I flew down to Anaheim from Portland this morning (absolutely problem-free trip) and after getting situated in the hotel (and calling Joe, who was out looking at layouts to tell him I was here) I went down and got my registration packet for the convention.

Contents of the very nice canvas bag (to be reused as a grocery bag, I suspect) provided included all the stuff I needed to make an ID tag (thank you to Digitrax for the lanyard), an Anaheim 2008 pin, an Anaheim 2008 patch, and a guide to the weeks events. I wandered through the contest room (photos at the end) and the silent auction (I'll find out tomorrow if I'm now a Z-scale railroader as well) and went over to say hi to the RPM guys... and point out that their flyer said they were going to be present on Thursday and Friday, instead of the correct days of Wednesday and Thursday. Compared to some of the RPM extravaganzas I've seen photos of in the past, this is a pretty small show for them.

I made it to several clinics today - two by Dave Connery and Brad Lloyd, the first of which was on Modeling Roads (informative - they'll use anything from dirt to plastic to patching compound depending on the look they want. They are definitely big believers in Bragdon weathering chalks. The second one was on "Details Make the Difference" where they showed how, through a before & after process, fairly simple techniques (starting by painting every piece of bare plastic on the layout) to make the scenes in a layout much more detailed and dramatic - to kick up the "oooh, aaaah" factor by those friends who don't know an SD45 from a 4-8-4, but do know what a city street should look like.  Oh - and Joe was complaining about doing 3 clinics back-to-back? These guys did SEVEN clinics in a row today. The one's I saw were #3 and #6. They were still going strong and cracking jokes in #6. Excellent presentations.

Another clinic I made it to included "The Hidden Treasure - Economical Building Kits" where Carl Heimberger showed how a little (!?!) kitbashing and actual modeling could change inexpensive Model Power & Bachmann Plasticville-type buildings into very nice structures indeed. He also did a bit of showing off in describing the changes he's made to Walthers kits as well - the amazing part was that he let us all pass them around the room. I only saw one part get broken off.

The last clinc I was at was by Barry Draper and was a comparison of the pros and cons of the various sound decoders (both with and without motor decoders) on the market. He thinks highly of Soundtraxx, although he's not happy that the generic "EMD 2nd Generation" sound includes a turbocharger that you can't get rid of (inappropriate for GP38's), he's definitely approving of Loksound, and he's not sure what's with Digitrax, since it seems like they released their sound decoders...and then went off to do other things. He definitely seems to like QSI - especially since they've gotten their Version 7 software out... except, as he mentioned, for the Atlas MP15DC, where apparently the chip is surface mounted instead of being socketed.

Two companies that he was not very hot on included MRC (he has hopes for them, as their sound quality is actually very good), and Blueline (impossible to advance consist, among other problems).

I'm very tempted to buy a QSI Revolution for one of my Atlas GP40s on Friday if they are available...

Photos? Oh... these photos....

An SD40T-2 located at the contest table. Don't know who detailed it as the forms don't have names on them - prevents inappropriate influence on the judges, I suppose.

This is three stories of Union Station - I don't know if it was submitted for judging or not. I actually hope not, as a major part of the station's sign was missing.

A 1/35th scale representation of the Dora Rail Gun. Absolutely amazing in it's detail. Absolutely disappointing in how few points I saw it receive for construction (21 out of 40). Word was that the judges were being rather miserly with the points today. Oh - that's my cell phone up against it.

For more photos (no captions yet, sorry), head on over to  https://goo.gl/photos/5kTPxRcU5drWqVTf6