Your first N scale picture that you said "wow" to...

[DKS]

Well, being as I was still in high school, I suppose I was more easily "wowed" back then, since these shots are not especially noteworthy any more.

[davefoxx]

This is not really a "Wow!" picture for me, but it is probably one of the earliest photos that I took where I felt like my modeling was at least reaching a level that I was no longer completely embarrassed by it.  This old layout of mine was my first attempt at scenery.  Previous layouts never progressed very far beyond the Plywood Central.  Sure, the lighting in this photo is not very good, but I could see some potential in this picture. Interestingly, this was taken before I repainted the room a sky blue color; it was a terrible yellow left over from the previous homeowner.



DFF

[wcfn100]

I haven't had a'wow' moment yet (maybe I will if I ever finish anything), but there are a couple shots that popped into my head right away after reading the topic.

Back 1991, I had built a small switching layout and a local modeler Mark Wilson offered to take a couple shots with his pin-hole setup.





Here's layout.



Jason

[Bendtracker1]

These were my first attempt at natural outdoor lighting back in 1996.  The clouds are real.  I used Kodachrome 25 slides.

[seusscaboose]

I like this one.  I think it captured the feeling of how the MA&PA would weave through the foothills with virtually no clearance through the foothills of making its way to York.

[mcjaco]

This one makes me smile whenever I look at it. 

[Philip H]

This one makes me smile whenever I look at it. 

Me too!  Nice work!

[RWCJr]

First N scale pic to get the "oh yeah!!!!" to was this first one of the roundhouses built, that I could get the camera into the building.

[TrainCat2]

Lost the garage layout and all of my pics (and cameras, house and about everything else) to Hurricane Andrew MINUS one image. This was the very first pic I ever took of a model train. So naturally I have always been biased and said Wow!

[Zox]

My first decent model railroading picture was taken on John Berger's layout:

[wm3798]

I fired this test shot out in the garage after I'd constructed the main structures for the paper mill.  The background is a painted door I used for my G scale Christmas garden.  Note there is only ground cover, the lighting is suspect at best, and none of the background hills are there.  But the angles and composition of the scene were definitely coming together into a scene that would ultimately end up in print.



Lee

[BCRail_FSJ]

I'd say this one from late 2010.  I had spent a few days installing and painting a shadow box style fascia for the Peace River bridge scene.  Stepping back and seeing the whole scene framed felt really good.

[Dave Schneider]

Nice work everyone! I have a MUCH more modest contribution than most. This is my first attempt at scratch building and really felt good to build something that replicated the prototype. This has encouraged me to build more structures for the Beer Line, and hopefully capture the look I am trying to achieve.
 


Best wishes, Dave

[M.C. Fujiwara]

Still playing around with the now-not-so-new camera, but these picts made me stop and say, "hey, maybe my modeling and photography is actually starting to get decent." 





Encouraged me to try to kick my mad modeling skillz up a notch. 
Still kicking.

[Sokramiketes]

This is an ancient shot of CGW 120 that I built back when I was 12 or 13.  It was the first time I destroyed a perfectly good model to detail it (Lifelike GP18 backdated with the GMM set) and painted and decaled myself.  I was pretty proud of it at the time but seeing "perfect" models in the paint shop articles in MR I could see the flaws...




Later on, and possibly more of a wow factor, was this stock car.  I eventually figured out that MR'ing was just as much art as strict adherance to prototype detail (though still learning how to best implement) and this stock car conversion got all of the look I was going for without having to be a board-by-board scratchbuild of the right car.  So, while not a scenic panorama, this is a shot that still says wow to my eye.  (and also, wow that's crooked)