(09-20-2016, 07:43 PM)sunhuntin Wrote: wow! what camera setting did you use to do that?

• I started with regular "product" photography for all my minis: a tripod for the camera and a plain-white background (just a sheet of paper) and the room dark enough that the only light came from the flash (bounced up and behind me, off the ceiling) at full power; f/8 and 200 ISO and aperture-priority mode so I think 1/125 or 1/250.
  
• For the GitD minis I dropped the flash power, by experimentation, so there was enough light to show the details but without getting a fully-exposed photo. Setting the flash power to 1/8 seemed to be about right; neither 1/16 (couldn't see well enough) nor 1/4 (the glow wasn't prominent enough for me) turned out right.
  
• I played with the aperture a little and might have settled on f/5.6 instead of f/8 but I don't remember. It might have just let too much light in from the flash and "dulled" the glow in relation.
  
• I turned on the 2-second timer and put the camera in manual mode with a longer shutter speed to get the glow to expose after the flash was off. 4 seconds ended up being about right; 8 had too much noise and at 2 the glow wasn't really bright enough. There was a little bit of light from the TV and maybe a tiny bit from outside (the moon) but most of the light in the long exposure part should have been coming from the glow off the minis.
  • I shone my big flashlight on the minis for about 45 seconds before each picture, to "charge up" the glow. 20 seconds wasn't enough (I'm not sure Charlie got enough charging, for example).
• I tried changing the aperture a little, but was constrained by depth of field with the lens/distance I'd chosen; I never tried changing ISO because it's too hard to change with that camera but that's a good way to give yourself a little freedom one direction or the other.
  

(09-22-2016, 08:27 PM)Super Wrote: I am not sure exactly the size of the Minis but wouldn't any of the Hotwheels/Tomica/Matchbox display cases like this one work? http://www.ebay.com/itm/Hot-Wheels-Matchbox-Car-Display-Stand-Case-for-1-64-Scale-NO-DOOR-HW-GB20-BL-/271881215775?hash=item3f4d621f1f:g:p1wAAOSwBahVY85y

(09-17-2016, 04:42 PM)drewbenn Wrote: Speaking of images... I just added them to my checklist page. You can click on any of the engine names (in the blind bag list) and get a small picture of that engine. I took most of the pictures from the thomasminis wikia (thanks jdogman!... and sorry for filling up your logs with 404s last night while I was trying to automate the fetching ). There are still a few dozen engines that don't have pictures; I'll get those added as I have time. In the meantime, if anyone sees anything else that's broken (or just doesn't seem right), please let me know!

(09-22-2016, 07:55 PM)Pablo392 Wrote: I am sorry, I am super late to the party, but did anyone find out a way to build a display or rack unit where we can hang on the wall and put the minis for display?
I have been keeping mine in those 32 slot (30 usable) bead boxes, but I 've already outgrown those and I think I wasted enough money on those boxes.

I am thinking of building something with a plywood back, sticking the pictures of the trains and then the actual trains on the front, so I know which ones I am missing, and where each one goes.

(09-22-2016, 09:05 PM)drewbenn Wrote: The absolute best display case I've seen so far is the beautiful display OttawaQ shared with us that looks like it's just a few 1x2s, or possibly 1x3s, maybe routed to provide a guide for the front wheels, and put together so much nicer than anything I can do (the things I make are never quite square, let alone jointed so neatly).

(09-22-2016, 08:32 PM)Pablo392 Wrote: I've been using your site (and submitting some comments, time to time) for a while now.

(09-23-2016, 12:10 AM)drewbenn Wrote: It's always nice to hear from someone who's using it I do read, and appreciate, all the feedback, even if I don't act on it. You're not the first to ask for the re-releases to be linked to the original releases, and I've got some ideas percolating in the back of my mind but I'm still figuring out how to make it work only for the people who want it, and never for the people who don't, and then how to explain that to everyone.