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)

No BrickLink order...

For those of you just tuning in, BrickLink is a site where you can buy LEGO from thousands of people worldwide. What’s cool is that you can buy individual pieces as well as sets. For me, it’s a great way to get minifigs from sets I’ve missed or don’t plan on buying. I’ve recently ordered 1381 Vampire’s Crypt, Professor Mcgonagall from a fairly expensive Harry Potter set, and a couple other random minifigures.

Last weekend I ordered the Mad Scientist and Frankenstein’s Monster from 1382 Scary Laboratory, along with the Mummy minifig from 1383 Curse of the Pharoah. Ordering these three minifigs for around $7.00 saved me over $40.00 (assuming I could even find these discontinued sets for less than MSRP).

Well, I was really looking forward to getting this latest order this weekend (since they shipped airmail from eastern Canada on Monday), but there was no little package in the mailbox today. I’ll survive, I’m sure, but this means I won’t be updating my Puddleglum figure to use the head and hands from Frankenstein’s Monster. We watched two consecutive baseball games today (Red Sox vs. Angels and Mariners vs. Twins), so I was able to finish a really nice vignette of the Cair Paravel treasure house from Prince Caspian. Look for a post with a link tomorrow. In the meantime, I uploaded pictures of all the Narnian minifigures I’ve created so far:

http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=141949

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Giant Stairs (with Puddleglum version 0.1)

I’ll be changing Puddleglum a bit when I get my next BrickLink order, but here’s a preview of a vignette based on a scene in The Silver Chair:

The Wardrobe

Lucy enters Narnia for the first time through a wardrobe in a spare room, “leaving the door open, of course, because she knew that it is very foolish to shut oneself into any wardrobe.”

(Click the thumbnails to see bigger pictures. Click here to see the gallery once it’s public.)

Final Conan O’Brian Set from Hman

Head on over to his blog to take a look:

http://hmanslair.blogspot.com/

The couches are fantastic. I’ve been old (and employed) for too long to have watched Conan regularly, and so some of the details are lost on me, but Hman has included things like the “Walker Texas Ranger” lever. Since he posts mainly on FBTB forums, Conan is naturally interviewing a stormtrooper and a couple clone troopers. Nice.

Lantern Waste (with a bonus “Ferrari Knight”)

First up today, a new vignette I created over the weekend, based on a scene from C.S. Lewis’ The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (book one of the classic Chronicles of Narnia series):

Now aren’t you mad that M***B***s got the Narnia license for the upcoming movie? More Narnia creations to come soon.

And I couldn’t pass this next one up. “Ferrari Knights” by Brickshelf user nias:

Absolutely original. Absolutely hilarious.

Pump up the volume!

Following on the heels of last week’s Electric Piano, I created a turntable:

The turntable has a working arm, spinning record, green LED screen, and a pair of mini-speakers — all built with exactly ten pieces.

LEGO Diablo II and StarCraft minifigs

Blizzard Entertainment develops many of my favorite games — games in the WarCraft, StarCraft and Diablo “universes.” Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been working on minifigs based on Diablo II:

This week, I also added Terran units from StarCraft:

To be honest, I’ve seen better Terran Marines and Firebats on Brickshelf, but all of them use bricks instead of minifig parts. This is my attempt to build StarCraft minifigs using “normal” minifig parts.

Electric Piano

I enjoy creating minifig versions of the bands and musicians I like, but the only instruments I’d given them so far were very basic guitars. To remedy that, I’ve created what I think is one of my best non-minifig creations in a very long time — an electric piano:

The piano has keys, a music stand, foot pedals, and three legs:

The black keys are hinge pieces and the white keys are 1×1 plates (the latter my wife’s idea). I particularly like how the legs look as though they have casters.

Late Night with Conan O’Brian

A few months back, I created a minifigure of Conan O’Brian:

Earlier today, Hman over on FBTB Forums posted his version, complete with the beginnings of a very nice set:

I really like the head he used, and the guest chair is fantastic! I’d love to see a version with a smaller desk and a full backdrop. Keep up the good work, Hman! (Click the image above for more pictures — don’t miss Conan interviewing a Stormtrooper.)

Minifig Anatomy

Each minifigure you get in a LEGO set usually consists of six components:

A head

One torso part

Two arms

Two hands

Two legs

One hip part

Arms, hands, and the torso always ship as one piece, as do the leg and hip parts. LEGO usually also includes headgear of some sort — a hat, helmet, hair, bandanna — something to cover that little bald stud! Finally, no minifig would be complete without accessories — tools, weapons, and so on. The old construction worker from the 1980’s is an excellent example:

But by taking apart the “default” minifig, you can do nearly anything. Here’s one of my recent favorites:

That’s Cloud Strife from the game Final Fantasy VII, as he appears in Kingdom Hearts. To create Cloud, I used Gilderoy Lockhart’s hair, Draco Malfoy’s head, and a purple cape from the Harry Potter line; Han Solo’s legs and Bib Fortuna’s torso from the Star Wars line (with Bib’s arms replaced with yellow arms and brown hands); a custom wing assembly I borrowed from my own flying Fury design; and a Buster Sword I created using three very basic parts.

Here’s the game art I used as the basis for my design:

I was fairly pleased.

Welcome!

Well, I’ve been online since 1993, and I work in the Engineering department at a software development company — I’m even a technical writer! — but I seem to be a fairly late adopter when it comes to blogs. Oh well…

This blog, or “blocklog,” will be all about those beloved plastic building blocks we all know and love — LEGO! My personal specialty is minifigs that use only out-of-the-box parts. Although I have a few pieces I’ve painted, cut, or otherwise mutilated, I’ve recently decided that’s something I’m going to avoid in the future.

So without further ado, here’s a link to my Brickshelf gallery.

I frequently post on FBTB Forums and Classic-Castle Forums, so post a comment here, or say “Hi!” over there.

Oh, and like the subject says, welcome. ;-)