Archive for June, 2008

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Sonderkraftfahrzeug 139 Marder III by Pepik

Brickshelfer Pepik has quite the collection of German World War II vehicles.

Here’s the Sd.Kfz. 139 Marder III in action on the Eastern Front:

(Via Klocki.)

King Solomon takes a bit of a wrong turn toward the end

The latest installment of The Right Hon. Rev. Brendan Powell Smith’s The Brick Testament wrap up the story of King Solomon.

In this scene, Solomon’s son Rehoboam threatens the Israelites with forced labor and scorpions:

(Like the source material, not all content is suitable for children.)

Scene from H.G. Well’s Time Machine

Alex Eylar, known for his ambient LEGO photography, produces a scene from H.G. Well’s Time Machine. Click on the photo to learn more about the scene depicted and see the entire setup.

Brickbuilt Wall-E by Joe Meno

Joe Meno, editor of BrickJournal magazine, built the first well-done model of Pixar’s adorable little robot Wall-E. The creation features moving parts including the neck and arms and rolling treads and took three months to plan.

LEGO Star Wars 10188 Death Star pics reveal interior and 21+ minifigs [News]

UPDATE: 10188 Death Staricon is now available for preorder from the LEGO Shop.

The intrepid Eurobrickers who comb the LEGO.com image cache for new files have found photos of the upcoming LEGO Star Wars set 10188 Death Star.

The box art:

At least twenty-one (21!) minifigs:

The set even comes with a small TIE Advanced fighter (aka “Darth Vader’s TIE fighter”):

Check out Eurobricks or reader Will’s photoset for a couple more pics.

Tell Gizmodo’s Jesus Diaz what you want to ask The LEGO Company

Gizmodo contributor Jesus Diaz is spending the day at LEGO headquarters in Billund, Denmark tomorrow, and wants to know what sort of questions you’d like him to ask the good people of LEGO, including designers for the MINDSTORMS, Creator, and LEGO Star Wars themes.

Head on over to Gizmodo and leave a comment for Jesus, send him an e-mail, or post your questions here and I’ll pass them along to him.

Have fun, Jesus!!! :-D

Live to build, build to live

Mark Kelso reveals the secret of the most prolific builder, Jordan Schwartz (Sir Nadroj).

Baby wants chocolate

Nelson Yrizarry sculpts a giant bar of dark chocolate.

Unwrapping the mega candy bar, we find a lovely surprise. Although it’s not a golden ticket to the chocolate factory, it’s something equally surprising: baby Toby! Toby is a character of Builders Lounge first appearing in a creation by me and then ended up in the hands of Brent Wolke to be swallowed by a monster. Since then, it is now a tradition to pass the headless baby Toby around the world to be featured in various bizzarre ways.

Is it a bird? Is it a plane?…

It’s a Tzek Tzek. Built by Martians and prized by humans. A slightly different take on the retro-futuristic Savage Planet concept.

Martian Tzek Tzek by Tim Gould

Shannonia the beautiful

Shannon Young’s famous microcity called Shannonia underwent a huge expansion recently, resulting in the most beautiful stage of its evolution so far, now with topographic features such as the ocean and shoreline. To appreciate the current status of the city, one ought to see the history of Shannonia and its humble beginnings. The best part is that Shannonia is still growing and is forecasted to double its size at BrickCon in October.

Check out the amazing satelite view:

DARKspawn illustrates why dwarves are superior to ewoks

Although Aaron “DARKspawn” Andrews reminds us that both dwarves and ewoks are short, the diminutive and hirsute denizens of mines and mountains are unlike ewoks in every other way.

Most importantly, dwarves are awesome:

And ewoks are not. The end.

Nathan Sawaya exhibits brick art in Hawaii

With appearances on Letterman and Colbert, “brick artist” Nathan Sawaya is quite possibly the only LEGO builder with anything close to celebrity status — and deservedly so.

Nathan has recently opened an exhibit at the Pearlridge Shopping Center in Aiea, HI. He debuted several new sculptures, including “Green” below:

Nathan also did some onsite work. Here he is working on a mosaic of the Hawaiian flag:

Thanks for the tip and the photos, Nelson Yrizarry!

You can see Nathan’s art at the Pearlridge Shopping Center through July 20th.

Tim Zarki’s adorable MaK-inspired hardsuit has me going “Awwww!”

Long-time readers of this blog should know by now that I’m a sucker for small adorable things. Tim Zarki isn’t helping my addiction by posting this cute little hardsuit inspired by Maschinen Krieger (often abbreviated Ma. K. or MaK):

That’s a Technic figure helmet. I may just have to dig mine out of my “useless” bin and give this one a try myself. (I know, I know, there are no useless LEGO pieces!)

Halo fans drool over possible BrickForge Space Marine armor [News]

Kyle “Armothe” Peterson of BrickForge has posted a very cool custom “Space Marine” that looks remarkably like a certain Master Chief:

Does this represent a potential future product from BrickForge? Intriguing…

In related news, Mark Sandlin (Flickr) has posted prototypes of another upcoming BrickForge product — the Megagun:

See more views of the Megagun in Chris’s photostream on Flickr.

10191 Star Justice and 10192 Space Skulls 30% off [Sale]

In news sure to please those of you who thought that 10191 Star Justiceicon and 10192 Space Skullsicon were a bit more expensive than you liked, both sets are now 30% from the LEGO Store online.

10191 Star Justiceicon is now USD 69.99:

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Similarly, 10192 Space Skullsicon is also now USD 69.99:

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Other stuff on sale:

As always, these links only work for the US and UK.

Jehkay’s sentry will clean up your mess

Jehkay makes good use of the big blue half-cylinder piece from the cement mixer set as the armored shell of a sentry and riot control quadruped craft. The front opens to reveal the minifig pilot, ready to restore order to any situation.

Nick Dean returns fire

Like Nannan’s Black Fantasy and Tim’s cave racers, Nick Dean’s RAMM theme has become an Internet phenomenon, copied ad nauseum — sometimes successfully, sometimes not.

So it’s always refreshing to see a new RAMM creation from the Feldmarschall himself:

But perhaps Nick is most famous for his future-military vehicles, like this RAMM Bluthund Quadruped:

We’re gonna need a bigger cave racer…

The title of Brent “thwaak” Wolke’s entry for the Reasonably Clever Pigs on the Wing contest was too perfect not to *ahem* borrow for my own post title here. ;-)

Brent’s Jaws-inspired fishing boat/cave racer manages to hit all the rules while still being completely unlike any other cave racer we’ve featured or that appears in the increasingly crowded group pool on Flickr.

Hunkering down with legomocs

Flickrite legomocs enters the Picking up the Pieces contest with this great scene featuring a group of survivors building a bunker:

Enter the Pantheon of Eternal Solitude

Capturing the lines of Classical Greek architecture at minifig scale is challenging enough, but Mastergongfu has done so quite nicely at microscale:

Thanks for the e-mail, mastergongfu!

ImpreSariO takes flight in his Tin Goose

Reader John Rudy sends word of a great Ford Trimotor airplane from Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom by ImpreSariO

Don’t miss ImpreSariO’s other entries in the Klocki Indiana Jones Contest, including this great scene from The Last Crusade:

A horse by any other name…

…wouldn’t be as cool as this one.

Check out this incredible pegasus by edulyoung

Many thanks to Bruce of VignetteBricks for pointing this out on Classic Castle

Light-up Iron Man minifig by Brickmodder

This isn’t a Photoshop job:

That’s right, Brickmodder has added 7 LEDs to a custom Iron Man minifig. (Custom decals by Jared “Kaminoan” Burks and Chris “Uubergeek” C.)

Here’s Mr. Stark in action (with weapons by BrickArms):

Exploring cryptozoology and exobiology with Mike Stimpson

I just love Mike Stimpson’s work. His LEGO photography is unparalleled, and my favorites are of course the classic photographs he’s recreated.

His latest photos are inspired by the mysterious life-forms that may or may not exist around and above us:

In a more serious vein (as many of Mike’s photos are), Mike has recreated the photo of a South Vietnamese monk lighting himself on fire:

For those who’ve not noticed, Mike has a whole separate Flickr account where he shows exactly how he set up each shot in his amazing series. Definitely worth checking out.

Where can Paul Lee’s 800-pound Gorilla go?

Answer: Wherever it wants to, of course. Also, I suspect Paul Lee’s hard suits weigh a bit more than 800 pounds.

Here’s Paul’s Gorilla Hard Suit in an urban combat environment:

And here it is on Mars: