MR and Pelle, Sittin' in a tree...


kjchronister

kjchronister

Member
Seriously. Am I the only one that things Model Railroader and Pelle Soeborg are having a romantic interlude here?

Yes, the guy is an accomplished modeler. But he's not God. His scenery is very good. His weathering... a bit ham-handed, IMHO. My face lit up when this month's MR arrived today with a big feature on weathering: I don't have that much experience with weathering and lots of rolling stock to weather. But then... all Pelle all the time. Meh. His weathering looks like someone slapped on some paint with a brush and then dusted it with gray. Which, as it happens, is pretty much what it was. And Cody Grivigno seems to be a disciple of his: same technique. The feature he did on a Santa Fe Diesel looked like a Jackson Pollock painting. Splatter!

I've got nothing against either of these gents. Just feel like I'm 'full up' on their work and maybe someone else should have a turn here.

Folks: Rust is caused by water. Water flows. It has surface tension. It it affected by gravity (e.g. it flows DOWN). Dabbing on rust-splotches with a brush isn't gonna turn out realistic...

But more than anything, can we have an issue or three of MR without Soeborg's stuff in it? I'd like a little diversity, please...

Honestly, every year or two when it expires I cut MR a check out of habit. But the truth is I spend much more time and attention on Model Railroad Hobbyist these days. And NOT just because of the price...
 
This may be a tad off topic but if you want weather tips, check a forum called the rust bucket. As far as MR goes, I haven't bought an issue of theirs in years. It's more ads than anything else and usually (as you stated) features the same folks every month. If I want information or pictures of layouts, I use google or YouTube. And of course this forum!
 
I hate to say it, but i think my next renewal notice is going unanswered... i don't mind the ads from vendors, but i hate how many "ads" there are to upsell you to more kalmbach services. Pay more for online videos, pay more for 'special issues' that used to be part of the standard fare, and the incessant emails for other pubs. Most critically, the quality of content has gone straight downhill for years now: repetitive and self-focused.
 
kjchronister said:
But more than anything, can we have an issue or three of MR without Soeborg's stuff in it? I'd like a little diversity, please...
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Well, they can only publish what people turn in. I've not supplied them with anything, have you? Maybe I'm spending too much time posting on the forum instead of writing.??? I've got several really good ideas, probably just to lazy to get them into publishable form.
 
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Well, the masthead lists 8 editorial staff, not including the "contributors" so I think they should be offering more than volunteer content, especially considering it's a paid publication. You're certainly correct about the amount of info here on the board; maybe their editorial staff should be spending more time here. "Finger on the pulse" so to speak. As for myself, I'd sooner contribute here in a community of peers that adds real value in a dialog format. If I offered up an article to anyone, it would be MRH, because.... free.
 
Iron Horseman said:
Well, they can only publish what people turn in. I've not supplied them with anything, have you? Maybe I'm spending too much time posting on the forum instead of writing.??? I've got several really good ideas, probably just to lazy to get them into publishable form.
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Yup.

They have standards to uphold, even if they are their own, and they do publish articles from credible modellers. I think, if we were to be less peeved over MR's penchant for Mindheim and Soeborg, and looked back in history, the same pattern emerges each decade we look into. Only certain people are featured, and they are the ones whom others seek, seek to emulate, and who write up their experiences and results, with photos, and send them in for possible publication. IOW, they walk the walk. The rest of us just get vexed and carp about it.
 
Iron Horseman said:
Well, they can only publish what people turn in. I've not supplied them with anything, have you? Maybe I'm spending too much time posting on the forum instead of writing.??? I've got several really good ideas, probably just to lazy to get them into publishable form.
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Excellent point. I once spoke with Bill Schaumberg about this and got pretty much the same answer, though it was colored by Bill's sense of humor. One or two other factors are: Budgets are going down as revenue does, which means less trips to layouts as was done in years past and more stuff moving "inside".

I also remember many years ago complaints about too much John Allen in MR. The more things change, the more they stay the same!
 
Well, ill just say I recently bought an estate crate of train stuff, including years and years of old MRs. I read 'em with glee, did not feel there was too much john allen or tony koester or anyone else... but more than anything, the recent ones are simply a pale shadow of what they used to be. The comparison is pretty stark if you put issues from the 70s and 80s next to more recent years.
 
It was fun looking at old prices in the ads too... honestly, I think corrected for inflation, the often-said "the hobby has got so expensive" is more perception than reality.
 
I didn't think there was too much John Allen. Well maybe at times unconsciously. If anyone was "worshiped" Allen has to be it. I don't miss it. It all seemed rather depressing and gloomy with a silly railroad name G&D. I got more as a lad from the other contributors back then.

Guys like Andy Sperando (sp?) were a breath of fresh air later on.
 
I do have to admit that I did get tired of Malcolm Furlow seemingly all the time in MR back in the day.

I only have one problem with the "corrected for inflation, the often-said 'the hobby has got so expensive' is more perception than reality" argument. Salaries themselves have not kept up with inflation over the years! About a year ago my son did the calculation for me. My starting salary out of college of about $12000/year was a number in the $40,000/year range today. And my salary today is certainly not $40,000!

In effect, millions of people today are getting-if they are lucky-early 1990s salaries at best with 2014 prices.

This helps explain the economic problems and the existence of the 1% vs. 99% point of view.

Ok, off the soapbox now. (Ducks and runs for cover!)
 
Back to the original post... about the ubiquity of Pelle's presence in MR. There's another angle here that has almost nothing to do with model railroading per se, but is about how journalism has changed: As legacy media struggle to adjust to a world in which their economy has been turned upside down by the way technology has changed media culture, one way they have sought to adapt is to focus more on the personalities in their own operations -- making "stars" if you will.

Naming Pelle a contributing editor (in most magazines, that's a title that says the person has a pretty much guaranteed opportunity to be published, and maybe gets paid a little more for his or her stuff -- it is not a staff posting) is an example of that "star-making" approach. I'll won't pass judgment on whether it's deserved or not; I find his work exceptionally well done, but have little interest in the modern era that he focuses on.

There is a real contrast here with John Allen. In the issue of MR with Allen's obituary, editor Linn Westcott noted that he and John Allen took great care NOT to overexpose him to readers, but to spread out his appearances in the magazine. (And, he noted, when RMC published an Allen piece on one occasion, MR got a letter complaining about "too much John Allen" in the magazine...)

I subscribe to MR and to MRH, and find strengths in each of them, but I have to say that MRH is just as guilty as MR, if not more so, in its promotion of what seems like a small, exclusive cadre of "insiders" in the hobby.

Just one man's opinion here, so take it for what it's worth...

(P.S. -- although I view the issue somewhat differently than you do, kjchronister, I loved the title you gave this thread and laughed out load at it.)
 
Thanks, @dairystatedad. The title was my way of keeping it light.

I think Mr Smileys post makes my point better than I did: diversity. I get tired of pelle and think he's overused. He got tired of someone else. Someone wrote a letter about too much John allen... it's not so much about any one of those as a diversity of viewpoints, styles, eras (I too have little interest in modern era), etc.
 
I, too, got a good laugh out of the thread title!:eek: It took me back to my childhood. But I digress...

Having had 2 articles published - one in MRH, the other in the now-defunct MrG - I can attest that producing a publication-worthy article when you have a full-time day job is HARD WORK!

For starters, there is the staging and capturing of photographs; editors typically want several shots of the same view at different light/color/contrast settings so they can choose which one they think works best.

Second, technology [i.e. digital photography and the internet] has enabled 90% of today's modelers to enjoy their occasional 15 minutes of fame, so the magazines have had no choice but to raise the bar. [Who wants to pay money for something they can easily see online for free? Not me...] So if you are writing about your layout, the photographed parts of it have to be pretty much finished: Track ballasted/painted, rolling stock weathered, structures on solid foundations [not "floating"], and no cobwebs or dust.

On top of that: Even if you have built a "perfect" layout and and are very talented photographically, if your writing is sloppy, magazine editors usually don't want to spend a lot of time rewriting a submitted manuscript into something more polished. So journalistic talent is a must.

Very few modelers fit all three of the above criteria and have the necessary time/desire to be published; editors have a tough time finding enough writer-modelers of that caliber. So when they finally do, they tend to stick with them and "milk" their talent for as long as possible.

So it's not just a matter of "snobbery" and "elitism" on the part of magazine editors - it's about survival.
 
Hi All,
Sorry to resurrect an old thread, like others, the title made me laugh!
Unfortunately the intervening time has seen little change from MR, I gave up on the magazine a long time ago, not because of Pelle, not even because of Cody (whom I find quite irritating, sorry!) but simply because for me, the magazine ran out of ideas.
Throughout the 80s and 90s, I found it a fascinating and wonderful source of information and entertainment but when the noughties arrived, it began to be too samey*. This may have been down to me, having seen a lot of stuff over two decades, I'm not sure. I have taken two other, British/European magazines over a similar period and they keep me entertained still so maybe it's not me?
I also recall getting a bit fed up with Malcolm Furlow but he didn't seem as prevalent as today's guys!
I have had one article published myself (in "Continental Modeller", if anyone's interested!) and did use to edit a club cycling magazine for about three years so my answer would be to invite articles more actively from modellers around the country (at least) and accept a few small "flaws" in grammar, photography-rather than editing the heck out of something until it follows a house formula.
That would be a start, I believe.
Cheers,
John.

Edit: * one of the most interesting aspects of any model railroading magazine for me, are the 'layout' articles and I found MR had become increasingly formulaic and often written by a staff writer, presumably after having done an interview with the layout owner. In my very humble opinion, this is one of the ways in which MR spoiled itself.
If a layout owner was allowed completely free reign over his thoughts about how and why he built the layout, what his aims were and how he enjoyed the layout, I think that would be refreshing and interesting!
 
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I guess I don't have quite the problem with Pelle that other have. But, having pretty much "completed" by 1940's-1960 layout, and having been in the hobby for about 65 years, I don't react with as much interest in a lot of his articles, so I just glance at them and go on to something else. I'd really like to see some articles by somebody on modeling the Burlington Route/Great Northern/Northern Pacific lines in "my" era, and maybe more kitbashing articles, but, frankly, MR to me is a better read than RMC these days.
 
The latest article in MR by Pelle is the first one of his that was of use to me. I don't get much into the plastic and desert scenes that are often represented in MR. My modelling has benefited much more from HOExplorer's posts than MR.
 
MR is certainly getting to be thin these days at 80 pages. Great photography, which has always been the case. RMC I think is still in transition. MRH is great, but only on the puter, unless you print it out.
 
Yes, the title took me back to what, about age 6? Nuff said.

I haven't subscribed to MR for years and only occasionally browse it at the local library. Until recently, they always beat out RMC and others in graphics and presentation but I haven't found it as enjoyable in the past 10 years as I used to in the 80's and 90's, in particular. Sure, they get into a rut with some of their contributors like Furlow and his sagging freight cars and caricature trains, and Pelle, although I like desert scenery over the endless east coast scenery that we generally get treated too or pacific northwest, which is nicer IMO.

As for RMC, since White River Productions took over RMC publication, the magazine has improved a great deal. I wouldn't say they are still in transition, but rather the transition has already occurred. In fact it looks more like what MR used to be and less like RMC used to be. Go pick up a copy and check it out, I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.
 
My problem with MR is not Pelle or any of the other "favorites". The problem is that there is rarely anything that interests me. I just received my subscription ending issue, and I can't see paying what they want for a year or three, when the magazine just doesn't interest me any longer. RMC is far better than it used to be since White River took over.
 
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