Theatrical Fog Machine

Perhaps a theatrical fog machine?

I have seen some photos done with one to produce a "hazey day" effect that looked really good. Sorry.. can't recall where.. but I think it was in Model Railroader.

Chris

In the fog

Our own Charlie Comstock has done this.

Yep, check out issue 1

Yes, check out issue 1, the lead article on the Bear Creek ... one of the photos toward the back of the article was done using dry ice fog. The magazine includes a fog photo and one without fog for comparison.

There you go!

There you go!

If I can remember the MRR image I saw I will post back. It was a different use producing a distance haze as opposed to a fog effect.

Where would one get dry ice?

Chris

fog

Instead of adjusting the paint color

Instead of adjusting the paint color, could''t you just hit everything on the layout with a light spray of a soft gray? Or would that appear too "dusty"?

Chris, Dry ice is available from most ice dealers.

It is often used to keep ice cream cold at a picnic when there is no refregeration available.

More Specific

The fog machine idea sounds interesting, but I am thinking more along the lines of how to prepare the scenery:

 - How do you make the "green" lanscape fade to gray the farther the away it is? - I would guess this is a chance to implement forced perspective - that is, disant itmes more gray, close items more their natural color.

- How do you make things look wet?

Milt

Ithink I would start by taking a picture in the fog.

If the fog is dense like the "tuley fog" that we get in the central valley of California where we frequently have 100-200 car pile ups on the freeways, and visibility is less than the length of the hood of a typical car, forget it!  If it is only as foggy as the picture you posted, you should be able to get a decent exposure under natural light with no flash.  While the dampness will make things tend to be shiney, the lack of bright sun will also tone things down so that they won't reflect as much.  A few good pictures of various things on a foggy day will give you an idea of how things really look in the fog instead of how we remember them. 

After you have some good pictures, you can experiment with paints to see what produces the effect that you want.

Don't wait too long

Thanks, all.

I wrote my follow-up questions, had to actually do some real work ($$$) and came back to post it, and I see a whole bunch of useful replies in the intervening time (just so you don't think I'm not paying attention).  Bernie is on the right track - how to create the look without too much gloss.

I too was thinking of an overspray of gray - it's just scenery, and this portion of the layout is shallow - so not much harm done if I botch it.  Making the ore dock look wet - hmmm, that's a big commitment.

For the record - only the ore dock scene is subject to this foggy notion - 20' x 2' area or so.

I'm doing all I can to refrain from puns regarding fog.

Milt

Lake Superior and pea soup fog ,also weathering

Milt, the suggetsions about taking a picture and fading the backround are on the right track (pun intended) < GROAN> But a couple othe comments are probably in order. I grew up nearby, and model it as well (Ashland, WI) I couldn't figure out why I couldn't get the scene right until I figured out that even in the 80's (the timeframe I model) there is still soot peeling off of the buildings, giving a sort of mottled apearence, I haven't figured out how to recreate it yet. But if your modeling the height of the rail boom, in the city where "Rails meet Sails" then it is probably even worse. 

   Doc Dorin's (Patrick C. Dorin) books give a hint of how nasty it was down by the water. It's going to be tricky to pull off. You've got fines from Iron Ore, coal dust from the engines and the coal docks, grain dust from the elevators, smoke from everywhere (including the Duluth steel mill). I'm looking forward to seeing pictures as you work on it. If you don't have them Doc Dorin's books are invaluable as a reference, 

Wow, I thought Los Angeles had bad smog!

Since the advent of polution controls on industry as well as cars, the smog has cleared up considerably in L.A. compared to what it was like when I was growing up.  I thought L.A. was the only place in the U.S. that had bad smog.  I've never noticed the L.A. smog actually discoloring and peeling off buildings though.  What is the old joke about L.A. smog, "I don't trust breathing air that I can't see!"

Smog peeling

Russ; That's because LA smog is typically nitrogen compounds, carbon monoxide, and ozone from vehicle exhaust, turning into nitric and carbonic acid when combined with the fog. LA  wasn't really a heavy industry town, and didn't really have a pollution problem until everyone discovered cars after WWII. The air pollution problem the heavy industry cities had was from the extensive use of coal, especailly in the Grat Lakes basin, and along the river valleys. The water in the fog would combine with the soot in the air and create a black mess were ever it stuck. Gerry Leone on his Bona Vista RR (I guess I should say MMR Gerry Leone) has a pretty good example of what these buildings looked like in the fifties as the soot was flaking off, check the pictures of his Bicktul company, in his town of La Pointe. Just google "bona vista railroad".

Gotta get back to the grind, shutting down the contract, gotta inventory every little thing.

Not quite true.

We didn't have the heavy industry of the Northeast, but we had smudge pots in the Orange groves.  Smudge pots were designed to put a pall of thick black smoke over the groves during cold nights when frost could damage the trees and particularly the fruit.  Until the housing boom of post world war 2 started to displace the Orange groves in the 1960's (Prior to 1960, farming was more lucrative than land values) all of Orange County, Western San Bernardino County, Western Riverside County, and Northern San Diego County were orange groves anywhere the land was flat enough to have a grove.

Since the land values have risen, most of the old orange groves are gone, and the citrus groves and avocado orchards have moved up into the foothills.  Now they use large wind machines to keep the crop from frost damage.