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Dan Holbrook's 1972 BN Duluth-Superior Layout


Jon Gwinnett

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It might just be me that's only found out about this layout recently, but this is superb work:

http://www.pbase.com/dh30973/holbrook

 

I've never seen this in the press - have I missed it?

No, I've not seen this layout before, either. But the name Dan Holbrook does ring good bells. I believe that he was a leading light in a club called the Midwestern Model Railroaders (or v similar) in Batavia, Illinois. They had built a layout that allowed its era to change, thus enabling different factions within the club to run their kit be it modern or period, in separate sessions. Each session would be "sponsored" by an individual leader, and Dan Holbrook was one of those. I think the club premises were rendered no longer available - and the club folded some years back. Evidently modelling skills will out, as these pics show! Interestingly, in one of the pics there is a guy called Blair Kooistra watching & I'm sure his byline has appeared in magazines and probably books as a prominent railfan, photographer, author.

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Blair Kooistra is the owner/builder of the Walla Walla Valley RR - http://www.wwvrailway.com/ - a very talented modeller indeed. I think the RR is on about its third iteration - it has certainly been in either one of the Kalmback GMR or MRP series

 

Great Model Railroads, 2005. Blair considered modelling the same shortline as me, but was put off by the overhead wires. The last time I heard from him he was thinking of modelling an Australian prototype.

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Blair Kooistra is the owner/builder of the Walla Walla Valley RR - http://www.wwvrailway.com/ - a very talented modeller indeed. I think the RR is on about its third iteration - it has certainly been in either one of the Kalmback GMR or MRP series

 

Sadly, Blair (who is a dispatcher with BNSF Railway; we occasionally talk on the company radio when he works the Seattle Terminal desk) tore down his Walla Walla Valley layout a few years back. I was fortunate to see the version 1.2 -- the track plan and theme in GMR 2005. I horsetraded with Blair for the SW1s from version 1.0 several years ago -- 2002 I think. They later received new paint schemes. I regret that now.

 

He's been bitten by the Australian bug and is modeling 1978 downunder http://northofnarrabri.blogspot.com/.

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It might just be me that's only found out about this layout recently, but this is superb work:

http://www.pbase.com/dh30973/holbrook

 

I've never seen this in the press - have I missed it?

 

A wonderful layout! Burlington Northern in the early 1970s, in the Upper Midwest, just after the merger that created it.

 

Dan is a yardmaster with BNSF Railway. An article on how he operates his layout appeared in Model Railroad Planning 2009.

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He's been bitten by the Australian bug and is modeling 1978 downunder http://northofnarrabri.blogspot.com/.

 

 

Dear Paul,

 

That would explain why I saw his name on a recent Trains magazine "motive power special", covering our indigenous "48 Class" Alco DL531 6-axle "road switchers" here in NSW...

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_South_Wales_48_class_locomotive

 

http://alcoworld.railfan.net/nswgr6.htm

 

http://www.oaustkits.com.au/index.php?act=viewProd&productId=22

 

Happy Modelling,

Aim to Improve,

Prof Klyzlr

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The only question I have is how much of these photos have photoshopped backgrounds. Well, maybe not photoshopped, but this photo http://www.pbase.com/dh30973/image/51607182 from a different perspective shows that a lot of the effect is photo backdrop plus careful camera work. The farther back in the gallery you go, the more you see work that's certainly good, but my socks are still on my feet. A mag would run the first half dozen shots. A mag would run more shots by Peter North.

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The only question I have is how much of these photos have photoshopped backgrounds. Well, maybe not photoshopped, but this photo http://www.pbase.com/dh30973/image/51607182 from a different perspective shows that a lot of the effect is photo backdrop plus careful camera work. The farther back in the gallery you go, the more you see work that's certainly good, but my socks are still on my feet. A mag would run the first half dozen shots. A mag would run more shots by Peter North.

 

Speaking from the point of view of someone who is currently scratching their head over the issues associated with trying to make a backdrop blend in with the scenery from a number of angles and not just what I can photograph and control through what appears in print, it's an interesting form of modelling. I decided I didn't like photo backdrops because the lighting and contrast don't visually blend with the rest of the layout, making the natural seem, un-natural. I bet if you were in the room you wouldn't initially notice the backdrop, but once certain lines didn't add up, would start to become more noticeable.

 

It's an interesting comparison with a Peter North layout, Continental Modeller seem to print more photos than US mags, and once you consider the square footage exposed, the UK layout is going to be extremely well covered. And I can't honestly remember his layouts having anything but a plain backdrop.

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I think Peter North tends to load up the foreground, rather than relying on the background as these photos tend to do. It reminds me of a chat I had with Bob Smaus, who also relied on the foreground a lot, when he was still in LA: it kept coming back to "who are you trying to kid?" You sort of accept from the start that this is a model, and you work from there. Playing games with the background in the end isn't going to be convincing -- as you say, you're going to run into issues of perspective, lighting, and so forth. So stress depth of field and foreground detail. This is what some of the great rail photographers, like Emery Gulash and Philip Hastings, also do.

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I think that a scenic backdrop is frequently difficult because of perspective problems, unless there is space betweeh the buildings and the backdrop itself. The other alternative is a plain sky backdrop with the buildings against it so that the eye isn't being grabbed by the perspective effects. The most effective ones are done in layers with the most distant objects/hills/buildings being hazed and showing virtually no details with the nearer layers becoming progressively less hazy allowing a lithe more (but not a lot) detail to show.

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I think Peter North tends to load up the foreground, rather than relying on the background as these photos tend to do. It reminds me of a chat I had with Bob Smaus, who also relied on the foreground a lot, when he was still in LA: it kept coming back to "who are you trying to kid?" You sort of accept from the start that this is a model, and you work from there. Playing games with the background in the end isn't going to be convincing -- as you say, you're going to run into issues of perspective, lighting, and so forth. So stress depth of field and foreground detail. This is what some of the great rail photographers, like Emery Gulash and Philip Hastings, also do.

 

 

Perhaps we're comparing apples and oranges.

 

The Franklin & South Manchester, for instance, is an impressive model, but for me it doesn't look realistic. Clever, intricate, hugely accomplished modelling skill, but not "realistic".

 

Peter North's layouts (can only speak for photos, never seen one in the flesh) seem to try to capture the "macro" detail to the Nth degree, but perhaps because of their compact size don't convince me in the same way that Dan Holbrook's layout does. Don't get me wrong - Peter's layouts were hugely influential in convincing me I could model US HO in Britain, and they will always be favourites, but they're not quite what I aspire to.

 

On the other hand, as JWB's own layout thread shows, it’s not what you do, but the fun you have doing it that counts - i.e. one of the blessings of this hobby is its depth, breadth and variety. (Is that 3 blessings?)

 

My take on Bob Smaus's work - and he's another favourite, is that while he details the foreground, it shows a restraint of texture and lack of clutter which convince more than layouts which to my mind are too "busy"

 

However, I take the point that in real life, one is always aware that one is looking at a model - its only in photographs that the "illusion" can hopefully become complete. Don't know that this is a bad thing - again all part of the rich variety.

 

 

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Well, here's some more thinking about photography, model and prototype: this Philip Hastings photo (site where I got it says the photo is copyright cleared for public display)

 

 

http://www.railroadheritage.org/ImageStorage/Img--00003153.jpg

 

is a good photo that happens to be of a rail subject (sort of like the ones Jack Delano took in the 1940s for the US Office of War Information -- good photos, useful for modelers and railfans, but Delano wasn't even necessarily a photographer, and he went on to be a music composer!). It's well composed, well-lit (or better maybe to say purposefully lit), it's interesting, and it has a subject. But really, no background at all.

 

This is also the sort of effect John Allen often aimed at, though I don't believe he ever really tried to make you think it was a prototype rather than a model. Heck, I don't think Michelangelo ever tried to make anyone think it was a person and not a statue.

 

The photos of the Holbrook layout, not the same thing. Lighting is OK for the purpose, but actually, there's no real foreground, just tracks in most cases. Composition from so-so to non-existent. If you think about it, while the background effects make you ask if this is model or prototype (in some cases), no prototype rail photo magazine would run any of those photos, since their subjects are so ordinary and the composition mostly just so-so.

 

That's what sometimes has me scratching my head over the photos by some of the better-known US modelers -- they're technically good enough to satisfy MR, but they look like prototype photos taken by a mediocre photographer!

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The layout in this thread uses similar techniques, but with obviously more blending in and image manipulation of the original photo. I'm still not convinced it can work from all angles, as the builder has more control over the angles we see.

 

http://www.railroad-line.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=28839

 

The most recent post says an article describing the technique will appear in October's Model Railroader.

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The layout in this thread uses similar techniques, but with obviously more blending in and image manipulation of the original photo. I'm still not convinced it can work from all angles, as the builder has more control over the angles we see.

 

http://www.railroad-...?TOPIC_ID=28839

 

The most recent post says an article describing the technique will appear in October's Model Railroader.

 

It does. The article talks about controlling sight lines etc. Very interesting.

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