only to save a few quid.

 

Good luck to them.

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I bet Boeing are quaking in their boots that they'll be found out that they didn't make the, F15 or F16, or BMW with the Mini....

 

Anyone with an ounce of common sense can see why the Hornby brand name is kept, and why it is marketed as it is.

 

Lets face it there was no confusion in the mid sixties when it became Triang-Hornby, and obviously the management back then could see the value (based in Margate) of rebranding as Hornby Railways, and then as 'Hornby'. My non modelling school contemporaries knew 'Hornby' as the top of the RTR tree, or alternatively the only game in town back then. Triang was what you saw in the toy section of the K's/Freemans/Littlewoods catalogues to buy 'on tick'.

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7 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

That being so, Take Nobody's Word for It is always good advice but, though like all documentaries it chose the aspects of the story to focus on, I didn't see anything in these two programmes that felt untrue. Unfortunately that's not always quite so true  

 

I think we are disagreeing over very small differences. To clarify; I don't think they were being false and showing footage from a different event, it was meant as an extreme example of how editing can make you perceive a scene a certain way.

The way they had played the 'reaction' and the show in general for drama and laughs made me suspect that the clips were from different parts of the same event. There are 7 different angles in that sequence and only 2 camera ops on the credit reel ('ops' being used here as a gender neutral word), a Shooting Producer and an Additional Camera (we know that there were not always 2 cameras on location every day from people who were there). Of course it's entirely possible I am wrong and that was indeed the staff's reaction, I am skeptical though.

To me those people looked like they were listening to someone still talking rather than reacting to what Lyndon had said, coupled with James May's VO to generate a laugh. After all, the juxtaposition of blank faces and momentous crashing music is more funny than people saying 'mmm' and nodding slightly.

Perhaps some of this does stretch the BBC's guidelines but from what I know of my colleagues and friends who work at the BBC, this is nothing out of the ordinary.

What is completely silly is me and my company actually pride ourselves on filming as much as we can for real so I should actually be reinforcing the notion that it's real rather than being skeptical, lest you all start picking my work apart ;)

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8 hours ago, adb968008 said:

But scalectrix however is an instant win for VR.. imagine yourself driving that car whilst sat on the couch, against your mate.. and he doesn’t even need to be in the same house as you ! - i’m  think you could even ditch the track and have a course defined by machine learning and race the cars round your house, or the street running off battery/Wi-fi .

 

So basically, a PlayStation driving game then. My 48K ZX Spectrum had similar games back in the 1980s. The problem is that when you remove the physical models and replace them with VR, you are copying something that other companies with bigger budgets and more experience have been doing for many years.

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12 minutes ago, rockershovel said:

My elder son is badgering me to “build a train set” for my grand-daughter.. I think he wants to see his Hornby (or Tri-Ang, I don’t recall - it is 25 years old after all and has been in the loft for a LONG time) TPO Coach in action again! 

Hornby still make the Royal Mail coach as R4526 GWR Night Mail Coach (Operating) - era 3 for £26.99. I enjoyed playing with my original Tri-ang mail coach in the 1950s. The lineside apparatus had a 'visit Margate' hoarding.

 

Hornby Dublo copied this with an electrically operated Royal Mail coach.  You can still buy these for about £20 each and I have a rake of about six of both the Hornby Dublo and Hornby versions for my 'Night Mail' train.

 

I was fascinated by the Tri-ang operating accessories like the ore wagon and the level crossings and I wish they still made them. 

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I know that "one Swallow doesn't make a Summer" but saw this on Facebook this morning.

 

Many thanks for the add. After James May’s recent series about Hornby I’ve decided to rekindle my interest in model railways and am about to build a OO layout in my spare bedroom. I’ve already purchased some locos including the new Hornby Terrier which is gem. Now for the track plan

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4 minutes ago, Phil Parker said:

 

So basically, a PlayStation driving game then. My 48K ZX Spectrum had similar games back in the 1980s. The problem is that when you remove the physical models and replace them with VR, you are copying something that other companies with bigger budgets and more experience have been doing for many years.

 

Don't underestimate the power of adding a known and well-loved brand to new technology. Consider, for example, the Lego movies and spin-off computer games. Why, you may ask yourself, would anybody buy a game or watch a movie based on plastic bricks when you can have far more detailed animation based on original material? But it's the brand association which sells it. It doesn't take a lot of imagination to see how "Scalextric VR" could be a similar hit.

 

More generally, the idea of using VR technology connected to physical objects isn't new. There is an appealing aspect to being in control of a physical object (eg, a car on a track), and thus being subject to the real laws of physics, rather than simply a software-generated representation of an object. What's known as FPV Drone Racing, where drone pilots wear VR goggles connected to onboard cameras so that they see (and fly) the course from the drone's perspective, for example, is a rapidly growing sport. That's a concept which could easily translate to Scalextric.


As for copying something that other companies with bigger budgets and more experience have been doing for many years, well, let's tell Hatton's not to bother competing with Hornby, eh.

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5 minutes ago, Robin Brasher said:

I was fascinated by the Tri-ang operating accessories like the ore wagon and the level crossings and I wish they still made them. 

 

I had the giraffe and mail coach. I always longed for the ore wagon. Alas, 'twas not to be.

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6 minutes ago, MarkSG said:

What's known as FPV Drone Racing, where drone pilots wear VR goggles connected to onboard cameras so that they see (and fly) the course from the drone's perspective, for example, is a rapidly growing sport.

 

<off-topic>

Is this a 'mind sport' like Bridge? One that fat men can take part in without breaking into a sweat?

</off-topic>

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6 minutes ago, MarkSG said:

 

Don't underestimate the power of adding a known and well-loved brand to new technology. Consider, for example, the Lego movies and spin-off computer games. Why, you may ask yourself, would anybody buy a game or watch a movie based on plastic bricks when you can have far more detailed animation based on original material? But it's the brand association which sells it. It doesn't take a lot of imagination to see how "Scalextric VR" could be a similar hit.

 

More generally, the idea of using VR technology connected to physical objects isn't new. There is an appealing aspect to being in control of a physical object (eg, a car on a track), and thus being subject to the real laws of physics, rather than simply a software-generated representation of an object. What's known as FPV Drone Racing, where drone pilots wear VR goggles connected to onboard cameras so that they see (and fly) the course from the drone's perspective, for example, is a rapidly growing sport. That's a concept which could easily translate to Scalextric.


As for copying something that other companies with bigger budgets and more experience have been doing for many years, well, let's tell Hatton's not to bother competing with Hornby, eh.

 

Good point about Lego, but they managed to bring a new angle on an existing concept. I don't see the same thing with any of the brands in the Hornby cannon, at least not the ways they have been suggested so far. With drone flying, there is a logic to being able to see from the perspective of the device because you are operating in a 3D world. WOuld you get the same when driving a car firmly fixed to a slot? I suspect you'd decide that not being fixed to a slot would be more appealing. Also, the assumption of the VR demo, and comments on here, is that you wouldn't have the car or track at all in real life. 

 

As for budgets, Hattons vs Hornby is a more equal contest than Microsoft and/or Sony vs Hornby.

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15 minutes ago, Phil Parker said:

 

So basically, a PlayStation driving game then. My 48K ZX Spectrum had similar games back in the 1980s. The problem is that when you remove the physical models and replace them with VR, you are copying something that other companies with bigger budgets and more experience have been doing for many years.

 

Exactly. I play with trains (can't pretend it's more sophisticated than playing!) to get myself and the kids away from screens. 

 

If I am wearing VR goggles that isolate me from the world then what is the point of a physical model?

 

AR on the other hand could be a fun additon. Pull a model train into the station and then hold up the iPad to see virtual passengers, freight being loaded, people around Skaledale houses, steam from the loco etc.

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@MarkSG @Phil Parker

I agree with both your point and Phil's.  For Hornby to invest directly in developing their own software, kit, marketing etc would be madness.  Others do it already and better.  Hornby doesn't need the distraction from its core business.  However, there is some value in linking their constructional brands to software.  Given they understand how a licensing agreement works, I can see the logic in licensing the scalextrix or Airfix names to some software businesses.  I commented above that I thought this was Hornby kite flying.  Listen to what Kohler was saying - he was seeking to say "we have this, come and talk to me."  If he wanted to develop this in house, we wouldn't have had that segment of the programme.

 

David

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