The industrial revolution was all about bigger. The technological revolution is the complete opposite. For those that want to see the death of the McMansion era, these 15 gadgets are a comforting portent of things to come.

1. Camera

James Bond would have a ball with this exact replica SLR mini-camera, complete with lenses and flash bulb. It’s all flash in no cash, though; try to take an actual photo and you’ll find out it isn’t functional. Still, Glico (a Japanese company) gets style points for the idea.

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2. Cheese Burger

Cute (a decidedly feminine word) and hamburger (a masculine invention) shouldn’t go into the same sentence… yet, there they are, when I sit and write about this combo meal. The burger has a diameter of 1”… only slightly bigger than a quarter. Add in a miniaturized drink and fries, and you have a reverse-super-size situation going on.

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3. Model Railway

David Smith crafted the train set you’re looking at. And he did the entire thing by hand. What’s even more amazing is that it actually works; you can set a small train to doing laps around the track and through the tunnel.

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4. Gun

Now, while I have a hard time thinking you could harm a fly with this gun, maybe that’s its benefit. A gun for monks.

Correction: this SwissMiniGun (only 2.16” long) fires real bullets at approximately 270mph; that’s fast enough to kill a man if you can get close enough. That is, if he doesn’t die from his mocking laughter first.

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5. Car

The Peel P50 – manufactured on the Isle of Man from ’62 to ’65 – served little purpose beyond bringing soul-crushing ridicule upon its owners. The only cool thing about it is it cost just shy of $250. Then again, who would even spend that to buy a metal red wagon with an internal combustion engine?

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6. Violin

This is one instrument only a virtuoso (with incredibly deft fingers) can appreciate. It’s less than 2” long, from tip to toe. No word as to whether Eric Meissner, the violin’s creator, bothered to craft a bow for it.

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7. Computer

Remember when simple computers filled up entire warehouses? Yeah… welcome to the future. This uber-small (2”x2”) and uber-cool (black on black!) device is specifically designed for use on spaceships. Shimafuji Corporation has officially trumped Apple in the swagger department with this one, if you ask me.

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8. Teddy Bear

Thumbelina would have really dug this. Bettina Kaminski, a German sculptor, brought Mini the Pooh into existence, to the amusement and applause of fairies worldwide. I hear it’s a big seller in some parts of Middle Earth.

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9. Mailbox

You can’t tell by the picture, but this is the tip of a pencil. The mailbox is shaped out of lead. Seeing that I have to sharpen my pencil 2-4 times to get it right, I can only imagine how long something like this would take.
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10. World’s Smallest Microwave

Heinz, the company behind the goodness that is Heinz ketchup, has done it again with the Beanzawave. Only a genius could come up with a coffee/soup/sandwich heater that you is powered by your computer via USB. As a professed workaholic, I’ll personally be adding the CEO of Heinz to the ballot for the 2012 presidency.

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11. Toliet

You’re actually looking at an integrated circuit that – for some unbeknownst reason – naturally took the shape of the porcelain queen. This is visual proof that s*** happens, even in the technology realm.

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12. Phone

The Modu Phone is hell if you have fat fingers. And you might as well forget about texting on what the Guinness records holds as the “world’s smallest cell phone”.

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13. Engine

The internal combustion engine has reached new heights, shrinking to an eye-squinting size of 0.5” long and .039” wide. Just imagine: soon you’ll be able to “fuel up” your laptop and run without a plug for months. We’ll see the Energizer Bunny will go the way of the dinosaurs in our lifetime, guaranteed.

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14. Watch

How anybody can fit 98 moving parts into a watch that is 0.5”x 0.18” x 0.13” is beyond me. The mystery factor alone (how’d they do that?) was probably a biggest reason it stayed in production for 20-odd years. And don’t ask me how to tell the time with such a small face; who uses a watch for that anyway?

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15. Guitar

This guitar is so ridiculously small, that when you strum it the eardrum is physically incapable of registering the sound. But I bet dust mites could have a mean jam session with one of these.
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Photographed or processed with a tilt-shift effect, real-life landscapes convey the feeling of macro photography. And isn’t that close to the great dream of turning real trains into toys?

1. Miniature Commuter Rail by Paul Nicholson

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2. Tilt Shift Train by The Fox and The Polar Bear

Original photo taken from a bridge, just outside of Chepstow on the England / Wales Border.

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3. by Rene Kleizen

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4. Train Station by Brendan Skinner

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5. Hauptbahnhof Hamburg by =Thomas=

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6. Toy Train by rolohauck

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7. WestCoast Express Miniturized by Tylerngram

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8. Miniature or real? by ja.vroegop

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9. Tilt Shift Train by BnBattaglia

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10. Toy Train on Bridge by emsox

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11. The Toy Train by oneindigo

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12. by xxsilenexx

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13. by jimspokat

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14. Model Berlin by zimdollar

A model of Berlin with a tiny train system.
Or..
Simple "fake model" photoninja’ing, with a gradient lens blur and a bit of masking.

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15. by FilipR8

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16. Miniature Shinagawa by architrex12249

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17. Miniature Budapest by hoving

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18. City Toys by DesteN

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19. Train19 by FilipR8

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20. Train33 by ~FilipR8

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21. Snowdon Train by nevyn

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22. Tilt-Shift Tokyo

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23. Bluebell Railway Tilt-Shif by Darren Hendley

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24. Tiny Train by ichigo-55ty

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25.  Train2 by FilipR8

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26. Old Steam Train by Aussiegall

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27. Incredible Tilt-Shift by Josh Mock

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28. by Vitaloverdose

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29. Canadian Pacific by delawarm

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30. by sinkdd

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Backdrop is also used by others even if they have a tabletop or freestanding layout. Backdrop creates an illusion of scenery that extends in an infinite environment.

Making a backdrop is not really difficult as you think, but not too easy. It will take you a tiny effort and a little time to make a perfect one.

If you have a wall-hugging layout, you may want to hide the corners of the room because the corners of the room are not realistic to be used as a scene. You can use hardboard and attach it to the walls that extend from the layout to the ceiling. Make sure that you use hardboard that is flexible enough to make a good rounded area. After you placed the hardboards, use a spackling compound and drywall tape to cover the seams. Sand the seams once the compound dries to make a nice flat surface.

After sanding the seams, next is painting your backdrop with any scenery you desire. It may be clouds, ocean, forest and etc. If you don’t want to paint because it is messy, then you can have printed scenery using your own photographs or you can mix the painting and the printed scenery.

- Supporting structure

- Grid or Platform

- Subroadbed

Supporting structure

If you are a total beginner in this hobby, It is suggested that you will first start with a small layout. Your benchwork may comprise of a 4×8 feet piece of plywood, or a solid 3×6 door that you can inexpensively purchase at a building store, supported on old kitchen table made of wood or folding table that you are no longer using. You can also use your old ping pong table.

Platform

After you built the model railroad benchwork frame or main supporting structure, you can use 1/2 inch to 3/8 inch thick platform made of plywood where you can construct your layout. Make sure that the plywood extends beyond the support’s front edge by a couple of inches.

If you are always on the go or want a portable layout, you can build it like a lego so you can easily dismantle your layout and assemble it again when you reach your destination.

Subroadbed

Most of the layout builder’s subroadbed use homosote for their platform or subroadbed on top of the plywood. The major disadvantage of it is the dust that can enter your lungs when you are cutting it. Be sure that you are wearing a protective mask when you are working with it.

For more detailed instruction in building a Model Railroad Benchwork, visit here.

Model railroad benchwork planning

In designing your model railroad benchwork, you may use grid paper in scaling your plan or use computer to virtually plan your benchwork instead. To check if the tracks really fit your general plan, you can lightly lay out several tracks on the floor to check if it really fits. If it will not fit, then you can change or resize your trackplan.

Even if you already checked and completed your benchwork carefully for many times, you will still encounter some minor problems like misfits. Planning ahead of time however, will help you prevent from encountering major problems.

Some people use different techniques in planning their benchwork. They use the available space they have and figure out the size of their plan based on it. By the way, there is no rule of building the benchwork.

Here are some examples that you may want to use:

- A logging layout with freight locos moving small chunks of wood to lumber distributors, paper mills, or furniture stores and shay locomotives carrying logs to sawmills from the camp of forest logging.

- Coal mining trains that carries coal through the Mountains from the mines to steel mills and power companies to power industrial and residential areas.

- A train that transport eggs and milk from farms to local market.

- Passenger trains that transport people from their house to the workplace, shopping areas, towns and cities.

- Trains that carry wheat, corns, and rice to the mills and stores.

- Trains that carry cars or motorcycles to the local automotive distributors.

Themes give your model a sense of reality and purpose so that you will not get bored.

Choosing which type of model railroad software to use depends on what are your ultimate goals and how much time you want to spend on your computer. Planning your railroad layout on your computer gives you a techie feeling and makes your planning organized and easy. You can even exactly determine the cost and quantity of the materials to use. A lot of these software programs let you simulate your layout by displaying virtual trains and railway operating on the screen helping you redesign the layout if you encounter problems.

Use the planning software if you don’t have the space or time to actually build your model layout. You will also save a lot of money since the cost for errors in designing will only happen on the virtual world.

Some of the software is very powerful in designing railroad layouts but complicated for beginners. Other softwares are easy to use but not that powerful in designing complicated layouts. Once you master the software, you will enjoy designing complicated layouts.

If you want to download Model Railroad Softwares, visit this site. The site provides some free and paid softwares.

Buying a ready-made model railway signal for your model railway layout is quite expensive especially if the layout is big. You need to purchase a lot of these. Some of these are very poor in detail and not accurate to the scale. Why not build your own railway signal?! It is not only cheap, you can even design how you want it to look like and you will also enjoy making it.

Materials:

• Black and Metallic Grey paint
• PVA Glue
• 1 straw
• 1 millimeter thick card
• Electrical wire (long enough to reach froM the location to the power source and the switch)
• 1 on-on switch
• 1 Green LED (Light Emitting Diode)
• 1 Red LED

Tools:

• Wire Cutter
• Clamp
• Hole punch
• Scissors
• Craft knife
• Soldering solder and iron

Diagram:

For the complete steps and details in making a Model Railway Signal, visit here:

The link shows a total of four step by step instructions.

One of the several advantages of joining model train clubs is gaining a lot of knowledge from your fellow members and you can even share your own knowledge to them.

Clubs are a big help when you stumble upon some problems in your own model. You can call your fellow members for help and surely some of them already encountered the same problem as well.

Joining clubs is not just enjoyable and exciting; you will also gain a lot of friends and save a lot of time and money since you will learn easy and effective new methods of doing things.

For example if you are using an old table, you may encounter problems on where to place the holes in drilling your electrical connections like the switches. This is why that DIY table is preferred by most modelers. If you build your own table, you will have no problem in making electrical connection route. You can also directly build your scenery to the table.

The main part of your planning stage is deciding on the size of your model train layout. After you have decided on the size of the layout, then you can plan on where to place the scenery. From this, you will be able to work out where to put the support for the table and where to place removable flooring for easy access in retrieving the train in hard to get areas.

In designing your own model train table, you must consider creating interlocking sections if it is quite large. These will be an advantage when you want to disassemble and transport your model to other places.

You should also consider the height of the table. The height must be perfect in reaching derailed vehicles or in redesigning the scenery.