I really wanted to go to see two exhibits in particular. Mark Casson's Grime St layout and the Modelu stand. Both, I'm glad to say, lived up to expectations. I'll return to Grime St in a minute.
Waiting outside Lincoln station for the vintage bus it was immediately obvious who else was going to the show. I'm afraid every stereotype of the modeller was represented and I pitied the poor solitary normal family with two kids who were looking for the bus as well. When it turned up I think they thought they'd been misled.
The show itself was, I guess, fairly typical of the type of regional show I used to go to when I was growing up. It was pretty mainstream in terms of the layouts on display, Eavesdropping on conversations in the over crowded cafe area suggested that people were really enjoying it. To be honest had I not had the camera with me I could probably have whizzed round and been out in forty five minutes.
But I did have my camera with me, primarily to get some photographs of the aforementioned Grime St and also to have another go at capturing Hospital Gate. Along the way though I decided to try and take some photos of the sort of layout that I would normally rush by.
So Grime St. A tramway layout that unlike so many tramway layouts is designed to look look good even without any trams running. Though if trams aren't running there are still other road vehicles moving, Mark uses a modified Faller system to animate buses and trucks, and magnorail for the bicycle.
I still wish Hospital Gate had a darker backscene, but I must admit I enjoyed it more seeing here more than I did the last time. I suspect that might be down to the lighting and where it was located in the hall.
Marske, had some very nice rolling stock but somehow didn't gel for me as an overall layout. One of those cases where I couldn't quite put my finger on why though.
The other 7mm layout, Chesil Exchange was a pleasant example of a light railway.
I managed to find at least one scene that I liked on an otherwise unremarkable OO gauge layout.
I also managed to find a couple of interesting angles on the small HO gauge Duncans Mine
The surprise of the show for me was how much I enjoyed the N gauge layouts, of which Peakdale was far and away the best.
A few more pictures are on Flickr with Grime St getting an album to itself .
Grime Street is fab isn't it? I've only seen it once unfortunetely, but it does live up to its name, unlike a lot of tramway layouts which are usually far too shiny and seem to be sponsered by Metcalfe.
ReplyDeleteI'll keep an eye out for Peakdale, looks to be well modelled and its a local (to me) subject.
I should have mentioned two things about Parkdale. The first that it is one of the Lincoln clubs own layouts, and the second that part of its charm is that it doesn't feature a station, just trains running through a landscape.
DeleteThe thing I like about shows is the chance to be surprised at layouts and scales I hadn't expected to enjoy. The camera is a useful addition as if you can ignore dull train photos, it makes you look for detail. My collection of show layout photos is heavily detail based and as you say, sometimes you find odd corners of otherwise unremarkable layouts that catch the eye.
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