About Andrew Becraft (TBB Editor-in-Chief)

Andrew Becraft is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of The Brothers Brick. He's been building with LEGO for more than 40 years, and writing about LEGO here on TBB since 2005. He's also the co-author, together with TBB Senior Editor Chris Malloy, of the DK book Ultimate LEGO Star Wars. Andrew is an active member of the online LEGO community, as well as his local LEGO users group, SEALUG. Andrew is also a regular attendee of BrickCon, where he organizes a collaborative display for readers of The Brothes Brick nearly every year. You can check out Andrew's own LEGO creations on Flickr. Read Andrew's non-LEGO writing on his personal blog, Andrew-Becraft.com. Andrew lives in Seattle with his wife and dogs, and by day leads software design and planning teams.

Posts by Andrew Becraft (TBB Editor-in-Chief)

Kotaku takes a first look at LEGO Battles, real-time strategy game for DS [News]

Although LEGO Battles for Nintendo DS was announced back in February, details so far have been sparse.

Kotaku had a five-minute look at the game yesterday and has some pre-release impressions.

LEGO Battles screenshot

Stephen Totilo writes:

In traditional RTS fashion, the player draws a box around their Lego units and clicks on places for them to move to or attack. A pull-down menu enables the player to build to build appropriately-themed Lego structures: towers and factories and the like. There was no drag-and-drop Lego construction, but manual block-building hasn’t been much of a component of any of the recent Lego games.

Our speculation back in February that the images we had then were pre-rendered cutscenes and not real game-play turns out to be true. Oh well, not surprising.

LEGO Battles will be available in June.

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Smug red-shirted LEGO Star Trek minifig won’t survive the away mission

You know it’s true.

legomocs combines LEGO elements in a fairly simple way to achieve perfect brick-built phasers and a tricorder. Combined with the red and yellow torsos, these minifigs are instantly recognizable.

Jamie said it best: “Normally they look too plain, but it’s amazing how nice black pants and a few accessories can make blank torsos look.”

David Pagano animates Space Police 2009

LEGO stop-motion animator David Pagano has stepped forward as one of the people behind the recent LEGO Space Police teaser.

Check out the first episode in what is apparently going to be a series.

And yes, we know that the new sets are starting to show up at TRU.

There’s a LEGO brick inside each of us

Artist Jason Freeny amazed us last year with his detailed minifig anatomy schematic, suggesting that minifigs are just regular humans inside their plastic skins. Turning that idea inside out, Jason’s latest piece — “What you’re made of” — suggests that we all have a brick somewhere inside all of us who consider ourselves LEGO fans.

LEGO to participate in NMRA National Train Show [News]

For all you LEGO train builders attending the NMRA National Train Show this summer, here’s some pretty cool news:

As part of the National Train Show on July 10-12, 2009 in Hartford, CT, Jamie Berard, set designer of the newly released ‘Emerald Night’ and employee of The LEGO Group (TLG), will participate as part of the show. Jamie will be giving a talk on both July 11 and 12 (Sat. and Sun.) about the design process and thinking that led up to the final ‘Emerald Night’ set, and about the Power functions components that support it. Fans are encouraged to participate to offer their views on the new platform. Jamie will also be available during the show for any questions you may have about his other excellent creations – Fast Flyer, Cafe Corner, Cool Convertible and Green Grocer.

Also as part of this year’s show, Steve Witt, LEGO Community Relations Coordinator for North America, has graciously offered to host the traditional ILTCO pizza party at LEGO corporate headquarters in Enfield, CT after the show on Sat. July 11. Along with pizza and hanging out with Steve, Jamie and some of the LEGO Master Builders from Enfield, other events such as tours of the model shop and parts of the campus will occur. All train show participants are invited to attend.

To contribute to the layout please post to the Trains-n-Town NMRA 2009 forums at:
http://www.trains-n-town.com/forum/index.php?forum=34

Information about the National Train Show can be found at:
http://www.nationaltrainshow.org/2009/hartford.html

Photo above, from last year’s NMRA show, by Peter Norman. See more photos of LEGO models at NMRA on Flickr.

Biscuit made me blog this

From beetles to snails, we’ve enjoyed the encounters that Geppelin‘s minifigs have had with animals over the years, but none are cuter than this kitten meeting a ninja.

Thanks for the link, little bro! Hope I didn’t make Tsunami too jealous.

Thomas Oechsner’s May Neo-Classic Space project

The end of March didn’t mean the end of great Neo-Classic Space LEGO creations. LEGO fans have continued building some great models, not least of which is Thomas Oechsner‘s latest project — a new Neo-Classic Space model just about every day so far this month.

See all of Thomas’s Neo-Classic Space models on Flickr.

Bring on the Waterworks

Chase Lewis (Vid’) has posted his largest LEGO diorama to date, featuring a band of survivors holding out against a well-armed apoca-boat.

Check out the full photoset on Flickr.

Neo-Blacktron gears up for invasion

The Ugokin aliens may have been forced back to the fringes of known space by the Neo-Classic Space fleet, but there are other powers rising in the void.

Andrew Lee (onosendai2600/Wintermute) and Fradel Gonzalez (Slice151) have kicked off what is sure to be the next building craze — Neo-Blacktron.

Here’s Andrew’s Heavy Fighter:

And Fradel’s Eliminator:

Check out all of Andrew’s Neo-Blacktron creations, Fradel’s NBT, and the new Neo-Blacktron group pool.

Halo Turtle transport

What happens when you combine a Warthog from Halo with arctic sno-cats? Why, this “Turtle” transport by Kurt (Lemon_Boy), of course!

The four tracks in place of the tires and the gun are especially cool.

Izzo’s back – for now...

It’s been more than six months since Izzo has posted anything on his blog or to his Brickshelf gallery. For his return, Izzo put a lot of effort into his mecha, and it shows.

The mecha itself is awesome, with powerful shoulders and boost-jets on the legs, but I think the human story is more interesting here.

Izzo runs an art gallery, and his work has taken nearly all his time in the last six months. Even though the urge to build something with LEGO kept nagging at the back of his mind, he never found the time. Work even took him to Denmark, but his schedule precluded a pilgrimage to LEGOLAND.

When he began this mecha, Izzo’s “muscle memory” helped him build, but he couldn’t remember where he’d stashed all the parts he needed. Now, Izzo’s not sure when he’ll be able to post something next.

We hope Izzo will find time to post more LEGO creations again soon, but his story is a good reminder that LEGO — as much enjoyment as we have with it — is just a hobby, after all, not real life. Our commitment is to our families, our work, and our real-life communities.

Jaw-dropping LEGO Pirates movie made with MINDSTORMS NXT

Nearly all LEGO movies we feature here on The Brothers Brick are animated with stop-motion. NeXTSTORM has instead programmed a LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT brick for every single element of motion in this LEGO Pirates movie.

Awesome tip, Dylan!