Monthly Archives: August 2011

LEGO minifigs going to Jupiter on NASA’s Juno spacecraft! [News]

As part of Lego’s partnership with NASA, three aluminum minifigs will be placed aboard the Juno spacecraft! The minifigs will represent Jupiter, Juno and Galileo.

Lego Press release:

Three LEGO® Minifigures leave earth on the Juno deep-space probe today on a five-year mission to Jupiter to broaden awareness of the importance of planetary research.

The specially-constructed aluminium Minifigures are the Roman god Jupiter, his wife Juno and ‘father of science’ Galileo Galilei. The LEGO crew’s mission is part of the LEGO Bricks in Space project, the joint outreach and educational programme developed as part of the partnership between NASA and the LEGO Group to inspire children to explore science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.

The LEGO Minifigures will help get attention for Juno’s mission to improve understanding of our solar system’s beginnings by revealing the origin and evolution of Jupiter.

Juno and the Minifgures’ journey will be featured on www.LEGOspace.com, the website that gathers together educational and fun material about space. The site also houses a number of downloads, videos, a LEGOnaut game, and various facts about space exploration. Later this year it will also have videos of experiments conducted with LEGO Education models on the International Space Station.

From the NASA website:

NASA’s Jupiter-bound Juno spacecraft will carry the 1.5-inch likeness of Galileo Galilei, the Roman god Jupiter and his wife Juno to Jupiter when the spacecraft launches this Friday, Aug. 5. The inclusion of the three mini-statues, or figurines, is part of a joint outreach and educational program developed as part of the partnership between NASA and the LEGO Group to inspire children to explore science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

See full text of NASA article here.

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Tanning on the Death Star

Who says that working for the Empire is a drag? Apparently not Ernesto Carrillo.

I’d rather wear a mask

If it were as cool as the Witch Doctor‘s. Norbert Labuguen NorbyZERO made this mask and wore it to Comic-Con.

Via Ka-GO

Hispabrick 11 is now available [News]

HispaBrick Magazine recently released their eleventh issue and I was quite impressed with it. They have definitely been improving with age.

This issue is packed with goodies and it’s all free! There is a literal plethora of articles including, among other things, the Arvo brothers‘ Mini Moog, Firas Abu-Jaber’s vehicles, a history of classic Space, 5 set reviews and interviews with Barney Main (AKA SlyOwl), Jamie Berard and Tormod Askildsen.

Carljin Cow’s Ice Cream Shoppe

Mark Larson is delving back into his Fabuland world with this den of dairy delights. I love the design of the house and how Mark managed to work in so many Fabuland elements but still kept it fresh and new. Well played, Mark!

Rocky Mountain High

Matija Grguric has built a sweet little mountaintop shrine. You’ve got to the love the roof design and geometric patterns on the walls.

Mercedes-Benz LO 3500

This 1935 Mercedes bus, by Klaus Dobisch, is incredibly well-designed. The streamlined look is perfect.

Ceasarea Amphitheatre

Yaron just posted a really nice build of the Ceasarea Amphitheatre. I really like the archwork on the front facade. Though the builder populated the arena floor with fantasy creatures, this is an ancient Roman amphitheatre in Israel that is still in use today.

Medic!

There’s a special place in my heart for Army ambulances built from LEGO. Andrew Somers has been posting variants of his Humvee-like Bulldog for a little while, but my favorite is the Medical Evacuation Variant. This beefy vehicle sports working suspension and opening doors. 10-wide isn’t my preferred scale for a vehicle in a world populated by minifigs, but they are pretty wide little people, so this scale allows Andrew to fit four minifigs in the cab plus two stretchers in the back.

Andrew’s Bulldog MEV follows his brilliant Python tank

The State of Denmark art prints by Matthew Ulstad

As much as we have an artistic appreciation for many of the LEGO models we feature here, it’s also great to run across art inspired by LEGO. Artist Matthew Ulstad has created a series of prints titled “All is Right in the State of Denmark,” including a minifig study inspired by Leonardo Da Vinci’s “Vitruvian Man,” complete with a background printed using actual LEGO baseplates.

For those of us interested in hanging some of these on our own walls, you can pick up prints on Matthew’s Etsy store.

Rayzer Industries Sky Drone watches from above

Raysor L. (Rimven) has changed his screen name since we last featured his Tsu-ka Technician last week, but he can’t hide from the all-seeing TBB eye in the sky. Okay, well, it’s actually us who can’t hide from the awesomeness of his sky drone, but you get the picture.

The white color blocking on the gray wings (or is it the other way around?) is lovely, and the “eye” subtly incorporates the seed part for the 4th NPU challenge.

Orange Jedi Interceptor punches through Trade Federation blockades

Though Lucas lost me by the second Star Wars prequel, I still love many of the vehicles and vessels designed by his brilliant team. One of my favorite scenes is the one in which Obi-Wan and Anakin fight through the blockade of Coruscant in their Jedi Interceptors. Official LEGO Star Wars sets have featured the Eta-2 Actis-class Light Intercepter a couple of times, but this studless design by Kevin Murney (legorevolution) truly pops. The bright orange certainly helps.

Thanks for the tip, Dave!