Model Trains Used In Superman Returns

The latest Superman movie, Superman Returns, uses intricate layouts of model trains. The crew created some of the sets used in the movie at Fox Studios in Sydney. Production designer Guy Hendrix Dyas recreated these sets and including the model train set.

The plaza set that Dyas needed to create outside the building was so large that none of the Fox stages could accommodate it. So, in an unconventional move, the filmmakers decided to build the set outdoors, using the road between two existing soundstages. "The weather was fantastic and we were able to fill the nearby roads with yellow cabs, buses and other street traffic. We also transformed an adjacent area into a mini Central Park and added a subway station. It was definitely one of our most challenging sets to build, but it turned out beautifully," says Dyas.

In addition to the yacht, Dyas created two other sets that were completely unique for Superman Returns -- an intricate model train set built in the basement of the Vanderworth mansion, along with an enormous island set that was simply referred to as New Krypton.

"We were extremely meticulous when it came to details," says Dyas, "because, when Lex destroys the train set with his crystal experiment, it's a metaphor for the destruction he intends to achieve on a human scale. Our train set was already enormous by regular standards, but since it needed to look even bigger, we built a basement set around it using forced perspectives and other design tricks. We used three different scales of miniature trains, using the largest ones in the foreground near the camera and the smaller ones in the background."

Included in the many vignettes of the train set are environments as diverse as a cacti-filled Arizona desert, a gleaming skyline of Metropolis and the snow-peaked mountains of the Swiss Alps.

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