The Brothers Brick » Town

Hill Valley 2015

Nannan — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 03:30:37 +0000

Alex Jones (Orion Pax) built a Back to the Future diorama featuring various buildings from Hill Valley. Each building has its own unique color scheme and architecture worthy of a closer look. You can see the entire layout on Flickr.

NYC back in 4-wide

gambort — Tue, 31 Jan 2012 14:27:47 +0000

I’ve made no secret of my love for Jonathan Lopes’ urban landscapes and was a little sad to hear he’d destroyed his latest town. Luckily he’s back with a new project which promises to be very interesting: starting a new town in a sub-minifig scale. By my guess this is about half to 2/3rds the size of a regular train layout but so far seems to have most of the details I’ve always loved. I’m very excited.

LEGO Elmore in 1972

gambort — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 03:14:52 +0000

At this year’s Brickvention I once again had the pleasure to team up with the very talented Mike Pianta (scruffulous) for a town/train diorama. Like last year’s Ararat we went for a rural Australian town theme, and again set it in 1972 to maximise our building fun. This time we chose Elmore for its distinctive train station.

You can find many more pictures by some wonderful photographers at the convention in the layout’s flickr group.

While we’d learnt a lot from the previous year this one presented new challenges. Not least for me how to bring large buildings in my aeroplane luggage. And for Mike how to assemble large base segments without ever getting a chance to see them all together. Luckily we were able to overcome the challenges and I’m very happy with how it turned out. Apparently the TLG judges were too as we were honoured to be awarded Best in Show.

Batman as you’ve never seen him

gambort — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 03:28:17 +0000

Shannon Sproule (Shannon Ocean) has a very odd interpretation of the Batman in 2025. It’s for the LUGNuts 51st Build Challenge: Batmobile 2025.

My highlights of recent town and train

gambort — Tue, 24 Jan 2012 04:45:40 +0000

I’ve recently been on a hiatus from TBB due to an excess of real life commitments (work, life and LEGO) and a need to have a bit of a break from blogging. But of course this didn’t stop people (particularly Polish people it seems) posting great models, nor me from filing them away for future use. Which brings me to this four model roundup, presented in the order I added them to my list.

First Maciej Drwięga has a fabulous rendition of the Polish PKP ST43 locomotive.

Second Bartosz Kacprzyk (the oneman) shows off an Alouette.

Third Karwik shows off a Kama3 5410 as driven by his late uncle.

And finally Chris Edwards (cjedwards) brings is an excellent train station.

Well detailed, lovely work by all four builders.

Art Nouveau inspired modular bank

Nannan — Wed, 18 Jan 2012 22:57:43 +0000

The combination of exotic colors and shapes from nature in Dita Svelte‘s modular bank makes this a standout build among fan-made modular buildings. The different gradients of green and earth tones add a complex layer of texture on top of that formed by the bricks.

Mad Max Christmas

gambort — Sat, 24 Dec 2011 21:03:18 +0000

Joe Klang (-derjoe-) has given me a perfect opportunity to wish everyone a hot and Summery Christmas from Australia. There was a time when Mel Gibson was considered kind of cooler than an anti-semitic drunk. And Max Max comes very much from that time. In his second recent car-based diorama Joe shows why. The last V8.

VW NPU

gambort — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 22:11:23 +0000

I must confess I’m not a huge fan of the flex as windows technique so I almost didn’t blog this one. But the design of the iconic ‘face’ of this Volkswagen Type 2 is just too good not to blog. Karwik has definitely exceeded himself on that.

Thanks to misterzumbi for prodding me about this.

Gran Torino in LEGO

gambort — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 21:15:31 +0000

For his local (Cologne) LEGO brand store recently, Joe Klang (-derjoe-) built a scene from Gran Torino. What I find particularly attractive about this scene is how inorganic it feels, while reflecting the movie so well. It almost feels like a platform game version of the film with the straight lines, diagonal grid and textural elements. And the neat suburban lawn feels even more sterile than in real life.

Thanks to Alex Jones for the heads up

Sneaker Freaker Fleeter

gambort — Thu, 08 Dec 2011 05:25:29 +0000

It’s no secret that Alex Jones né Schranz (Orion Pax) is a big sneaker fan. So his Sneaker Freaker van came as no surprise. These new mini vans are even more adorable than the big one.

A cuter scooter

gambort — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 22:07:44 +0000

Karwik is no stranger to two-wheel creations but I think these latest scooters are some of his cutest. The use of the hollow 1×2 slope brick is the cleverness that makes these work.

Fortnight to go for 7777 Redux contest

gambort — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 07:44:10 +0000

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.

A better LEGO boat

Andrew — Thu, 17 Nov 2011 06:55:37 +0000

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.

Functioning Lego bumper cars arena

Nannan — Mon, 31 Oct 2011 14:55:23 +0000

Nuno C creates this classic amusement park attraction featuring bumper cars that actually move. The mechanism is described as a system of gears underneath the floor that moves magnets that pull the cars. This technique has been used in at least two instances but none as complex as this. See the video on Flickr.

Here’s the video:

That’s a Big Caterpillar

Chris — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 19:30:59 +0000

This smart-looking piece of equipment was made by Marek Markiewicz (aka M_longer), and is actually in minifig scale. The real Caterpillar 24M stretches over 46 feet long, and has a 24 foot wide blade! Marek’s Lego version is equally impressive, though, featuring a pneumatically operated blade and rear ripper, and functioning steering and articulation. Marek has even made a cool video to showcase the moving parts in action.