Evancelt Lego has captured a little piece of the Wild West in a beautiful LEGO colour palette in this snapshot of the Westward Expansion. Theres some nice takeaways here from the construction of the carts and the autumnal trees using horn pieces to the clouds made from ice cream.
And as they rode off into the sunset, the wagon train was last heard humming Wandering Star…
Every once in a while we get a build that is out of this world. Not only because of techniques or parts usage, but because it is a work of art made with LEGO pieces. Ring-Rise by Tom Loftus (Inthert) is exactly that. A colourful painting. A cinematic shot with perfect framing. Just an astronaut and his cat, all alone on a monochrome alien world, looking out on the colourful rings of a planet. A simple idea, flawless execution.
Tom knew he wanted to incorporate the famous basalt columns of Iceland into a build. The Alien Landscape category of the yearly Space Jam contest was the perfect opportunity. Layering them in shades of grey (black to dark grey to light grey) give the impression of light coming in from the space-scape beyond. The planetary ring uses Simon Pickard’s intricate curving surface technique that few have mastered. Tom spiced it up by making it as colourful as he could, evoking the psychedelic hues of nebulae and other heavenly bodies.
Check out more builds by Tom here!
There is something special about a scene that not only tells a story but triggers your imagination to see the entire world beyond what you are looking at. Heavily understated and humbly set, this scene is masterfully staged by builder W. Navarre.
Once your mind recalls that you are looking at a LEGO creation, you will feel the need to explore further and look deeper. This is when you will notice the technicality that is cloaked by the emotional connection to the scene. The bridge that draws your focus is indeed one amazing build on its own. With parts facing in just about every angle on the protractor and the clever placement of the slopes aids the design, ensuring a great visual aesthetic to the bridge. The technical candy does not stop there! For those hungry for more, your eyes soon move beyond the bridge and over the fields… then onto the mountain range in the background. It is here that you see more creative usage of curved slope pieces to help form the chiselled yet visually pleasing features of the distant mountains. The colour choices only build this further creating a clever and realistic sense of depth.
You can see the original TBB article on this build here
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What’s that off in the distance? Cecilie Fritzvold has created a beautiful view of a distant bridge, or maybe a nearby view of a model train set. It’s hard to say for sure, but this stellar mix of textures and techniques is certainly satisfying to look at. I love how the fence along the left side of the scene, and that second lamp post, drop down to create the illusion of a hill leading down to the bay. The bridge itself also merits a closer look, being constructed from the rather unusual Large Figure Part Shield Holder with Axle. (That choice of part was no accident, as this is one of Cecile’s entries into the latest Iron Builder contest, which focuses on creative use of that very element.)
Making bridges out LEGO can be a challenging task. Check our our archives to see how other builders solved that problem.
The bittersweet ending of The Lord of the Rings is a scene that impacted many readers and viewers such as myself. It is the last we see of our beloved heroes after so many trials and tribulations in their story. In this scene, our heroes join the elves on a boat departing Middle-Earth to “a far green country under a swift sunrise.” Many see this as an allegory for death and the journey beyond, whether it be heaven or something else. Like Bilbo, I like to think of this in a more optimistic way: a new adventure in an unfamiliar land. JNJ Bricks captured the moment in the Grey Havens right before their departure in a striking, immersive LEGO scene.
The minifigures of Frodo, Gandalf, and the hobbits stand in the foreground, out of focus and facing away. The elves wait by the boat, ready to take them on their journey out of the completely brick-built harbour. LEGO parts make up everything in this scene, from the water to the sunset sky between the cliffs. My favourite detail, the arches, and towers across the water look just like the movie, despite being so small. The boat, being grey, is distinct enough to not blend into the background. The accuracy of this scene invokes the same emotion in me as I experience while reading the book or watching the movie. Now I am in the mood for some of Tolkien’s poetry…
This colorful creation by Jake Hansen (Mountain Hobbit) jumped right out at me with the inviting use of colors that spellbind and luring me to a place where it’s mystical that I almost want to drive right into the canvas of LEGO bricks of which it’s sculpted with. The imagery is vertically split into three: the cool flowing blue of the waterfall streaming, the dark orange earth that paves the path to the hidden abode, and the muted green of the grass work in a perfect combination of something that seemed like it spun off an artist’s color wheel. The equally bright and random colors mushrooms fitted with various sizes of technic gears in tan bring the magical land to life.
Collaborative building projects can yield amazing results, such as this slick 1969 Ford Mustang Boss 302 overlooking a picturesque cliff. The bright red Mustang was built by ham_MOC, while the cliff was built by Jonathan S. If you didn’t know this was a collaboration, you might think everything was made by one person. That’s because the two builds pair nicely, complete with advanced coloring techniques like the Mustang’s two-tone exterior and the layering of colors on the cliff. It makes for a cohesive build that couples American muscle with the beauty of the American West.
The two builders built this colorful vignette for the LEGO Ideas contest, “Celebrate your favorite Ford Mustang in a beautiful scenery!”
Here’s a pretty LEGO view — a daisy-strewn meadow with a brick-built backdrop. Hans Demol built this mosaic for a display with his local LEGO group. Mosaics are not usually my favourite kind of LEGO building, but the addition of the strip at the front with the daisies elevated this into something more interesting than a simple rendition of a pixelated image. It would be even better if some of the varied green shades in the backdrop’s “grass” had continued forward over the base, but that’s nitpicking at an otherwise lovely design.
Smart parts and color usage unite in a LEGO totem pole pieced together by Jonas Kramm. The reversed dark red horse armor on the head of the symbolic structure is my favorite parts usage here. Though the focus of the scene is the pole itself, the base of the pole and skeleton setting the scene are notable additions.
Finding yourself in a middle of lifeless desert during a crimson sunset is probably one of my biggest fears. Thanks, vir-a-cocha, for illustrating it! But honestly, this scenery looks amazingly cinematic. Even thought it’s just a vast empty desert, there are so many things to spy, like the skull near a lovely cactus or the smooth transition between the foreground and the background via forced perspective. Fading sky is absolutely the best way to complete this masterpiece.
Patrick Massey builds great fantasy environments, then stocks them with entire armies of figures. But like the landscape we featured previously, much of his scenery is so gorgeous that it demands to be enjoyed unpopulated as well, to appreciate all the little details. Fortunately Patrick seems to feel the same way. The result: pure LEGO scene-porn!
