Nice!

The variety available in TT scale for 5ft gauge is impressive. You assemble nice scenes. Excellent choice of backdrop. 

5ft TT scale

Matt,

Thank you. There is indeed quite a lot of 5ft stuff available in TT scale. In TT scale, modeling 5ft is even much easier than modeling US prototype. Only shortcoming is that there is not yet a 'real' Russian steam engine available. The only way to get Russian steam without scratchbuilding an entire locomotive is to use former German engines that were modified to run on 5ft after WWII. However, this situation will change with a TT scale model of a steam engine of series Эм, which is expected later this year. It will be a small batch production, in which Russian manufacturer Peresvet cooperates with German manufacturer Jago, which makes the drives. This will solve some quality problems Peresvet still has with the driving mechanism. While the Peresvet models look excellent, the running experience is not what you would expect today. When running 5ft equipment, I prefer my M62, which was made by Roco. This engine is to be seen in a picture I posted earlier in this blog comment:

http://model-railroad-hobbyist.com/node/18937#comment-161852

Joern

I thought it was a real scene!!!!!!

Joern

I thought you posted a real life photo, had to look closely to be sure.  My wife is still certain it is a real scene.

Thank you for sharing

Tom

Oh, yeah

I thought it was 1:1 - then I viewed in full screen: the only tell was the slack in the rope on the bucket.

Superb modeling.

Yes it's a Model worthy

This picture has my vote to appear in the column in the magazine! Besides being a different prototype and scale it also is an excellent blending of background photo and foreground models. 

This pic created a dilemma

• netti-casino.co

The line between physical and virtual modeling

"This pic created a dilemma for the real and artificial"

At least, the pic raises the question where to draw the line between physical and virtual modeling. In the scene on the pic, the steam engines, the crane, the truck, and the brown structure on the left are still real models. There is also a baseboard with ballasted tracks, road pavement, and some green. However, the final picture was created on a computer by combining the model photo with a background created from two different photos of real places. Thus, I used the models to produce a digital photo, the data of which I used to create the final pic by mixing it with data from other photos. So, the final pic was just created from data. The question is, is this still model railroading or rather a kind of computer art? We just had similar arguments in the discussion thread on the current 'reverse running' topic. If I replaced the real models by virtual 3D models (look at the photo-realistic renderings in some computer games), one would probably hardly notice the difference. I would not do it, however, since I still love real models. 

BTW, in the die-cast auto model scene, combining model photos with real photo backgrounds, often with heavy computer rendering of the final pic to get the desired effect, has already a tradition. It's even kind of an own scene. As an example, have a look at the Flickr stream of this guy: https://www.flickr.com/photos/95316196@N04/

In model railroading, this is quite a new development. Maybe, MRH is the very right place to discuss this topic.

Joern

Another 5ft model scene

I recently made another 5ft model scene using the same technique. In October 2014, I bought two Russian TT scale (1:120) tank cars from Berlin vendor TT Club. In one of the following photo sessions on my balcony, I took a photo of a small tabletop setting using these tank cars. Afterwards, I somehow forgot about that photo. Recently, I found it on my hard disk, spent some time for the final rendering and added a matching background, for which I combined parts of several industrial photos. The result proves that this photo didn't deserve to be forgotten. The diesel locomotive is a ЧМЭ2 made in the 1980s by East German TT scale manufacturer BTTB. It doesn't meet today's modeling standards but still works for such a photo scene.

Joern

https://www.flickr.com/photos/jpachl/16805299318/player/