Big Buildings - The flatter the better!

I have just been reading the latest posts on Daryl Dankwardt’s blog. Daryl has reached the point of adding scenery and buildings on parts of his layout - an envious stage to have reached to be sure. I’m particularly taken by the Arrowhead Brewery Daryl has installed at Gainseville.

Why building bigger buildings isn’t better

Building flats are, in my view, an essential aspect of successful layouts. But why? Surely a complete building looks better because it is “complete”. Isn’t it better to have the whole thing modeled just like the buildings we “see” in real life? Don’t partial buildings destroy realism?

In my opinion, the answer is a resounding NO!! I am not saying we shouldn’t model full buildings, I am saying if you want to make something seem big, don’t model the whole thing.

I should also point out, I am not a big fan of making buildings. Partially because I’d like my railroading time to be spent doing railroady stuff, but mainly because I am not convinced that buildings earn their keep from a realism standpoint relative to the amount of layout real estate they consume. So my interest here is to consider how little building is actually needed.

Seeing is believing, or is it?

Before we consider the merits of flat buildings, let’s first spend a little time examining how people perceive the word around them. We humans are pretty adept at taking in a lot of information from our environment and making sense of it quickly. Vision evolved to enable the appreciation of detail for it’s benefit to survival, not for the appreciation of the aesthetics of the detail. For the longest time, it didn’t matter if something was pleasing to look at, the dominant question was more about could it be eaten or could it eat me?!

During the late 1950’s researchers found that we manage this enormous quantity of information by learning which parts to ignore. There are three main perceptual mechanisms we all use to navigate our way through each day. They are deletion, distortion and generalization.

Interestingly, the more successful modeling efforts tend to exploit these natural psychological blind spots and mental malleability we all use as we perceive the world before us.

Deletion

Deletion refers to the way our minds discard large quantities of information from what we are seeing and just consider the things that are important. An example of this is reading the words in this sentence but pretty much ignoring all the other words in your field of view above and below this line. Modelers should care about deletion as it affects how much detail can the viewer take in at once as their gaze moves from one thing to another on our layouts.

In 1956, George Miller wrote a paper titled Seven Plus or Minus Two. (Click here for Miller’s paper.) Miller’s research revealed an important observation that peolpe can deal with seven simultaneous bits of information plus or minus two. On a good day we can handle nine bits of simultaneous information, on a bad day, five. As an aside, this is the key rationale behind phone numbers being seven digits long.

This aspect of perception has implications for modelers when considering adding detail to models. Beyond about seven details in a single view, we are not getting much additional benefit in terms of realism as the additional details will basically not be seen. It’s as if they are invisible! This isn’t to say that if we carefully observe something that we can’t discern lots of detail, we of course can. What it does say is that when people are looking at one thing after another, each new thing that comes into view will only have about seven bits of information that will register with most people.

Here’s an example you can try. Think about a long train, something we railfans love to see, rolling by on the track. How many specific different cars can you recall once the train has passed? Often we are left with an impression of the number of locomotives and cars, approximate numbers of car types, a good sense of how many different roadnames were present. When it comes to specifics though, the likely number of particulars we remember from the collection of cars we just saw will be about a half dozen.

Distortion

This is where we mentally embellish what we are looking at either by adding to the image or by modifying the image. An example of distortion is picturing in your mind how something will look once it is completed. You could call this the viewer’s tendency to give the “model the benefit of the doubt”. It is also the willingness of the viewer to complete the intended image in their mind, where the model is incomplete in the flesh, to match their perception of what the model represents. This is vitally important because we all have different perceptions in our heads and as modelers we can’t ever hope to get our models to match all those different perceptions. It can actually be a good thing to let the viewer complete the image to their liking.

Modeling has a lot to do with exploiting distortion. We look at the model and our mind fills in many of the elements that are not present for us. We picture our train struggling up the mountain pass even though in reality it is only gaining a few inches in elevation over a few feet of distance. Our minds translate what we are seeing into an appealing visual that we have in our consciousness. Why? Because it feels good to imagine that bigger richer more realistic image. The closer the model maps to the mental image, the more convinced the viewer will be.

Generalization

Rather than carefully examine everything, we build mental rules - shortcuts if you will. Instead of having to think about everything we see, we just apply the rule. It’s faster and easier. As young children, the first few door knobs we encounter open doors and, after a while, we get the idea and stop thinking about door knobs and just apply the rule ‘turn to open’.

Generalization is a big deal in modeling. It says that after viewing say, a particular level of detail on the first few items, we are pretty much content to assume that the same level of detail exists on all the others. How to exploit this? Put more detailed items close to the viewer to encourage them to come to the conclusion that the rest of the layout is also highly detailed. Then, make sure there are no items on the layout that is glaringly in conflict with their conclusion that would cause them to re-evaluate it.

Why bigger isn’t better

Returning to the question of why flats work out better than large structures, lets take each perceptual mechanism and see how they apply to a building flat comprising only a side of the building and to the full representation of a building.

Deletion suggests that offering an excessive amount of detail to the viewer doesn’t help. When presented with too much detail, our minds start tossing out things deemed to be unimportant. When we offer the flat with enough detail to be convincing, the viewer evaluates “What is important in this scene?”. Usually all we are looking for is an answer along the lines of:”it’s a building near the tracks”. Backdrops and photomurals benefit from this effect too.

As train operators, a lot of our attention is on getting the right rail moves accomplished so there is often less of our brain paying attention to the building anyway. Modeling the full building would be a waste. As we run the train, we’re just not taking in the rest of the building in so don’t bother to model it.

Non-operators will of course be more inclined to evaluate the building as a building and are perhaps less likely to be convinced by a flat. Here the modeler relies on faithful rendering of the building flat to be convincing and rely on generalization to get them out of trouble. See below.

Distortion says the viewer is predisposed to believing that there is a building back there based on what is visible. And if not, we just fill it in to the extent that it matters and the viewer is willing. If the rendering of the building flat is good, and I’m busy running this train, I’m likely to go with the flow and complete whatever portion of the building I need mentally.

Non-railroading observers may be less inclined to “fill in the rest”. To the extent you care about the diorama quality of your layout, you can resort to generalization to maintain the illusion of realism for the viewer.

Generalization says “when you see one side of a building like this, there’s usually more building behind it even if I I don’t see it”. Since only the rear of the building is generally seen from the tracks it’s easy to see why the viewer doesn’t get hung up on the missing rest of the building. The modeled view that is presented lines up with what is normally seen. The modeler is exploiting rules that already exist in the viewers mind and putting the rest of the building in doesn’t add to the realism for the viewer.

The non-railroading observer, who is not distracted by watching or running a train, could still be prone to generalization if the edges where the building “stops” are carefully disguised. A slightly different rule kicks in here: “When I see the side of a building and I can’t see the rest of the adjoining walls due to trees or some other visual blockage, I believe the building continues back there, they always do”. Mixing flats with full-size buildings can also work if the full size buildings create the “norm” for the observer.

A full size structure takes on the burden of being fully representative since it by definition, it is the whole building now. Distortion within the observer still applies but now the viewer will be compensating for the differences between your building and their vision of what it should include that you perhaps did not model. Since we never have the space for brick-for-brick scale reproductions of big structures, the most common compensation will be for size and omissions of detail. Even when the modeler takes the time to produce a full model and devotes the precious space on the layout, the viewer will likely still need to be willing to give the whole thing the benefit of the doubt.

Significantly, flats don’t suffer from this last limitation. The viewer completes the vision in their mind via distortion and the flat becomes a building that is as big and complete as the viewer needs it to be. A bargain in my view!

The price of real estate

For a full sized, scale building to be as effective as a flat, it has to pay the rent on the space it takes up. If you have space to burn, then no problem, build the full thing, as big as you and your viewers expect it to be. On the other hand, if space is at a premium and your choice is between one full size or a couple of flats or partials in the same space, then I say go for the flats, railroading is mainly about the realism of running the trains and less about total realism in terms of engineering, architecture, and geology.

Flat out better

Thank goodness for the way perception works as it provides key opportunities for modelers to create realism, despite space limitations, by taking appropriate advantage of the perceptual effects of deletion, distortion and generalization.

Because they take up so much less space than a full size building, building flats provide much more value per square inch of layout than modelling the full building. Other than the interface with the railroad, the rest of the building doesn’t contribute to the realism of operations. Ironically, when the full building is modeled, the viewer may not be left with a sense of believability unless the building/plant conforms to their perception about how big such a building should be, even though the building consumes a substantial chunk of layout real estate and took countless hours to build.

My sense is to model the parts of buildings that face the tracks and be careful how to disguise the edges, to put a moderate amount of detail on the modeled parts of the buildings and strive for consistency in modeling standards with more detail in buildings that are closer to the observer.

Phew, that’ll teach me to check out Daryl’s blog! If you have a moment, go ahead, check it out!

- Coxy

Comments

[Ed Harrison]

Absolutely fantastic article. This should be mandatory reading for any serious model railroader. Great job! ...Ed