Large Scale Central

Polaroids or (35 mm) of your RR

Uncropped,unedited,but it must be an image from developed film …you can do scanned pics of the pics you have or however you prefer to load images of your RR back in the day. You must show the picture parameters like you are flipping through an album.

Any takers ?

OK; I’m game - well sort of. These are from before I owned a digital camera, so I know they are scanned prints. I can’t say they haven’t been cropped or edited 17 years ago when I first posted them.

Before I had an outdoor railroad; I had a loop around the Christmas tree with a cardboard / fiberfill mountain/tunnel…

That spring/summer I made my first tentative steps in the dirt…

I bought a digital camera that fall. By the time I began actual construction outdoors I had made the switch.

" Rooster " said:

Uncropped,unedited,but it must be an image from developed film …you can do scanned pics of the pics you have or however you prefer to load images of your RR back in the day. You must show the picture parameters like you are flipping through an album.

Any takers ?

I can do that…

First loop out in the driveway. Layout is being built on the right. (Now long gone)

To give you feel of how long ago this was, the little girl in the pic is my niece Kimberly. She’s now married with her own kids.

And eventually the track made it up to the new layout. That’s an original Bachmann Big Hauler kit called the Prairie Flyer. Bought it at Nicholas Smith Trains for $125. That was about 1989 or 1990. It now has a BBT 460 drive in it.

A view from the driveway.

That same area in 2013. As you can see the pressure treated ties have been replaced with an E P Henry block wall. That was done in about 2006 after the ties had begun to deteriorate. At about that same time I went with batteries and radio control to eliminate all the wiring that existed on the first layout.

And that eventually evolved into what I have now.

" Rooster " said:

Uncropped,unedited,but it must be an image from developed film …you can do scanned pics of the pics you have or however you prefer to load images of your RR back in the day. You must show the picture parameters like you are flipping through an album.

Any takers ?

It’s from my layout in the seventies (last century!) and from slides, but it’s rather tiny and HO like…

Polaroids, sounds like what you would get from freezing your ass off !

Gary, I wish I could still get film for my Polaroid. I used to end up with an audience when I took pictures with that big clunky thing. Snap the shutter, pull the yellow tab. Pull the white tab. Wait sixty seconds, then peal the print off of the negative. I still have 3 or 4 of them cameras around here.

David - apparently the film is still available assuming your’re willing to pay for it. (https://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-money-mouth.gif)

Ah, not really. Fuji Film did make film for my old Polaroid, but they stopped making it years ago.

Oh well, digital photography is less expensive, and easier for me to post online. I don’t have a scanner at home, so my old 35mm shots of the first year of my railroad will probably never be seen online.

Amazon listed the Fuji and some Polaroid films 600 series

To me, this site Polaroid Originals, seems to indicate that they sell a number of the instant film types. I do agree that digital is probably the easiest and most versatile of the formats available.

You could always get something like a Polaroid Mint Pocket Printer if you are really enamored with “instant” printing. (https://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-surprised.gif)

These aren’t polaroids, but they are scanned from prints taken before I got my first digital camera in 2003. [In Fall of 2003 huriicane Isabel obliterated my garden and railroad, so any photos like these are pre-digital camera!]

This was the first train on the original loop:

I had a lot of Bachmann hoppers in those days:

I used to strive for EBT-like yard shots:

Here’s another old freight on the long curve:

David Maynard said:

Gary, I wish I could still get film for my Polaroid. I used to end up with an audience when I took pictures with that big clunky thing. Snap the shutter, pull the yellow tab. Pull the white tab. Wait sixty seconds, then peal the print off of the negative. I still have 3 or 4 of them cameras around here.

https://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_from=R40&_trksid=p2380057.m570.l1313.TR12.TRC2.A0.H0.Xpolaroid+film.TRS0&_nkw=polaroid+film&_sacat=0

There are several options available for Polaroids as film is making a comeback in the art circles.

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/buy/Polaroid-Fujifilm-Instant-Film/ci/327/N/4093113315

There are still some insurance situations that prefer or require an indelible photograph. Digital photos are far too easy to edit. I really pity our future generations who attempt to research photographs of today.

As a side note, if you do want to play with a polaroid buy the film from a professional vendor. Expiration dates are more important now than ever since the chemistry is slightly different and is not as stable in the undeveloped form as it used to be

I left my Polaroid with my 8 track player and can’t find either.

I hated film pictures. I never could figure out all the stops and lens and other stuff. But the minute I got a camera with the screen on the back…WAM! I turned into Ansel Adams and Joseph Karsch all rolled into one. (Unfortunately, digital cameras and Photshop ruined entire sections of the art market.)

John I agree, with all the editing and filters and adjustments that can be made, a simple picture can be photoshopped into anything you want it to be and now any picture is suspect of being 'shopped into something else. But I do like the ability of instantly seeing you took 29 bad picture and 7 good ones , instead of waiting a week and paying for the 29 bad pictures plus the 7 good ones from your local Fotomat. Now you can take hundreds and just delete no harm no foul!

I subscribe to Ansel Adams’ philosophy of “making a photograph,” not just “taking a picture.”

That said, in a 36 frame roll, probably half had me wondering, “What the hell was I thinking?”, and another quarter of the roll just didn’t work out. If I got 6-7 good shots out of a roll, and 2 worth some darkroom time, I thought I was doing well.

I had the time so what the Heck…I used the cell phone to copy some old 35mm photos from my albums…

my first loco on my first layout in Southeastern Connecticut (march 1992 according to the printed date on the back of the picture from Mystic Color Lab)

the engine is an Aster Climax live steam built from a kit…I still have train bits in the boxes the parts came in! here passing through my first structure

This is nearly my first scratch built rolling stock. I could get stuff at the local hobby shop in East Lyme or Waterford on Route 1 including kits and LGB stuff!

this is my first GO at model railroading HO on a sheet of plywood ( and hanging over the edge ) Paper mache over chicken wire, real trees and green sawdust grass. mid '70’s i guess and i was in middle school (called Junior High School in our town)

My mom (is) was a Photographer and had a darkroom for B&W printing. I imagine I actually printed these.

this was the re-build of my second HO Empire in the early 80’s

this one doesnt really count but I was an Early adopter of Digital Cameras…I had one with a 3-1/2" floppy in it

it shows my second “garden” railway really the only one actually in a Garden. Stamford Connecticut

Better late than never…

My first layout circa 1966 ( I was 17 ) and my brother Matt (16) started this 5 years earlier. It lasted another 2 years when Dad sold the house. It had to be destroyed.

Bruce Chandler said:

It’s from my layout in the seventies (last century!) and from slides, but it’s rather tiny and HO like…

Some of those structures seemed to have inspired the current layout (https://www.largescalecentral.com/externals/tinymce/plugins/emoticons/img/smiley-cool.gif)