Relative to the conversation that has occurred here on several occasions about the dinginess of Sellio's cityscapes I have been watching "The Public Enemy" on TCM tonight. All of the city scenes reflect trash and debris on the street much as Sellio's depicts. As this movie was produced in 1931 we might conjecture that the producers were depicting city life as they saw it. Most of the scenes reflect a dingy, dark, and dirty city. Just a thought.
Well, OK. The F&SM models Boston. So I guess that Boston is the nation's premiere pesthole, right? Worse than Camden, NJ, worse than Mobile, AL........................... Mobile is horrible it is one of the ugliest cities I have ever been to. It is a decayed industrial cancer on the shores of Mobile Bay, and even IT is not as awful as the F&SM. I just happened to put my hand on the F&SM video this afternoon as I was looking for something in the closet. So, I popped it into the VCR and hit the play button. I was astonished! I had forgotten how garish and unbelievable it really is. There is no way I would want my model railway to look like that. It is a cartoon, not a model railroad. It looks like the aftermath of an enormous, stupendous dumpster explosion. A city built in the midst of a sanitary landfill.
Is it a work of art? Yes indeed, it is. But it is most emphatically not a realistic model railway. Roger's is several orders of magnitude more believable and pleasing to look upon. I wish I could have seen more of it.
..............F>
An interesting thought, at that. We might also conjecture that the producers exaggerated the trash and debris for dramatic effect, in precisely the same manner as television programs made today exaggerate a particular element of their setting for dramatic effect.
But a documentary made during that period would certainly be worth looking at. Didn't the federal agency - whose name eludes me, the RFC? - charged with Depression-era public works have some made by filmmakers like Frank Capra?
Cheers,
Mark.
Good Morning!
Another thought which also grew out of this thread is the definition of Model Railroading. *It is What It Is* to the individual, although some can't seem to accept this.
God may have created the world in 7-days, but we can't begin to model One-Billionth of the same in our lifetime.
Selective__Compression -- remember this buzzword? Same goes for how we depict our models.
George Sellio modelled His__Own__Layout to suit His--Own__Tastes and we need to view it from this viewpoint, Not Our Own Personal preferences. We may be depressed by such scenes, we may not like such scenes, but we must admit that he Is Successful in modelling what he wanted to portray.
People try to be diplomatic when viewing another's layout by saying: "Too bad that you couldn't......"
Not Too Bad At All -- I made it that way because I want it that way. What's The Problem?!?!(:>)
Waiting for a bus is as thrilling as fishing, with the similar tantalisation that something, sometime, somehow, will turn up. George Courtauld
James B. Holland
? Holland Electric Railway Operation....... "O"--Scale St.-Petersburg Trams Company (SPTC) Trolleycars and "O"--Scale Parts including Q-Car mailto: snipped-for-privacy@pacbell.net
? Pennsylvania Trolley Museum
Good Morning!
In all honesty, Dan, this is going very far afield and could be considered *OT*--
Since we live in an imperfect world, we will not be able to define anything precisely. An exception is possible for any and every thing, and what you state above would fit this thought.
But we are talking about model-railroaders so it would be assumed that what the modeller is building is related to rail -- not a city scape with an airplane. And since any one modeller or any group of modellers would not be able to model The Complete Scene, a certain aspect is emphasized that is to the modellers liking. Apparently this is what Mr.George Sellios did and as a result is catching much flack -- not because what he did is wrong, but because it doesn't meet the viewers specs. We need to look at a layout through the eyes of the builder // modeller, not our own, and not our own preferences.
I am a model TrolleyCar fan and do not have an interest in mainline railroad modelling. But I can look at what a model railroader has accomplished, no matter how small, and definitely appreciate his efforts and appreciate it for What It Is, NOT how I perceive it should be. I get great inspiration from modellers of mainline RRs this way -- or from any modeller, for that matter.
Waiting for a bus is as thrilling as fishing, with the similar tantalisation that something, sometime, somehow, will turn up. George Courtauld
James B. Holland
? Holland Electric Railway Operation....... "O"--Scale St.-Petersburg Trams Company (SPTC) Trolleycars and "O"--Scale Parts including Q-Car mailto: snipped-for-privacy@pacbell.net
? Pennsylvania Trolley Museum
Nobody is actually criticising his work, we all say that he is an excellent modeller.
We may be criticising his style as somewhat over done and "unrealistic".
-- Cheers Roger T.
Don't waste your time typing that Roger. They know what "we" said. they are reading what they want to read. Everyone who has been on this board for more than three days knows that not a soul has denegrated the quality or the artistry of the work. They see what they want to see and jerk their knees.
...................F>
Roger. I wasn't singling you out. I made no reference to you in my post. Sorry if I gave you that impression.There were about 500 posts in the first thread.I thought many of them were very narrow in their opinions and very critical of some very fine work.. I've been in this hobby for longer than I like to think...(getting to be an old Phart)..about 50 years off and on and I appreciate any good work whether it be scenery, trackwork , Z to G and anything else for that matter that can be associated with trains.
And , this was no Knee Jerk reacti>
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