Visit - Forced Perspective by Marty McGuirk

Copyright Nicholas Kalis

Visit

Model railroading author Marty McGuirk has an exquisite layout under construction in the basement of his Virginia home. On Saturday, November 5 2022, Marty hosted an open house held in conjunction with a joint Potomac Division and James River Division convention held at Battlefield Baptist Church in Warrenton, Virginia. In the above photo (Photo 1) we see an N scale mill on just one small area of Marty McGuirk’s HO scale model railroad. McGuirk’s mill is an example of effective use of forced perspective in this Autumn scene as the N scale (1:160) mill is on a railroad whose scale is otherwise 1:87 (HO). Marty made the important point to visitors that with such a technique it is important that the HO scale train not pass behind the mill as the disparity between the scales would be jarring and the forced perspective effect destroyed. McGuirk’s mill is on a river that is not quite completed. Marty tells us this scene is a work in progress with more vegetation planned in the foreground. This mill model – with a long history – is patterned after a mill found in Richmond, Virginia even though the setting for this layout is New England.

 

This layout is one that replaces Marty’s previous layout – the Central Vermont Railway Roxbury Subdivision. To learn more about Marty’s current layout visit centralvermontrailway.blogspot.com or click Central Vermont Railway