web-site up-date

Phil Anderson wrote: We are taking a break from trains for a month sooooo- see us in August.

web site explains what's happening.

----------------------------------------------- Hope you have a nice vacation, Phil! BTW, your car's a real beauty!

Bill Bill's Railroad Empire N Scale Model Railroad:

History of N Scale: Links to over 700 helpful sites:

By painting everything in the vicinity orange to match?

That reminds me of an outstanding module that was at last week's N scale convention in Virginia. It was a single board, titled "New York City - 1940." The back board was a black and white photo of the NYC skyline, while the module was a river/dock scene - also all in black and white! (Or subtle shades of gray, actually.)

It was an incredible effect and masterfully done - a 3 dimensional black and white photograph.

Mike Tennent "IronPenguin" Operating Traffic Lights Crossbucks Special Effects Lighting

I thought everything was black and white a long time ago.

Actually, I've thought about something similar and was never sure if anything was ever written about it. I've always wondered if one wanted to publish or print a model photo in b&w, if the final results would be better if the main objects were painted in shades of gray, rather than a variety of colors. I'm thinking that painting them various shades of gray would prevent, say, a dark green and a dark red from both coming up the same shade of dark gray when printed in b&w. Has anyone ever seen this covered before?

Jim

The time-honored way to separate colors of similar reflectivity when shooting black and white is to use filters. (Assuming panchromatic film) a red filter will lighten reds and darken greens and nearby colors on the color wheel, a blue filter will lighten blues and darken oranges and neighbors, a yellow filter will lighten yellows and darken purples, and so on.

You fellows have brought up and interesting point about color verses black and white. I did retake the picture on the web-site to natural colors. see it at

It still is. Haven't you been following US politics?

In the old days of Hollywood (and it's predecessors) actors would often be made up with light green pancake so that they might appear more "lifelike" in black-and-white. There must be information somewhere in the history of film that would show recommended colors for appearance in B/W photograpy - or some simple experimentation...what about digital manipulation of color photos, removing all the hue information?

Jeff Sc. Binary World, Ga.

Just as a point of clarification, that green makeup would have been during the time that orthochromatic films were used, which were relatively insensitive to red. Therefore, skin tones would tend to come out a little dark, and lips would be unnaturally dark. (Those were the films you could develop under a red safelight.)

With the advent of panchromatic films, there was no further need for green makeup, and guidelines that were in use in orthochromatic days would no longer be applicable.

Oh, man, that looks a lot better - thank you (that's why I gave you a hard time)

Mike, I saw that black & white module (actually various shades of grey and white). It was stunning!

The Kitch'N Sink was something else.

There were so many outstanding modules that it was impossible to really appreciate them all. I wish I had had more time to look around, but since I was busy at my tables, I couldn't.

Mike Tennent "IronPenguin"

I always thought WWII was a black and white war. Which is why I have problems watching things like Band of Brothers....

:D

Kennedy