Anything new in the realm of forced perspective?

Not a new idea but, smaller scale skyscrapers toward the back of my city scene work for me.

Jay, I certainly don’t have much forced perspective going on, but my layout is still in a state much like yours, as you know.  One are that you and others may have noticed is an HO farmhouse on a white Styrofoam hill behind my engine house.  I don’t know that it will end up there, but I have to use it somewhere.

It was built by Howard Zane of the Great Scale Train Show at the Maryland State Fairgrounds.  I met Howard there over 30 years ago, but was given the farmhouse just 2 or 3 years ago.  Our younger son-in-law, Dustin, works as a video editor and edited two videos for Forrest Nace of Nace’s Videography.  The first video was hours and hours of video that Forrest took of Howard’s layout.  Dustin is not a modeler, but over many months he learned a lot from Forrest.  He dubbed in all the sound as well.  Later, Dustin did the same for video Forrest took of Tony Koester’s HO layout.

Dustin and my daughter, Holly, gave me the Zane house for Christmas that year.  They are expecting our first grandchild in 2 months.  The medical folks are pretty sure it’s a boy.  Maybe in 3 years, I will finally have a train helper.  Neither of our daughters were really interested.

I would like to display my scratch built N scale diorama of the homestead where I, my dad, and my grandpa grew up.  I think it will still be better displayed off layout where both sides can be viewed.

Not new, but there are some really interesting shadow box models that use forced perspective at the Conwy Valley Railway Museum in Betws-Y-Coed Wales.  They have several such models on display - the shadow boxes are only a couple of inches deep, but the models are built so that they converge on a vanishing point.  Really quite a trick since it's done with actual scratchbuilt models, not paint or photographs. 

Unfortunately, the only photo I could find is at https://www.tripadvisor.com/At...i_National_Park.html - follow the link and go to the 7th photo.

This is a scene I did on an old layout. The background buildings, vehicles and people are HO.

I went with S scale buildings and an HO Marends donkey pump for this scene.

@Mark Boyce posted:

Jay, I certainly don’t have much forced perspective going on, but my layout is still in a state much like yours, as you know.  One are that you and others may have noticed is an HO farmhouse on a white Styrofoam hill behind my engine house.  I don’t know that it will end up there, but I have to use it somewhere.

It was built by Howard Zane of the Great Scale Train Show at the Maryland State Fairgrounds.  I met Howard there over 30 years ago, but was given the farmhouse just 2 or 3 years ago.  Our younger son-in-law, Dustin, works as a video editor and edited two videos for Forrest Nace of Nace’s Videography.  The first video was hours and hours of video that Forrest took of Howard’s layout.  Dustin is not a modeler, but over many months he learned a lot from Forrest.  He dubbed in all the sound as well.  Later, Dustin did the same for video Forrest took of Tony Koester’s HO layout.

Dustin and my daughter, Holly, gave me the Zane house for Christmas that year.  They are expecting our first grandchild in 2 months.  The medical folks are pretty sure it’s a boy.  Maybe in 3 years, I will finally have a train helper.  Neither of our daughters were really interested.

I would like to display my scratch built N scale diorama of the homestead where I, my dad, and my grandpa grew up.  I think it will still be better displayed off layout where both sides can be viewed.

Thank you Mark for the insights; very interesting. I would be inclined to move the farmhouse to the left so it’s not hidden. Perhaps some HO flats on the wall behind the engine house.
However, the BIG story is the pending arrival of your first grandchild. When asked what my favorite sound is my immediate response was, “Granddad”.

@Mallard4468 posted:

Not new, but there are some really interesting shadow box models that use forced perspective at the Conwy Valley Railway Museum in Betws-Y-Coed Wales.  They have several such models on display - the shadow boxes are only a couple of inches deep, but the models are built so that they converge on a vanishing point.  Really quite a trick since it's done with actual scratchbuilt models, not paint or photographs.

Unfortunately, the only photo I could find is at https://www.tripadvisor.com/At...i_National_Park.html - follow the link and go to the 7th photo.

Thank you Mallard, never heard of this but wow very impressive.

@railroad-guy posted:

I went with S scale buildings and an HO Marends donkey pump for this scene.

Pup and Dan, thank you for sharing your work. Your ideas work.

Jay

@Tranquil Hollow RR posted:

Thank you Mark for the insights; very interesting. I would be inclined to move the farmhouse to the left so it’s not hidden. Perhaps some HO flats on the wall behind the engine house.
However, the BIG story is the pending arrival of your first grandchild. When asked what my favorite sound is my immediate response was, “Granddad”.

Jay, I totally agree the farmhouse needs to be moved so it isn't hidden.  HO flats is a good idea for right behind the engine house.  I had to put the house somewhere for the time being. 

Thank you on the BIG story!   My wife already gave me a cup that says "Recently promoted to Grandpa"  As I'm pushing 68, I'm glad we don't have to wait longer.

@Tranquil Hollow RR posted:

Thank you Mallard, never heard of this but wow very impressive.

That's the only place where I've ever seen such things.  It's really unfortunate that I couldn't find better photos - the one I found isn't the most impressive of the models.  If I find time to sort through my photos I'll post some better ones.  As I recall, there's one with multiple tracks where the builder shaved the rails so they maintained the illusion of depth.

The Conwy Valley Railway Museum is a bit of a hidden gem that's attached to a hobby shop near the train station.  It's not large, but it punches above its weight.  That portion of NW Wales has a lot of railway attractions.

@Mallard4468 posted:

That's the only place where I've ever seen such things.  It's really unfortunate that I couldn't find better photos - the one I found isn't the most impressive of the models.  If I find time to sort through my photos I'll post some better ones.  As I recall, there's one with multiple tracks where the builder shaved the rails so they maintained the illusion of depth.

The Conwy Valley Railway Museum is a bit of a hidden gem that's attached to a hobby shop near the train station.  It's not large, but it punches above its weight.  That portion of NW Wales has a lot of railway attractions.

They did do a great job with the forced perspective at Conwy Valley Railway Museum!

Nothing new, but here's my use of forced perspective.  All buildings in elevated city area are O scale except for the tallest ones at the very back, which are HO.  I wish I could claim I calculated the correct building scale based on the distances and perspective...but really it was just trial and error, and a bunch of dumb luck that more or less works.

@Mark Boyce posted:

Jay, I totally agree the farmhouse needs to be moved so it isn't hidden.  HO flats is a good idea for right behind the engine house.  I had to put the house somewhere for the time being. 

Thank you on the BIG story!   My wife already gave me a cup that says "Recently promoted to Grandpa"  As I'm pushing 68, I'm glad we don't have to wait longer.

Congratulations on your well deserved promotion. With grandkids you get to wind them up and then send them home.

@Bob W / cprail posted:

Nothing new, but here's my use of forced perspective.  All buildings in elevated city area are O scale except for the tallest ones at the very back, which are HO.  I wish I could claim I calculated the correct building scale based on the distances and perspective...but really it was just trial and error, and a bunch of dumb luck that more or less works.

That looks great Bob and it works really well. Obviously you applied the SWAG theory. I like the paint tone and subtle clouds too.

Jay

Thanks, Jay, I appreciate the kind words.  I forgot to mention in the original post that I put the HO buildings on elevated platforms to get more height.  The ground-level O scale buildings hide the platforms.  Another step I didn't plan but made up on the spot!

@Bob W / cprail posted:

Thanks, Jay, I appreciate the kind words.  I forgot to mention in the original post that I put the HO buildings on elevated platforms to get more height.  The ground-level O scale buildings hide the platforms.  Another step I didn't plan but made up on the spot!

Bob, I agree with Jay.  You did a very convincing job of forced perspective in your city scene! 

@Tranquil Hollow RR posted:

Congratulations on your well deserved promotion. With grandkids you get to wind them up and then send them home.

Yes, our now 31-year old tomboy will get to experience some of what she did to us!    Just kidding of course.  She and her husband are well adjusted in becoming new parents.  She has been teaching private voice and piano lessons since finishing college, and has become a mentor to even some who are in real need of mentoring.  She and her husband are the ones who gave me the Howard Zane farmhouse.

Thanks, Mark -- I appreciate the compliment.  I wish I could claim I planned it out this way...but like many things in life, I just made it up as I went along.  I know this goes against all the advice the professional model builders give us to plan it all out ahead of time -- but I find it more enjoyable to just get started with only a fuzzy idea or plan, see how it develops, make changes, make more changes and finally the task is done.  I wonder how many of us on the Forum go about our modeling this way versus the "plan it all out ahead of time" approach.

Bob, lots of things on my layout “just worked out that way “.  There’s a reason professionals are professionals; they build layouts all the time.  Even retired, I can’t spend enough time at it to do it the way I planned.

Well, it's not new, but I do rely on forced perspective to blend the rear of the layout tunnel's ridge line with the mountain scene in the roll-down backdrop. I also rely on that distance gradation to include full O scale items (like the farmers market at one end, and the cell tower workers at the other) with some more out-of-scale items like the wind turbine.

Very nice Steve, I like the backdrop.

Nicely done, Steve!

I’m seriously considering buying several flats in HO to install on the wall. And I did a mock up just to get a sense of how it would work.

Jay