About John Moffatt

A LEGO fan with a crippling addiction to chocolate, John has been floating around the LEGO online community since 2007, harboring a weakness for building science fiction and fantasy MOCs. Nowadays you can find him on Flickr or starting swordfights at the LEGO store.

Posts by John Moffatt

Classic space station high in the Martian sky

A mix of spindly spires, smooth curves and hard angles floats above a red planet. Considering that orange and blue are complimentary colors, I’m surprised you don’t see more classic space themed ships around Mars – luckily for us Damien Labrousse has an artistic eye.

Classic space controler 15

What I really appreciate about this build is that it looks just as striking from the bottom as from the top. Instead of having to skimp on style for adding a stand, Damien hung the model so that the lower antennas and towers could stay tastefully uneven.

Classic space controler 15

Ares-3 off the drawing board

The friendliest looking starfighter you’ve ever seen has made the leap from LEGO Digital Designer to the real world. BobDeQuatre designed this ship three years ago in LDD and has made excellent use of several new bricks to take the design from “cool” to “really something else” during its translation to physical form.

ARES-3

The soft, bubbly white curves stand out against the blackness of space with flashy spectral pink and purple highlights, so at first you might miss the pair of giant, black-armored cannons on the front.
Take a moment to compare this ship to its original digital incarnation, since they’re very much similar ships built with very different styles.

Ares

Someone call for an exterminator?

I’m not fan of rats, cockroaches, and alien critters skittering around my spaceship, but I’m also not sure I’d like to have Djokson‘s character around either. He’s stocky, he’s menacing, he has a big gun and probably leaves a trail of aliens to match.The Exterminator
There is a lot of excellent color contrast in this build, with a few bright-colored pieces popping against the black armor and background. The blue hose caught my eye first, but then you look up and see the dark red eyes of the mask and suddenly the exterminator seems a lot less friendly. And be sure to keep four eyes out for some really excellent parts use on his alien trophy.

Lakeside Viking lodge in the snow

I’ll admit it: despite all the sci-fi that I build, my secret loves are castle and historical builds. Today Gabriel Thompson takes us out of medieval Europe, and heads north to Scandinavia and the land of the Vikings. The snow and ice in this scene are excellent, with undisturbed curves on the rocks, and studs in front of the hut to make it look a little more slushy after being stepped on. I’m also a fan of the marshy path left by the boat as it cuts through the thin ice. The only thing I don’t envy in this build are the minifigures’ short sleeves in such cold conditions.

Vikinghut5rs_010117

Bring me Solo and the wookiee

The galaxy’s favorite space-slug gangster, Jabba the Hutt, is one of Star Wars’ more recognizable aliens. Jabba is cold and cruel, but still enjoys the finer points of life on the harsh world of Tatooine.
Robert Lundmark has captured the slimy villain with great attention to detail. The contouring and coloring of Jabba’s massive form is impressive, the base is clean and sharp, the subtly angled face is ingenious, but it’s the eyes that catch my attention most of all. It’s a small detail like that that can really turn a build from a pile of bricks into a living character.

Jabba the Hutt

Working LEGO trebuchet lays siege to your cities

The trebuchet is a towering medieval siege machine, used to wear away at castle walls with greater power than ancient catapults. The army of Dalos has Andrew JN to thank for their latest weapon of war, and what a weapon it is! The model itself is a good clean build against the trend of making medieval buildings look more and more ramshackle, but the real magic touch is the functioning sling and winding mechanism. LEGO castles beware!

Trebuchet of Delos

Andrew was kind enough to post a video of the trebuchet in action, in which no castles were harmed.

Tripods wage a war of the micro worlds

A trio of Martian walkers carve a path of destruction through Tokyo Tag Team‘s city as the sun sets. The tripods look decidedly alien with a thin organic style contrasted by the squared off cityscape, and you don’t need to see the heat rays firing off to tell that they don’t come in peace.

War of the Worlds

While the tripods are the focus of the creation, I find the smoke trails off the burning buildings particularly clever. The billowing clouds of black curved bricks add a sense of movement that a vehicle on a plate just wouldn’t be able to capture.

Tri-pod Walker

Shortcut through a shady part of town

I would think twice about ducking through mike m.‘s narrow street, no matter how much of a hurry I was in. Piles of overflowing trash clutter the thin lane, and the myriad of signs hanging uncomfortably at head height do a wonderful job of making the place look just too unwelcoming for my taste. What I find most interesting is that the reflective nature of LEGO bricks, which usually gets in the way of making creations look realistic, actually looks like faded graffiti on the left wall. It took me a while to put my finger on it, and it’s a very neat effect.

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GOES-16 is all science, no fiction

I love a flashy futuristic spaceship as much as the next guy, but there’s something special about Ryan Howerter‘s modern weather satellite. Ryan has done a ridiculously accurate job of recreating the NASA / NOAA research satellite in LEGO, down to the last maneuvering thruster. I love the idea that every little detail on this model is some real piece of equipment measuring or transmitting up in space right now, and I’m especially impressed with the lens cover held open with a link of track.

Birds of a feather nest over a woodland cottage

A pair of LEGO birds, built from tiny feather elements, have found a home above a cozy hideaway in the woods. The contrast between the autumn leaves and bold blue roof  are what immediately caught my attention, but jsnyder002 has packed this fantasy hermitage with little details and clever building solutions that I just keep finding more of every time I come back for another look.

Forest Cottage