Our TBB cover photo “inbox” is yielding a number of gems we’ve missed. Dutch builder Stijn Oom has built a cargo ship in a style dear to my heart, with fantastic asymmetry and excellent color blocking — particularly the white stripes that span most of the length of the vessel.
![3H-5 [Alasie] - Cargo Transport Vessel](https://s3-us-west-2.amazonaws.com/media.brothers-brick.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/8516713148_e894659323.jpg)
Stijn says this is his first micro-space ship, so I’m hoping we can look forward to many more in the future.
I sat down with my boys a while back to build the new LEGO Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles 79104 Shellraiser Street Chase set. When I first heard that LEGO was coming out with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle sets, to say that I was excited was an understatement. The Turtles were a favourite of mine when I was a kid, and actually it wasn’t until I heard of the LEGO sets that I knew there was a new cartoon on Nickelodeon.
I will start with my overall impressions, and then go into the finer points. The set has 620 pieces, retails for $59.99 USD ($74.99 CDN) and comes with a total of 5 minifigures. I would definitely recommend this set to any TMNT fan, and actually also for those looking for a parts pack…even with this being a licenced theme set the price point is very good for the amount of pieces you get. This is a very well-designed set in terms of playability and ruggedness. The finished product is a nicely sized Shellraiser with a fair amount of play features, and a small, but very cool bad-guy truck.
I will admit to using child labour for this part, as I pretty much let Tate build it for me. (Well honestly I don’t think he would have let me build it even if I wanted to). I did follow along with him the entire time, and apart from a few points where he had placed a few pieces incorrectly, he was able to build the entire set in about an hour and a half. He was able to follow the instructions very well, so clearly adult LEGO fans wouldn’t have any issues with them. The one thing that really stood out for me was the use of some nice building techniques. We aren’t talking blow your mind SNOT or anything, but there certainly were not any shortcuts taken. In particular with the bad-guy pizza delivery truck, as a secondary part of the set, I was actually surprised by how cool the little model ends up…it is exceedingly fun to zoom around!
There was a total of 5 poly bags along with the sticker sheet, two tires and vehicle base. The minifigs were a highlight for both me and the boys. The turtles are so brilliantly designed, and I really love the fact that they used different shades of green for each of them. The baddies are also nothing to sneeze at, and are another example of ever-increasing quality of figure design and detail that LEGO has been churning out. The fact that Dog Pound has standard fig legs with the oversized torso works so perfectly, and does make me laugh a little bit too. Obviously the highlight of the bricks themselves are the new olive green ones. But there is a very nice selection of smaller pieces and commonly used parts that actually makes this set a pretty good choice for parting out. That being said, we have had the set for going on 2 months now and Tate still won’t let me strip it for pieces.
The set is an absolute hoot to play with. The Shellraiser has a tonne of neat play features: the roof is removable, there are flip-out computer panels and weapon racks, the rocket launcher on the roof, and the cherry on top is most definitely the adjustable wheels to allow it to roll on railroad (subway) track. After two months of being played with hard by my boys the set is still going strong, with only the red garbage can missing (Milo has a thing for garbage cans and won’t tell us where he put it). If you are a TMNT fan of any kind, you NEED to buy this set…and if you are just looking for parts, well, it is still a good choice.
It should also be noted the comic strip box art was done by TBB’s own Paul Lee.
Check out my full photoset for all the pictures.
And when you rush out to buy this, be sure to follow the links below and help out The Brothers Brick at the same time.
The Builds are changing. ∆TMM∆ has built the greatest bookends that Middle Earth has ever seen! These incredible, detailed micro-scale versions of Tower of Orthanc and Tower of Barad-dûr not only look great, but they serve a practical purpose as well.
Much larger versions of these Two Towers have been featured before on Brothers-Brick. OneLUG’s The Last March of the Ents and Kevin Walter’s Barad-dûr.
We may be well into March now, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t still in love with fantastic rovers. Case in point, here’s one we missed previously: Robert H’s (Robiwan Kenobi) Helium Transport Rover. Like all the best microscale models, it belies its size, and abounds with ingenious techniques. The micro-mech that accompanies it is also a marvel of miniature engineering, employing some cool joint techniques that even I haven’t seen before.
EDIT: Oops, looks like we didn’t actually miss this one the first time around. We blogged its differently-colored twin here.
At least, that’s how I remember the adage. Halfbeak has posted a creation on Flickr that makes fantastic use of stickers to add contrast and detail. I’m always a fan of checker patterns, and the stripe on the helmet is a great touch. The aesthetic reminds me of THX-1138, while the name (Koma Police) has gotten a song stuck in my head.
How would you like to have your photo featured on either our Facebook or Twitter page for an entire month? We’ve created a Flickr group called TBB Cover Photos to give you that chance.
It’s simple: Just add a high-quality picture of your LEGO model to the group. Once each month, we’ll select two photos for our cover pages, one for Facebook and one for Twitter. You then get bragging rights for a whole month!
Tips for success & glory:
Here are some examples of the aspect ratios to keep in mind:
Legalese: Please keep in mind that by joining and submitting a photo to the group, you are granting permission to The Brothers Brick, Facebook, and Twitter to use the photo (with full credit to you, of course).
March is Marchikoma month in the Lego Flickr community, resulting in many variations of think tanks. Chris Maddison‘s variation on the theme is far out of the ordinary, and he attributes it to listening music from Howl’s Moving Castle while building.
Sylvain Ballivet (iomedes !…) relies on shapes to create a dropship that looks functional. Each distinct white segment of the hull fits smoothly with the next to create the beautiful contours of this ship. The model was based on concept art by Syd Mead.
This edgy version of Little Red Riding Hood, by Evan B., depicts her in the midst of an anti-wolf vendetta. This build is quite striking. I think this is a case where the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The girl is nicely done, the landscaping is good, the wolf and the blood effect are well-thought out but when all the elements are put together something special emerges. I get a real sense of the character and her pain when I look at this build. Well done, Evan, well done.
This was built as an entry for the annual MOCathalon on MOCpages
We may be guaranteed never to see official Ghost in the Shell LEGO models, but that doesn’t stop LEGO fans from building their own Tachikoma, Fuchikoma, and other “Think Tanks” during what is now the annual Marchikoma challenge.
Chris (Ironsniper) puts the new olive-green LEGO elements to good use with his own entry, full of great shaping despite the limited parts palate.
The light and dark grays Chris uses for the non-olive portions are a great example of using different shades of gray to mimic different types of real-world metals — a subtle type of color-blocking missing from less-sophisticated builds.
This is one of those “the thumbnail looked like the real thing” creations. Chris Melby (ZeeMasterBrick) has deftly recreated a TREK hard tail “Superfly 29er” out of LEGO. This build is packed full of wonderful little details like the alien blasters for brake levers to the droid bodies for the pedal clips. The custom decal work by custombricks is just icing on the cake.
….Your training is complete, bruceywan. Bruce Lowell, Jedi Lego master, has made a 1:1 replica of Luke Skywalker’s lightsaber from A New Hope with a full length blade using 300+ 3×3 radar dishes for MocAthalon 2013 on MOCPages. It’s not as clumsy or as random as a blaster, but an elegant weapon for a more civilized age.
