Yearly Archives: 2017

It takes a spacecraft of titanic proportions to explore the Ice Titan

There is something special about LEGO’s retro space themes that makes people revisit them time and time again, and it’s probably nostalgia. One of the more popular themes is surely Ice Planet 2002 with its iconic blue-white-black and translucent orange colour scheme, and Tim Goddard has built an excellent microscale spaceship based on the 6973 Deep Freeze Defender, which he’s named Zycon V. It’s also tied closely to a collaborative story recently featured on The Brothers Brick: LEGO Space: ICE Titan.

The spaceship itself has nice shapes and a good balance of details and clean surfaces, as well as following the original’s colour scheme. Though I would have loved to see a bit more translucent orange included, and the curves may not fit into a 90’s inspired creation very well, those are minor points on an otherwise amazing build.

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Chibi cuteness can be contagious

Builder LegoWyrm takes inspiration from Hatsune Miku, a humaniod anime persona. LegoWyrm gives it a Spanish flavour with a red themed outfit, and upped the cutness factor by shrinking the character to a chibi sized version. It works gleefully well, with the dress piece arrangement and the pose held together by the unique use of elements for the feet.

Do you hear the people sing? Les Misérables in LEGO

The barricade scene in Les Misérables — the musical based on the novel by French poet and novelist Victor Hugo — is a powerful mix of song and drama. Loosely based on the 1832 Paris uprising, idealistic revolutionary students set up a street barricade and fight government troops to the bitter end. W. Navarre has managed to capture this scene fantastically with the large central barricade and a detailed backdrop showing narrow Parisian streets. The barricade looks the part as a jumbled collection of brown coloured LEGO wheels, ladders, furniture, windows and bricks.

There’s a lot of detail to be found relating to the musical version of Les Misérables, I particularly love details like the tear in the French flag, the lantern and the fatally wounded Gavroche.

You can see more images of this build and the other Les Misérables-themed LEGO creations in his album on Flickr.

Beauty of decay in the shape of a castle wall

Modern LEGO castle building trends call for intensely textured walls, with the texture achieved with use of many small tiles and plates. While it is quite impressive, it makes me wonder why all LEGO castles look like nobody is caring for them. This wall segment by Jonatan Svenning does not have this awkward situation, as it is meant to look decreipt and abandoned. It does the job incredibly well, with wall segments tilting and breaking apart.

While I wonder if a chain could hold a cobblestone tower, it certainly looks nice. But what sets this old wall from the rest is the overgrowth on and around the wall – from moss growing everywhere to the flowers and trees (including one utilizing large figure armor parts as a tree trunk) around the wall. The best plantal element however, has to be the tree growing straight out of the wall, crumbling it in the process.

The sea was angry that day, my friends!

Like an old man trying to send back soup in a deli… No. It was like four unfortunate fishermen losing sight of the shore and falling prey to the whims of a fickle leviathan. You know, THAT old story. Strange isn’t it? This LEGO scene by Andrew JN is full of impending doom, but it’s actually quite lovely. The icy water has a beautiful texture and it’s almost as if you can feel the mist on your face. As for the source material, Andrew says his build was inspired by a rubbery kracken and a sinking LEGO ship.

Quiet on the set

It’s unclear what movie is being filmed on Aaron Newman‘s LEGO soundstage (though my money’s on Forest Gump). What is clear, however, is that Aaron has created a still life that perfectly captures a slice of “behind the scenes” movie magic. The small details like the clapboard and messy tangle of wires make this scene look like the real thing. And the camera dolly on the rails, the director’s chair, and the heavy duty lighting are masterfully built.

Quarter of a million brick LEGO McLaren 720S goes from zero to ABS in 2000 hours

Founded in the nineteen-sixties by Kiwi racecar designer, driver, engineer, inventor and all-around legend Bruce McLaren, the McLaren company is one of the most successful in Formula One championship history, winning a total of 8 constructors’ world championships and 12 drivers’ world championships. This year, McLaren released their latest car in the Super Series lineup, the gorgeous 720S, and this incredible LEGO replica is the centerpiece of McLaren’s stand at the Goodwood Festival of Speed. Built by the team at Bright Bricks, the model comprises a staggering 280,000 bricks and took a team of six builders over 2000 hours.

The real car is powered by a 4.0 twin turbo V8 and can go from 0-60 mph in a mere 2.8 seconds and up to 124 mph in 7.8 seconds, with a top speed of 212 mph! However, the 1:1 scale model arrived at the Goodwood stand a bit more slowly, as festival visitors will help complete the model. They will need to place orange McLaren bricks in designated parts of the car, with the 720S reaching completion at the end of the Festival of Speed.

Duncan Titmarsh, the UK’s only LEGO Certified Professional and part of Bright Bricks, led the 720S build. The LEGO version weighs approximately 200kg more than the actual 720S, coming in at around 1.6 tonnes (1.8 US tons). The build features real wheels and a steel base but is otherwise almost entirely made of LEGO, including the brake pads, windscreen wipers, and windscreen. Some additional details like the badge and license plate have been provided by McLaren to finish the build nicely.

The LEGO 720s will go on tour to other marketing events once it has been finished, so you may get a chance to see it in person.

As American as apple pie

Four score and twenty.. No wait. The only thing we have to fear is… Uhhhm. Mister Gorbachev tear down this… Hang on. Ok, got it: Associate with men of good quality if you esteem your own reputation; for it is better to be alone than in bad company – George Washington. And George seems to be in pretty good company in this collection of busts by Tyler Clites depicting the Founding Fathers. WISHING OUR STATE-SIDE READERS A HAPPY AND SAFE INDEPENDENCE DAY FILLED WITH FIREWORKS, FRANKFURTERS, AND FREEDOM!

The village and its gatehouse

Gatehouses are quite a popular theme in LEGO castle builds, but this port village gatehouse by Titus Verelst still manages to bring something new to the table, surrounding the gatehouse with a village suspended on logs. It makes a nice composition with the rooftops and curved path, adding just enough minifig action to bring the scene to life, despite the bleak colour scheme. I do wish the builder had added water around the village, or at least used some clever digital tricks or blue paper as a stand in.

Mechas come and go, but Mazinger Z stands the test of time

It’s quite amazing to pause and appreciate that Mazinger Z was first introduced to the world almost 45 years ago, and it still stands the test of time, finding relevance to fans even today, and mecha master Kelvin Low brings us a great Mazinger Z. One cool thing to note is that this design is a rebuild of a previous version that employed a central frame from the Hero Factory system, and now Kevin’s overhauled it to a regular brick-based build. What difference does that make? Building with the classic system elements gives a cleaner look that matches the anime, but at the cost of building to a smaller footprint as it becomes heavier with regular bricks.

Many unikitties were sacrificed for Marilyn

At one tail per Unikitty, many Unikitties had to be sacrificed for this Brickheadz to come to life. The effort paid off for Krzysztof J as the effect it provides for Marilyn’s curly headlocks is almost ideal. A few other stylistic standouts include the infamous mole, which is ingeniously made with the negative space of a 1×1 brick with a single knob, and the clever use of minifigure hairpieces that make up the upper section of the corset.

Keep an eye out for black, white and dark red in the sky above

After a long break, German builder Sylon-tw is back into his assembly hall proving that his futuristic airplanes are still dominating LEGO skies. Instead of the dieselpunk go-to colors of grey, dark blue, bright red, or reddish brown, Thomas goes for bold black on the body and elegant decorations of white and dark red stripes. Combined with short droid bodies, the dinosaur flippers work perfectly as propeller blades. And in a nice change from convention, the aircraft has a fetching female pilot.