Photoshopping of images in magazines. Should it be done? If so, what is permissible?

[Izzy]

 The fiddle yard is such an important part of an operational layout that it deserves photography in its own right and a lot more description than it seems to get in most(all) magazines. So often it is left off of track plans and totally ignored - perhaps unsurprising when most photography is staged often more to show off a loco than to present the overall picture.

 

In some ways I think this goes to one of the main aspects - what do you want from what you are viewing? As I stated in an earlier post I mainly want information. How was this done? Can I used it? etc. At shows I often spend as much time looking at the 'hidden' side, where this proves possible, the fiddle yard of whatever type exists, how the baseboards were constructed and are supported and connected, the manner of point/signal/train control, as I do looking at the 'proper' side.

 

Do I enjoy looking at a layout and seeing it run? Oh yes, but for some this is all they require. From a magazine I want the same as I get from attending a show. Some pleasure from seeing well presented models, but also information.

 

Izzy

[dibber25]

I was going to suggest a survey (perhaps as part of a wish list survey?) but you have obviously already done one based on your rather sweeping statement about peoples views, It would be great to see the data it is based on?

Editor's have a very close and accurate perception of what their readers like and don't like, based on postbag, spoken comments, circulation (if they like it, circulation goes up, if they don't it goes down) individual issue sales and, from time to time readership surveys. The first requirement of the job is to know and understand your market. Pleasing all of it, all of the time, is a different matter!

CHRIS LEIGH

[dibber25]

OK: playing Devil's advocate:

 

You would 'strighten the lamppost on a layout' and 'hide the gap under the building'; so in a review of a model in the same mag, would you also photoshop out a scratch in the paintwork, or strighten a bent handrail or if the number/letter transfers were not stright would you correct that??

 

Surely if you want 'Great Pictures' over a 'true' representation of the model you shoud do...

We were discussing layout pictures, were we not? Review pictures do, of course, have to represent the model exactly as supplied, but we do, on occasions have to repair minor damage which has occurred in the post. There would clearly be no point in mentioning some defect in the review and then correcting it on the photograph!

CHRIS LEIGH

[dibber25]

I recall someone not a million miles from this thread who photographed some of his models outdoors with the North Wales coast in the background. They made very nice colour pictures and I think I probably used one or two in MRC. Were they misrepresenting the models, however? The background was certainly there and it wasn't made by the modeller. It wasn't dropped in by Photoshop, either. Is one a more legit way of making a nice model picture than the other? I don't think so but how do others feel?

In the early days of Model Rail our photographer decided to do a similar thing. He took a Bulleid Pacific home and photographed it against what he thought were neutral farm fields. I rejected the pictures because the background he had chosen was oil seed rape - in full bloom and bright yellow. It's a modern phenomenon - I don't recall ever seeing fields of it in steam days!.

CHRIS LEIGH

[brushman47544]

I'm sure there are many traps for the unwary. I think however that Tony Wright has the right balance of things in his illustrated reviews. The excellent photos may involve a degree of photo-editing, but none have effect of misleading the reader, nor misrepresenting the item under review. Simple really, until you set out to do it!

 

Here below is an 'out of the camera' photo of Hornby's Clan, although it is made from three exposures, and has been brightened a tad and sharpened, it is to all intents and purposes 'real'. If I was an editor I could perhaps use it for a review of the model, I would tidy the background, but little else.

 

Below that is a section of a picture in which it appears after I have edited the image further, and the picture would clearly not qualify as a reliable review illustration, even though the detail on the model really is something quite remarkable, a very little altered from the first picture. As an aside, I hope the coming DoG will brush-up as well!

 

I show these pictures because the thread interests me, and I do love photographing these models. Apologies if it does not quite address the issue.

 

Img_2622abc_crop3a_r800.jpg

 

Clan_BR_72008_portrait_5ab_r800_crop2.jpg

 

 

Rob

 

What really stands out to me on these two photos, Rob, is how you have managed to make the nameplate transfer in the first picture look like a real one on the second. Or did you add etched plates?

[coachmann]

I recall someone not a million miles from this thread who photographed some of his models outdoors with the North Wales coast in the background. They made very nice colour pictures and I think I probably used one or two in MRC. Were they misrepresenting the models, however? The background was certainly there and it wasn't made by the modeller. It wasn't dropped in by Photoshop, either. Is one a more legit way of making a nice model picture than the other? I don't think so but how do others feel?

CHRIS LEIGH

Just beamed meself down from not a million miles away and found this colour slide. Chris's comments certainly brought back memories from the days when film ruled and exposure was mainly down to experience and practice. I was asked to submit 4mm scale models in any livery I could dream up but NorthFreight was cunjured up by 'Rail' magazine staff 'cos no one at the time knew what the sectors would be called. The diaramma is in the foregound but the North Wales coast, trees and Irish Sea were indeed in the background at Llysfaen. This one-shot image (and others) was simply to cunjur up how things might look 'on a line near you'....

[stewartingram]

I'm sure there are many traps for the unwary. I think however that Tony Wright has the right balance of things in his illustrated reviews. The excellent photos may involve a degree of photo-editing, but none have effect of misleading the reader, nor misrepresenting the item under review. Simple really, until you set out to do it!

 

Here below is an 'out of the camera' photo of Hornby's Clan, although it is made from three exposures, and has been brightened a tad and sharpened, it is to all intents and purposes 'real'. If I was an editor I could perhaps use it for a review of the model, I would tidy the background, but little else.

 

Below that is a section of a picture in which it appears after I have edited the image further, and the picture would clearly not qualify as a reliable review illustration, even though the detail on the model really is something quite remarkable, a very little altered from the first picture. As an aside, I hope the coming DoG will brush-up as well!

 

I show these pictures because the thread interests me, and I do love photographing these models. Apologies if it does not quite address the issue.

 

Img_2622abc_crop3a_r800.jpg

 

Clan_BR_72008_portrait_5ab_r800_crop2.jpg

 

 

Rob

As always, stunning pictures Rob. But your photography is your version of modelling.

 

Stewart

[coachmann]

A gaggle of images taken in pre-Photoshopping days :-

 

I returned to Llysfaen many time over the years. The Transrail variant has a pucker moody sky shot with the model and not added later. That skyline is chock full of windfarm today....

 

The most adventurous shot was this with a real Class 150/2 Unit passing the model. Note how the sky pales towards the horizon...Very real...not photoshopped...

 

 

 

[robmcg]

What really stands out to me on these two photos, Rob, is how you have managed to make the nameplate transfer in the first picture look like a real one on the second. Or did you add etched plates?

 

Hi Andrew, I drew a line of shadow under the nameplate and up the leading edge. The original picture is about 10,000 pixels wide so no problem adding a 12-pixel-wide line or two.

 

Rob

[RJS1977]

Just came across this article with some interesting model photographs:

 

http://www.thisiscolossal.com/2013/10/forced-perspective-model-car-photos/

[Iain Popplewell]

Railway Modelling magazines are probably no different to other types of magazines in that  pretty" photo-shopped / airbrushed " images  sell.My worry is that the modelling mags  through the widespread use of this technology  create an unattainable modelling aspiration.Far better that modellers aspire to an attainable ideal, rather than be disappointed when their layouts fail to match the magazine images they have tried to emulate.

 

It's also useful in a magazine to see the"warts" in other  peoples models so you can try to avoid these pitfalls in your own models.

 

Personally I've no objection  to the substitution of "sky"for  background clutter to a layout, but removing baseboard joins,gaps below buildings etc. to me is dishonest and can only serve to diminish the achievement of modellers who produce excellent models that don't need photo enhancement to be truly inspiring.

[Iain Popplewell]

Should my layout ever be finished,(fat chance) and published in a modelling mag,(God forbid) I would like to  think that my modelling and layout would be judged on it's own merit by the magazines readers.It's an important thing to me that my layout is all my own work and I suspect a lot of modellers think like me.If the layout is published to universal acclaim marvellous! If it's greeted with derision so be it,at least people would have had a good laugh and possibly gained knowledge from my mistakes.

 

Should however some clever editor photoshop  out my dodgy wall joints,my leaning lamp posts,and tones down what he considers my over shiny loco's etc.etc.and adds one or two nice smoke effects it won't be my layout that's won "layout of the year" in fact no reader has actually seen my layout as it really is! But only the editors version of my layout.

 

More importantly I won't know what people thought about my layout and modelling,and when  my "layout of the year" was invited to Warley and all the people that had voted for it came to see it  they'd all be disappointed that my layout wasn't as good as they thought it was,because they'd all have been misled.

[Barry Ten]

I don't mind the odd bit of Photoshopping now and then (I'm thinking of skies and maybe smoke, plus the occasional cosmetic fix like a bent telegraph pole - anything else is not really "on" in my view). I do think it's become a bit excessive now, primarily in the British magazines, where the "low angle plus photoshopped sky" shot is now very commonplace. You don't see anywhere near the same amount of digital manipulation in Model Railroader, because the layouts are generally designed to look good without it, with a decent backscene being an integral part of the design rather than a last minute thought. There's generally a contextual shot, too, to show that the layout really does look the way it does in the tighter photos, so it's a not a question of digital manipulation being done on the sly.

 

Personally, if a layout doesn't have a backscene, or it isn't tall enough to allow low-angle shots without clutter and ceiling intervening, I'd far rather see an honest Monaghan-style helicopter shot looking down, than an attempt to suggest something that isn't there. It may not be misrepresentation in the cynical sense but as PMP suggests, it will set up an expectation which isn't going to be met when the layout is seen in reality.

 

On the same point, though, why do so many layouts have low or no backscenes? I saw a great layout at a recent exhibition, but all the operators were on the inside and the backscene (admittedly very well done) was only a few inches high. You could say that the operators needed to be able to lean over the backscene now and then but I never saw any shunting take place, just trains running through at express speeds. An engine stalled once, but the layout was so wide that someone had to come round to the front anyway.

[chaz]

Whilst working on Dock Green I am aiming to do the best I can with the model. When it goes to Warley there will be no Photoshop effect available to the watching throng (?). I have no objection to Photoshop being used to help the camera out however. The point has already been made that when we view a layout the mind "edits" out the baseboard edge and the operator's midriff - unfortunately the camera doesn't.

 

How about this for a sensible approach....

• Build your layout, stock etc to the highest standard you can with as few compromises as possible (every model has compromises)
• Use Photoshop to eliminate the unavoidable intrusions (eg the room clutter above your backscene)
• Use Photoshop to add steam and smoke, diesel fumes etc if that appeals - this won't mislead anyone!
• If you have visible compromises (gaps at the base of a building etc) fix them before deploying the camera

Personally I have often found it just as quick to fix a model as it is to use Photoshop, with the obvious long-term advantage!

 

Chaz

[Andy Y]

How about this for a sensible approach....

• Build your layout, stock etc to the highest standard you can with as few compromises as possible (every model has compromises)
• Use Photoshop to eliminate the unavoidable intrusions (eg the room clutter above your backscene)
• Use Photoshop to add steam and smoke, diesel fumes etc if that appeals - this won't mislead anyone!
• If you have visible compromises (gaps at the base of a building etc) fix them before deploying the camera

Personally I have often found it just as quick to fix a model as it is to use Photoshop, with the obvious long-term advantage!

 

Blimey; an outbreak of logical sensibility there; thanks Chaz!

 

It's fair to say that the better the presentation of the model the less any 'photoshoppery' will be needed to make the image into what the owner and viewer would like to see. I've probably mentioned elsewhere that BCB needs virtually nothing doing bar cropping because of the way it was thought through. I'm currently working on some snaps of frosty trees against a neutral background, on the face of it it needs very little work but to eliminate distractions above the backscene there's got to be some kind of false sky extension and as soon as that interfaces with frosty trees it can take an awful lot of effort but the modellers' efforts justify the additional effort on the photographer's part but hopefully it remains reasonably faithful to the modellers' intentions.

 

[Neil]

I think the Kinmundy example works well and is unlikely to offend anyone's sensibilities because the winter backscene is neutral and understated. So extending it up and sidewards doesn't really add anything different except improve the framing of the model, in a way that respects the original intention of the builder.

[chaz]

Blimey; an outbreak of logical sensibility there; thanks Chaz!

 

It's fair to say that the better the presentation of the model the less any 'photoshoppery' will be needed to make the image into what the owner and viewer would like to see. I've probably mentioned elsewhere that BCB needs virtually nothing doing bar cropping because of the way it was thought through. I'm currently working on some snaps of frosty trees against a neutral background, on the face of it it needs very little work but to eliminate distractions above the backscene there's got to be some kind of false sky extension and as soon as that interfaces with frosty trees it can take an awful lot of effort but the modellers' efforts justify the additional effort on the photographer's part but hopefully it remains reasonably faithful to the modellers' intentions.

 

9comp.jpg

 

Thanks Andy. I think your before and after shot of the Craven two-car makes the case admirably.