Wright writes.....

[Focalplane]

I consider the term 'Modern Image' still holds good today. . . . . .We can't have an ultra modern image or whatever when some things have barely moved on 55 years and other changes have taken us backwards 180 years.

And "modern image" seems to take on new meanings all the time, think "image and spin!"

 

As to changes that have taken us backwards, we had a good example yesterday on a First Great Western Adelante 5 car train from Reading to Worcester.  Summer school holidays, tourists visiting Oxford, the Cotswolds and Worcester - standing room only, buffet closed, trolley cart in the aisle.  Finally managed to procure two flip-down seats in the vestibule, one given up by the train manager.

 

In the good old days, such a working would have had additional coaches.

[Clive Mortimore]

And "modern image" seems to take on new meanings all the time, think "image and spin!"

 

As to changes that have taken us backwards, we had a good example yesterday on a First Great Western Adelante 5 car train from Reading to Worcester.  Summer school holidays, tourists visiting Oxford, the Cotswolds and Worcester - standing room only, buffet closed, trolley cart in the aisle.  Finally managed to procure two flip-down seats in the vestibule, one given up by the train manager.

 

In the good old days, such a working would have had additional coaches.

Hi Paul

 

I can recall many a train journey stood in the corridor on loco hauled trains in the 60s. Mum was always the lucky one and had the suitcase to sit on.

 

I have mentioned this before in other topics. The late Cyril Freezer said to me that my layouts when he viewed them at shows were true modern image layouts, both were diesel depots set in the 1960s. If the bloke who made up "Modern Image" says it relates to the 1960s then that is where we should leave it. Layouts with diesel and/or electric traction are not modern image but model railways with diesel or electric traction, simple.

[stewartingram]

I consider the term 'Modern Image' still holds good today. We as modellers are either recreating scenes from the steam-era or are modelling scenes with the new form of motive power that replaced 140 years of steam - the 'Modern Image'. We can't have an ultra modern image or whatever when some things have barely moved on 55 years and other changes have taken us backwards 180 years.

Basically I agree with this, though the change wasn't overnight. Think thus:

1. Diesels were the modern image but introduced on to a steam era railway.

2. Infrastructure - signalling, station buildings,signal boxes, etc underwent massive changes.

3. The Beeching report, and its effects such as station/yard & line closures, had a profound effect on the look of the railway.

 

These changes together brought about the "Modern Image", but it all took time. Indeed even today, some places still have the look of the "old" railway. Some areas such as my home East Anglia area were dieselised early, with little infrastructure change, and the Beeching effect took a few years to materialise.

 

Stewart

[Tony Wright]

Basically I agree with this, though the change wasn't overnight. Think thus:

1. Diesels were the modern image but introduced on to a steam era railway.

2. Infrastructure - signalling, station buildings,signal boxes, etc underwent massive changes.

3. The Beeching report, and its effects such as station/yard & line closures, had a profound effect on the look of the railway.

 

These changes together brought about the "Modern Image", but it all took time. Indeed even today, some places still have the look of the "old" railway. Some areas such as my home East Anglia area were dieselised early, with little infrastructure change, and the Beeching effect took a few years to materialise.

 

Stewart

Thanks Stewart,

 

With regard to things taking time to change, I've just been going through the proofs for my latest Irwell book describing the green-to-blue transition on the ECML. In one of the shots I took (50 years ago now!), I was standing at the north end of Platform 2 at Retford taking a picture of a southbound Deltic-hauled non-stop express. The loco (in two-tone green with a yellow warning panel) is hauling a rake of Mk.1 cars, all in maroon - the ER of BR at its most modern 50 years ago? Yet, all around, the infrastructure is not just LNER but there's some GNR there as well in the form of somersault signals and the wonderful North 'box. And, several of the vans in the sidings are wooden-bodied ex-LNER types. 

 

For me 'Modern-Image' is what flashes by my window as I write this. The once dignified GNER 225 and 125 sets now spoilt (in my view) by Virgin's branding. I'm off to finish my J69! 

Edited August 4, 2015 by Tony Wright

[Zomboid]

Modern means "now" to me. Would be so much easier if we adopted the European practise of "epochs".

[Andy Hayter]

ER, well, yes, and at the same time no.

 

The MOROP era definitions are all based around German railways and their history.  If taken as is they mean rather little to the French and even less to Poland.

 

Bachmann have tried introducing epochs - which are era by another name - but these seem to be universally ignored.

[Andy Reichert]

AFAIC, the real UK  railway system is frozen in time at the point I stopped trainspotting. (Coincident with my transition from short to long trousers).

 

Andy

[corneliuslundie]

I must admit i take a different view. Think of the Modern Movement. That represented a period and a style now long past. Since then we have had Post-Modern and all sorts of other styles. I think it is best to think of Modern Image in the same way as representing a particular period round the time of the Modernisation Plan. I don't know what we should call more recent periods, and I am not sure about the "epoch" idea but I think options are "Sectorisation", "Privatisation" etc. But even terms like Pre-Nationalisation are difficult. How far back does it stretch? 1923, 1890, 1830, 1800?

 

Jonathan

[coachmann]

I suspect 'modern image' was coined by someone within BR and Cyril F. picked it up and used it in an editorial. This wouldn't be a first. Anyone around at the time would have been aware of the bullsh*t in those railway 'newsreels' screened in cinemas .....Steam bad   -   diesel and electric good. The thing is it happened over a very short period too. Modernity in 1949 when BR was finding its feet was new steam locomotives and carriages to Big Four designs. Modernity in the mid 1950s was the new DC electric Woodhead line, then new hump marshalling yards. By 1958 the DMU-isation of everywhere was the modernity and before long BR was ordering hundreds of untried diesel locomotives, which were often failing. All of a sudden steam was out after only 11 years of investment! 

 

No one is forced to use any terminology and in fact it is far simpler to say what one is modelling rather than saying modern this or that or some epoch. I'm modelling BR W.Region near the River Dee circa 1957.....eezy-peeezy. 

[Clive Mortimore]

Modern means "now" to me. Would be so much easier if we adopted the European practise of "epochs".

Tony's layout is an ECML station set in the 1950s.

 

My depot layout is in the East London during the 1960s.

 

What else is needed but a location and a date, no need for descriptive titles?

[Market65]

Hi. Modern also means 'today' for me. I remember the DMU's and Mk1's in the early '60's and thinking, at the time, that they were so modern compared with the remaining steam loco's and coaching stock - indeed a complete contrast on one railway of the old and new.

At Market Weighton the station, although repainted into BR-NER colours, retained LNER green on Market Weighton West signal cabin ('cabin' as used by the NER of old). So, back in the '60's, there was a mixture of alsorts, and it did, admittedly, make things very interesting from the enthuiasts point of view.

Therefore, I visualise things as, for example, BR-NER, LNER, NER, etc. This is indeed easier than an 'era' system where I find that I am having to think what a particular era is supposed to be representing.

 

With regards,

 

Market65.

[Izzy]

 

Since the term first emerged I have always taken 'Modern Image' to represent the new/cut down post-Beeching railway era of diesel/electric/dmu/emu after the demise of steam, and specifically the start of the ' British Rail' blue times, which then where 'now'.

 

Personally I feel like others that a simple description of place and date is best and most flexible, and as good as anything else.

 

Izzy

[MJI]

To me modern image conjures up memories of the BR blue period.

 

I am afraid I have lost a lot of interest in the most recent railways. (Apart from proper traction back on the main line)

[coachmann]

To me modern image conjures up memories of the BR blue period.

 

I am afraid I have lost a lot of interest in the most recent railways. (Apart from proper traction back on the main line)

Interesting. Modern Image initially meant transition green, so if you associate it with rail blue, then it shows each generation possibly sees it as meaning whatever to does to them. Modern Image to me must be Peppercorn A1's and BR Standard locos, the images of modernity most seen in new railway books when I wus a lad.

 

Edited August 7, 2015 by coachmann

[New Haven Neil]

Modern Image for me is XP64 onwards.  Blue locos, arrow of indecision, white station signs in railway font.  CLASP buildings, all that sort of stuff.

[coachmann]

Modern Image for me is XP64 onwards.  Blue locos, arrow of indecision, white station signs in railway font.  CLASP buildings, all that sort of stuff.

....................and Bus Shelter Revival era.

[newbryford]

Modern Image for me is XP64 onwards.  Blue locos, arrow of indecision, white station signs in railway font.  CLASP buildings, all that sort of stuff.

 

"Modern Image" was the late 60's with XP64 and the BR Corporate Era - "modern image" is now and recent. However, IMO, I think the term is misunderstood and often misused to describe anything that's post 1968 and devoid of mainline steam

 

I'm with Clive in describing a layout with place and time. In the case of my own New Bryford - its' North West England in from 2009-present. It just happens to include mainline steam on the roster..... (When the layout was originally on the exhibition circuit in the late 1990's, it was described as North-West England from 1995-present - and there was plenty of steam then - mostly DJH kits)

 

The MI debate has been done to death much in the past here on RMweb and there's at least seven pages of it elsewhere........

 

As most of my modelling is of the near and recent past, I often like to use the term "contemporary" - but that is a forever moving target.

 

Cheers,

Mick

Edited August 8, 2015 by newbryford

[unclebobkt]

      As 'Wright writes.' seems to attract a fairly broad cross-section of railway-modellers - and I don't know my way around all of the other threads/topics that might be available - please excuse me if I high-jack this thread for the fleeting moment with the following:

 

>.1.- Photo-etched metal tools :

>.1.1.- 12 piece Punch & Die set, 2.0.-4.5mm.;

>.1.2.- Handle bending tool;

>.1.3.- 13cm. PM. bending tool;

 

 web-site: >> www.rptoolz.com <<

 

>.2.- Marino Method Modelbuilding Guides :

>.2.1.- Guide #3.: Understanding model-math and scale-jumping;

>.2.2.- Guide #4.: How to make your own decals,   Best cameras, papers, printers, printing methods etc. etc. to use.

 

Web-site: >> www.smashwords.com/profile/view/tennexican <<

                >> www.richardmarino,com <<

 

      Source: Airfix 'Model World.' for July 2015..

 

      E&OE..  Usual disclaimers.     

                >> www.richardmarino.com <<

Edited August 9, 2015 by unclebobkt

[Focalplane]

I agree with the simple layout plus era definition of a layout and have edited my signature accordingly. But the discussion really does come down to the "eye of the beholder" and probably one's age and experience. My only interest in modern image is, to be frank, how efficient it is in getting me to where I want to be.

[edcayton]

Modern Image-what you can go and see today. Anything else is historical, therefore the term "Modern Image" is a moveable feast.

 

Ed

[coachmann]

Somewhere in the midst of the upheaval that took place in the 1960's arrived the term 'Modern Image'. It actually described ruts in ballast where tracks had been removed, boarded up stations, goods yards and loco shed yards looking like a wilderness festooned in weeds and the remains of buildings, lines of Tenders with peeling paintwork and carriages with the circular X symbol awaiting their final journey. The railway of tracks and signalling had been exchanged for dereliction and amid this mess ran blue diesels hauling blue coaches past blue buildings. After many attempts at modernisation of the railway system,  'Modern image' to me summons up despair.

Edited August 9, 2015 by coachmann

[Allegheny1600]

Somewhere in the midst of the upheaval that took place in the 1960's arrived the term 'Modern Image'. It actually described ruts in ballast where tracks had been removed, boarded up stations, goods yards and loco shed yards looking like a wilderness festooned in weeds and the remains of buildings, lines of Tenders with peeling paintwork and carriages with the circular X symbol awaiting their final journey. The railway of tracks and signalling had been exchanged for dereliction and amid this mess ran blue diesels hauling blue coaches past blue buildings. After many attempts at modernisation of the railway system,  'Modern image' to me summons up despair.

That is what I grew up with!

By rights it's what I should model but I cannot - it's so damn dreary, I really dislike it.

Hence why in British outline, I prefer to go back in time - the early sixties seems fine to me as there was a mix of steam & diesels.

The mid to late fifties must have been amazing to see but personally I think the thirties or twenties would be better.

Best of all has to be the pre-group period/s though as there would have been literally, a riot of colour and variety.

You do have colour today but not the variety, sadly.

That's the beauty of railway modelling - it can be your own little time machine.

Cheers,

John E.

[coachmann]

The beauty of modelling the GWR is you can model a period that suits you, say BR 1950's, and yet run locos with a pre-grouping flavour in GW green past lower-quadrant signalling and through stations painted light and dark stone. I think this is why it is so satisfying and why I for one was drawn to it in my early teens.

[newbryford]

I'm modelling the current scene, yet I can still happily run stuff that was built over 50 years ago. Keeps me happy.

If I include the steam stuff, then it can easily stretch back 80 or more years!

Cheers ,

Mick

Edited August 9, 2015 by newbryford

[Clive Mortimore]

I'm modelling the current scene, yet I can still happily run stuff that was built over 50 years ago. Keeps me happy.

If I include the steam stuff, then it can easily stretch back 80 or more years!

Cheers ,

Mick

Hi Mick

 

I cannot go back as far as you, but I do have models of locomotives that (the real ones) were built for all four of the BIG FOUR companies but saddly they are diesels so are really "Modern Image" to some people.

 

Some thing I have always wanted to make but never got round to it is a train of these, http://heritagephotoarchive.co.uk/p226894771/h4ba2fa34#h4ba2fa34 The Bury electrics. I know there were other pre grouping electric trains but then Bury ones are just so ugly to be beautiful.

 

Diesel and electric modelling is not Modern Image. I know there are those who still lament the demise of steam traction. I am pretty sure that myself and other diesel and electric modellers did not make it happen. It is in the past so try to get over it. Like National Service, and horses pulling ploughs, steam locomotion appears to be brilliant, but in reality it may not have been that good at the time.