The Brothers Brick

I know we blog a lot of aurore&aube‘s dinosaurs. But that’s because they’re so good and so well photographed. Enjoy carnotaurus.

Registration for Brickvention 2012 and tickets for the public days are now open. The 2012 event will be held in the same place as the 2011 event (Melbourne Town Hall) with public days on the 21st-22nd January 2012 and a registered attendees only day on the 20th (with setup on the 19th).

As ever I expect this event to be heaps of fun. Last year’s event was huge and if past growth continues we can expect this year’s to be even bigger. I’m sure details of collaborative events will be announced closer to the time so keep an eye on the website for future announcements.

The timing makes BV 2012 a bit closer to Australia Day this year so if you’re coming from interstate or overseas try booking your accomodation sooner rather than later.

Please note that this year a new system is in place for registration. And especially note that a pre-purchased ticket will be required to attend the public days. This is to ease waiting times for those attending.

To become a registered attendee able to attend all days and display your models:

Follow this link to the Brickvention 2012 registration page at TryBooking
http://www.trybooking.com/ZYA

Registered memberships cost $60 (plus booking fee).
Make sure you bring along your printed tickets to the event.

Due to venue size, there are only 150 registrations available. The first 50 people who register will be entered into a special competition organised by LEGO Australia.

If you want to just check out the displayed models on the weekend:

Saturday 21st and Sunday the 22nd from 9.30am – 5.30pm are the Public Expo days, allowing the general public of all ages to watch LEGO® builders at work and view LEGO® creations and displays.

You will need to pre-purchase tickets for this display.

Adults – $10 (plus booking fee)
Children – $6 (plus booking fee)

Children under 3 are free

You can purchase tickets at TryBooking

Make sure you bring along your printed tickets to the event!

And if you don’t know where and when it is:

The next Brickvention will be held over the weekend of 21st and 22nd January 2012 at The Melbourne Town Hall, corner of Swanston and Collins Streets Melbourne Victoria, where anyone can come along and view the amazing creations made out of LEGO.

The Creations for Charity fundraiser benefiting Toys for Tots is ending soon, and prices on most items have been reduced to the lowest allowed by the donors. Many builders and customizers have contributed to the 100+ creations waiting to be sold, and they’re counting on the buyers to find a new home for their works. You can get more updates about Creations for Charity at their website or visit their store on Bricklink.

Though I prefer to earn my experience, medals, and achievements the old-fashioned way, I never cease to be impressed (and mildly amused) by those who design LEGO robots to accomplish their video game goals.

Guy Himber built a robot to get the Onyx Active Reload medal in Gears of War 3 (watch him get the medal).

Meanwhile, Justin built his own robot to max out his restoration level to 100 in Skyrim.

What do you think? Fair play or hax0rs?

The LEGO Shop online continues its pre-holiday series of sales & deals with a special offer for LEGO VIP program members. Get free shipping on orders over $49, get the second holiday set for free with orders over $99, get that plus 10% off your whole purchase for orders over $149.

Look for more sales news early next week, leading up to Black Friday weekend.

Another entry into Classic-Castle’s Colossal Castle Contest IX, Knight Eklund shows us something serene and beautiful with this lonely tomb on a hill.

You can see more photos in his photostream, and the entry gallery on flickr.

If you’ve seen the cartoon Samurai Jack, you’ll undoubtedly recognize Stephen Pakbaz’s (Apojove) creation of Jack vs Aku.

German LEGO Star Wars fan David Wagner wasn’t content just to build 10179 UCS Millennium Falcon and let it gather dust in his basement. He built an entire Death Star diorama full of classic details.

Oh, and it lights up! David incorporated LEDs throughout the diorama, including the Falcon’s cockpit and ramp, landing lights, and more.

Obi-Wan Kenobi makes his last stand against his former pupil:

Check out hudecity.de for tons more pictures.

What’s the first thing everyone says when they try Minecraft? “It’s like building with Lego!” And to me, Minecraft really is the perfect Lego-esque game. So, it was natural to combine two of my favorite things, which already seemed destined to be together. Some of you may have seen this at Brickcon 2011 back in October where I displayed it, but now it’s finally online just in time for the official game release date tomorrow!

Cars symbolize so much; we judge people on their taste in cars, we always have aspritions for bigger, sportier, faster cars…but I’m telling you. While I appreciate a lovely car myself, very very few of them make me smile like a 1950s Chevy.

Yep.

So, kudos to you, Patrick. It’s just gorgeous.

As much as Lego is a worldwide hobby, it’s not easy to be aware of what people from other countries are building, especially if they are not active in the English-speaking communities that we often visit. I’m glad that Olivier (LegoManiac) sent me a link to the nominees for the best MOCs of 2011 on Brickpirate, the largest online French Lego community.

Just a reminder that there’s only a fortnight to go in the 7777 Redux contest. Enter and you could become the proud new owner of a 10219 Maersk train, 7937 Train Station or 7936 Level Crossing.

All entries must be in by midnight 30th November on the east side of the date line. If your clock says Nov 30th you’ll be fine.

While some purposes may require a bigger boat, de-marco delivers one of the best LEGO boats I’ve seen in quite a while, replete with rigging, radar, and rubber tires. This presentation on the rippled, reflective surface is also lovely.

Via twee affect.

This post was brought to you by the letter R.

It’s rare to see a LEGO torii that has the correct proportions, but this one by Shannon Young looks like it would be perfect on a mountain path leading up to a Shinto shrine. It’s also quite nice in this LEGO scene featuring a ronin taking a final journey.

The LEGO Shop online is continuing free shipping for all orders over $99.00 through mid-December, ending December 12.

A fair proportion of the 2012 LEGO sets are also online now.

And don’t forget that you can pick up a free LEGO Star Wars ARF Trooper with the code 4TBB (US) or TBBO (CA).

UPDATE 1: The LEGO Shop team have informed us that the checkout system has experienced a problem recently while applying the promotional code, preventing the ARF Trooper from being added visibly to the the shopping cart at checkout. ARF Trooper supplies have not run out, and they are correctly being included in your orders.

Update 2: For those of you like me who noticed last night that the second of two Christmas vignettes was available for purchase at $10, this was also an inventory/website mistake. It will be available for free with orders over $99 during Black Friday weekend next week.