An easy way to set your era - right to the month, if you like!
As I continue to pull together tatters and bits of what, sometime within the next 20 years, will be a Pacific Northwest short line of the 1980s, I decided to apply a well-known trick for establishing a time and place: make some signs! (I have watched the Hollywood folks create atmosphere in filming locations by adding signs, and have seen that this trick works well in 1:1 scale as well as on model railroads). Since this particular sign is going to be on a road near the parking lot for my pulp mill, I decided maybe a beer sign would be a good investment, and since it is the Pacific Northwest, Rainier Beer (Vitamin R to the locals) seems like a good location setter.
One nice thing about a scale billboard is that, like the real thing, it can be quickly changed.
Movies and TV shows are pretty specific for era; the movie ad is VERY specific, marking the time as early 1990.
(Of course, the 2002 PT Cruiser is a bit premature - signs are only part of the era - but they are easy to make, and easy to change!)
Roger
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How do you...
...fasten the posters to the billboard to allow quick changeouts?
Mounting billboard graphics to sign
I use a small piece of double stick Scotch tape on the back near each end; I curl the edges slightly backward before mounting so the graphic image appears to stay tight against the sign board. Small pieces of tape don't damage the graphics when they are changed. Eventually, I will probably change the graphics to create seasonal differences (a sign advertising Christmas candy vs. a sign selling 4th of July fireworks, for example). Hmm; maybe beer for summer and Canadian whiskey for winter, too . . .
Roger
Rog.38
the next step...
Find a color display, like from an old cell phone or similar, and rig it up to change what is on the billboard.
Or be modern (if it suits the modeled era), and have it change every 30 seconds or so...
Mike WSOR engineer "Safety First (unless it costs money)"
Live video billboards
There is an example on Youtube of the Hamburg Airport model - spectacular in its size, lighting and animation (with a price tag of $5 million). The terminal includes the feature you describe - I-phone size video displays with live ads on them. I'm modeling the early 80s, so that would be a bit premature, but a modeler might be able to make a mechanically animated billboard (vertical blind displays that flip over to show a different picture; that sort of thing) that would better fit the era.
Roger
Rog.38
Better step
In the 1970s Vermont banned billboards. I've been in other states and I realize that I'm glad there not in Vermont and not on my layout. Good idea for away!!!
Better step
In the 1970s Vermont banned billboards. I've been in other states and I realize that I'm glad there not in Vermont and not on my layout. Good idea for away!!!
No billboards in Vermont
If your layout extended across a state line, that could be a good clue the train had entered the next state - billboards all of a sudden!
Roger
Rog.38
Remember the era of the billboard hardware
The mono-pod billboard depicted in the photos is actually a somewhat (within the last 30 or so years) recent development.
--
Jeff Shultz
http://www.shultzinfosystems.com
The Willamette & Pacific RR - Oregon Electric Branch
Model Railroad Hobbyist Technical Assistant
Agreed - type of billboard sets the era, as well
Billboards can probably do a good job of setting era any time in the past 100 years or so ("Burma Shave" had a great gimmick in the 30s and 40s). But you're right - the steel wedge-shaped billboard on a single pylon would likely look out of place before the 80s. Wood billboards with triangular support trusses would probably fit in to the entire century, though - both on the ground and on commercial building roofs. I like the versatility that modern computer graphics can lend - a web search can probably find a classic or antique ad for almost anything, and what you can't find, you can make. Adding the local community name (real or fictitious) could really set the scene: "BAYSIDE COAL AND OIL - Cedar Bay's leading supplier of home heating coal and fuel" etc. - name your town, your region, your era. "HORNET - Hudson's new model for 1951, on sale now at Cedar Bay Motors." The possibilities are almost infinite! But you are right - the wrong hardware would certainly ruin the effect.
Roger
Rog.38
You can do somewhat the same
with interiors as well. The observation / Lounge car I am doing an interior for? I did some research and since this is the IC railroad, I found the Chicago Tribune masthead and from their archives found the headline on the DAY I am modeling (innagural run of that name train) and built a scale newspaper for the passengers.
When we were doing the Ronald McDonald House Christmas layout in Jacksonville, in the day, sponsers got billboards with their company logo on it. I also did the HO scale HMS Bounty for the harbor layout. Fortunately there was a kit in that scale....
And a small sandwich sign out front of the library building, telling about story hour for the kids - The Little Engine that Could, followed by Thomas the Tank Engine stories.