Mirrors

The great master of mirrors was John Allen. Google "gorre & daphetid" and you will find a lot.

Basically when using a mirror you have to avoid your own reflection and find plausible excuses to hide the side edges ( easy) and the top one ( not that easy). John's mirrors were usually placed between structures joined by some kind of walkway. He modeled just half of the buildings, the rest being the reflected image. Also he placed vehicles and figures, painted different colors on the visible side and the reflected one, so they would look like two different ones. Also the thickness of the mirror has to be added to the equation, because thicker ones add some aberration that is detrimental to the effect.

Here is one:

http://witt-family.com/gorre-and-daphetid/MR-19520100-018-300_70.jpg

look carefully, the mirror is where the rail gap is.

Here is another one. Go find it!:

http://witt-family.com/gorre-and-daphetid/NMRA-19801200-068-600_70.jpg

Mirrors

Joe Fugate (publisher of MRH) has information in one of his scenery videos regarding the use of mirrors on his layout. He does this very effectively. I believe his explanation is in one of his scenery videos but I do not recall which one. See: http://model-trains-video.com/scenery.php

John

Mirror Tip

Using front reflecting mirrors rather than the more common rear reflective mirrors will leave a reflection without a seam on the edge. By front reflecting, I mean a mirror with the reflective surface on the front of the glass rather than on the back side.

Vol. 4

That's the DVD where Joe shows how to use a mirror.  Here's a picture of the scene:
 

 

The shadow in front of the U-Haul truck is in line with the angle of the mirror.  You can read a little more about how he did it here: http://cs.trains.com/TRCCS/forums/t/67098.aspx?PageIndex=2
Honestly, I'd recommend getting the DVD--actually the entire Siskiyou Line series.  I refer back to mine all the time! 
https://store.mrhmag.com/store/p8/Get_our_2-volume_scenery_how-to_video_set_and_SAVE%21_%28DVD%29.html

Bill

one more

Here's another picture that gives away the mirror trick:

Thanks - I'll look for it!

Thanks - I'll look for it!

Mirrors

Also keep in mind that they need to be cleaned, at least once in a lifetime. Plan access.

John Allens Gorre & Dephetid

if you go to the following page you can view John Allens RR Yard using a 4ft wide Mirror 8 foot tall to make his city and yard look GIANT check out the page below and if you look at the large gray building in the middle of the photo the one with large cathedral Yellow windows to the left is a covered walkway which both the building and the walk way are actually glued up against the glass mirror and the rest is reflection on the left side of the photo.

https://gdlines.org/GDLines/GD_Galleries/The_Slides/Set_01/index.html

Mini Mirrors

Some years ago I put a mini-mirror inside an N scale shop - but sadly no longer and no pictures.  I did pick up a small package of mini-mirrors just for that purpose and will use them someday in a rebuild.  Lightens up the inside and can make a shop that is 1.5" deep look much larger inside. 

Thanks for the link

Just spent the better part of the evening browsing the wonderful slides of John Allens G&D Railway.  Time well spent.

Mini Mirrors

Using mini mirrors in a small building gives the look of Dr Who's Tardis. When you look in the doors or windows the room looks bigger on the inside then on the outside.  

When I still lived in California one of my very best friends had a beautiful HO Logging Railroad in his Den. It was 25 feet long and 26 inches wide with close to 300 trees and about 40 of them were Giant Redwoods. Inside his Log cutting Mill he had a 12 inch long by 3in tall mirror along the back wall. He spent the better part of a year building that mill with more details than I could begin to describe and the inside was beautiful.

The way he built the interior if you didn't know there was a mirror in the model you couldn't tell and there were many people that didn't realize it until he told them and still they would say "where is it"? "I don't see any edges" "your kidding right where is it"? He would then remove the roof to see only half of the inside was finished the mirror actually set about 5/8s of the way into the model and the back 3/8 was just painted flat black.

Looking in through the Open front or both ends you just couldn't tell the mill wasn't 100% mill. He called the Mill "The John Allen Lumber and Long Pike Saw Co". He was always talking about John Allens RR and the one time he went to Johns Home with is Friends in Oakland California and got to see Johns RR first hand. He saw the Large Mirror on John Yard and that's when he got the the Idea and he put on both ends of His Logging Pike 26 inch wide by 4 foot tall Mirrors that gave the illusion the railroad went on forever. he also painted the top portion of both mirrors with the same background blue sky color and added clouds on them it made the wholeRailroad look twice the size it really was.

I tried to get him to send photos to any of the Model Railroad Magazines and he would just say "NO WAY!! then everyone will know I have this in my Den and I'll get robbed". But The few of us that saw the RR will always remember Him for his "Long Pike & Big Trees RR".

He passed away in 1989 at the age of 89 and his brother cut the RR into Two sections and moved it to his sons home in Colorado so I never saw it again.

Mirrors are a great way to make your RR or parts of it seam to go on forever and interiors really look cool when used and set up properly inside structures.

The really strange part of this story and Mirrors is My friends name was "Allen Johns" the mirror image name of his favorite Model Railroader.

Thanks for the tips and

Thanks for the tips and information!

I managed to fail to mention what I wanted to do: I have a track running parallel to the back of a 24" shelf (HO layout) that will run into a hidden "tunnel", but I want it to look like it is turning toward the background, running through a canyon or very narrow valley. I can hide much of the forground with rocks, trees and other vegatation, and can even hide the track with tree canopy. I thought a mirror would help make the effect if it showed the track (the train would "hide" the mirror when it is passing by so I'm not concerned with the opposite side of a train showing). I will get a couple small mirrors this week and experiment with them on a piece of completed track; perhaps multiple mirrors will give an even deeper depth of field and make the "curve" even longer.

I will also get Joe's video ordered next week to see how the experts do it! The pictures with the U-Haul are essentially what I think I'm looking to do, except with track instead of a road. I can use overhanging rocks and trees over the top of the mirror, so I don't think hiding the edges will be a problem - I just have to remember to make access for cleaning. Again, Thanks! 

video segment

The portion of the video devoted to the mirror is very brief and isn't a "step-by-step" segment.  Just wanted you to be aware of that up front.  However, there is so much other material, I'd be surprised if you didn't find many useful tips beyond the mirror part.  Joe's tree building instructions on the next volume (#5) is essential. 

I'm not affiliated with MRH or Joe's videos...but I've got the entire series and it's well worth the investment.

Thanks, Bill. I bought

Thanks, Bill. I bought both of his scenery DVDs as downloads, with a couple extras included. It took a while to get them all downloaded but I got them "immediately" rather than waiting for the postal carrier. LOTS of great information!

For my specific project I will experiment this week to see what happens with more than one mirror (it's supposed to rain in a day or two so I'll have an excuse to play indoors!) Worse case, I will redesign that section and make a different landscape. That's a nice thing about this hobby - mountains are not cast in stone!

another link

No such thing as too much information, right?  I found another link where a guy is using some mirrors in his scenery.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/themodelrailwayshow/6875829545/in/photostream/

More helpful information,

More helpful information, Bill! Thanks! In each case I see the mirror is nearly perpendicular to the road. I was originally thinking of bouncing the image off a couple mirrors that are off to the side, but I just thought - maybe I can use a "fake" piece of track and the mirror in the "conventional" position.

I'm on my way to Michael's (my daughter says she's going to leave me here if I don't come NOW - don't know when our roles reversed, but taking one car is important with today's gas prices!), so I'll get some mirrors and the experiments can begin!

The mirror's on Gerry Leone's

The mirror's on Gerry Leone's layout (linked above) are the first ones I've ever seen in person, and the effect is amazing.  It took a couple of visits before I could spot them all, and even with him pointing them out to me, some of them are almost impossible to see.

re: another link

unfortunately, gerry leone dismantled his layout and took the website down.  his use of mirrors was very cool.  he had a structure in one of the towns on the layout that depicted a 'town square' scene with a mirror strategically placed in such a way that the curve in the road made the area look deeper, he also had a car painted one color in the front and a different color in the rear so that the reflected image looked like two separate cars.

he had another mirror that made a road appear to go on forever into the backdrop, and another one that made a car look like it was coming over a hill (if i remember right).  i believe there were a total of 7 mirrors on his layout and each one was more clever than the last.  great modeler.  i hope's still active.

try

try here:

http://www.bonavistarailroad.com/

Here is mine...

On my previous layout, the mirror is under and behind the Atlas curved chord bridge to seemingly extend the view.

Bob Bochenek 

Using Mirrors

I would add a few further comments regarding the use of mirrors to apparently extend scenes on model railroads,  speaking as someone who has also successfully employed mirrors on a couple of layout scenes.

If the reflection in the mirror is to be easily visible to the viewer then the mirror must almost certainly be of the "first surface" type (referred to as a reflecting mirror by an earlier poster, I think). These have their silvered surface on their face rather than at the rear of the glass. These provide a virtually seamless joining of the real and reflected scenes, whereas common mirrors leave a very noticeable gap on close inspection that can be difficult to hide and immediately gives the trick away. I've seen a lot of attempts to use common second surface mirrors in railroad scenes and even with careful attempts at hiding the joints the hobbyist rarely succeeded in doing a truly convincing job.

There are several drawbacks about first surface mirrors that need to be pointed out. Even fairly small ones tend to be difficult to find and they are far more expensive than common mirrors. In addition, they can be cleaned only infrequently and with the greatest of care since the exposed silvered surface will scratch easily. 

Great care must be employed in their placement when used in a terrain situation, such that they are absolutely perpendicular to the scene and meet it at exactly a right angle. Any error in either angle results in a jog in the scene that is a dead give away that a mirror is being used. Thus, both the angle of the terminus of the real scene (especially if track is involved) and the supports for holding the mirror in place must be very carefully constructed.

In urban scenes where buildings will be reflected in the mirror remember that any signs will appear reversed (there are clever ways to avoid this however). At the same time, in street/road scenes great attention must be paid to the placement of vehicles, lest it result in a scene with cars driving on the wrong side of the road, or seemingly approaching each other head-on!

The most extraordinary example of mirrors being use to expand a scene that I ever saw (and independent of any actual layout) was published long, long ago in MR. It may have been the creation of John Allen, but I forget now. Anyway, it consisted of what appeared to be a small box perhaps two or three inches square. It was entitled "the world's largest parking garage". The lighted interior view, gained through a tiny peep-hole viewing through one wall that was a two-way mirror revealed a seemingly endless vista of vehicles, support columns and ceiling lights. It was accomplished by employing three first surface mirrors, one on each wall, plus the two-way as the 4th wall, with the floor and ceiling blank. A couple of HO vehicles with their colors repainted on the side away from the viewer and seen only in the mirror, together with quarter columns placed at the corners of the box hiding the mirror joints, completed the amazing illusion. I've always wanted to build one of these, but so far never have gotten around to it.

NYW&B

Tapfertal Mirror

Hi 3truckheisler,

Front surface mirrors scratch easily.

I tested the viewing angles before building the scenery, the replaced the mirror with window glass, built the scenery around the glass.  Then reinstalled the mirror after the scenery was complete.

John Allen

Looked it up...

It is in the December 1981 issue and does go into a lot of information and detail of this technique.

As as aside, this issue of MR had 194 pages!

Bob B.