the Pasadena model railroad museum

On the third Sunday of every month, some model railroad enthusiasts get together and run a model train yard as seriously as if the trains were full sized. The moment Lynn and I arrived, it felt like we stepped into an episode of How To With John Wilson that was set decorated by Wes Anderson's production team.

I loved seeing how dedicated these guys were to such a tactile, analog craft and that the museum has been in operation for 80 years (that's basically 160 years if you measure it in east coast years). If you visit, which I highly recommend, don't be alarmed when your GPS leads you to Alhambra instead of Pasadena. After the 210 Freeway was built in 1963 they moved the whole operation to Alhambra and took over a former rubber stamp factory (we used to make things in this country!) The site is one of the largest HO scale model railroads in the world, and I only included that fact here because i think HO scale sounds funny.

I've been excited about making short videos again for the first time in awhile. I used to do this professionally and got millions of views on lots of my videos for buzzfeed and super deluxe (nsfw) (alsoRIP). This was about 10 years ago and I realized I missed making short videos around LA so I decided to do it for a much smaller audience, for the love of the game! I recently bought an anamorphic lens for my Sony FX2 and I really love experimenting with it. As someone who fell in love with movies during the 80's, it blows my mind that I can have a small handheld camera with a lens that makes me feel like I'm James Cameron shooting T2, albeit on a slightly smaller scale. A HO scale, if you will.