I have seen a great many wonderful layouts with powerful lighting which to me look too clinical, too clean. I myself have never seen a clean railway except for a short stretch of freshly laid sidings at Haven Street on the Isle Of Wight Steam Railway. The layout is intended to portray my own view of what the railways really looked like, dirt grime, junk and all. This layout will be best viewed and operated in dim light or even better complete darkness, If an exhibition hall is a bit dull Stoneybridge will be having a dull day. This will allow me to go to town on the layout by using subtle lighting and moving machinery in the factories to give the layout more atmosphere.

Image NY1: Looking from the unfinished platforms on the station towards the yard. One end of the Bournemouth West dining set in `blood & custard' livery, is seen standing on the factory siding. The plywood backdrop behind the coach is destined to become the back wall of a large factory with glazed windows, interiors lighting and moving machinery. It is a bit of a huge project but will be worth it in the end and I can see it gradually taking shape as the months roll on by. :-)

Image NY2: View across the mainline to the yard with Class 31 and 33 diesels lurking in the shadows. There will be more lighting in the yard area once the walls are completed, I decided not to put them in yet as they would most probably get beaten up during construction work.

Image NB1: Looking into the signalbox from 10cm on Macro using no flash and only the interior lamp in the signalbox gave a surprisingly good image, The first working lever can be seen pulled out from the frame and an attempt at a track diagram can be seen on the back wall above the cupboard. Now that I know the level of detail I can see with the camera I'll have to put a bit more detail in the box, A signalman would be a good start!

The box is not yet glazed as I am thinking of using thin glass microscope slips to put real glass in the windows, these are also most useful for glazing some 4mm scale buildings, locos and coaches. With plenty of uses for the 7mm scale modeller.