For my latest creation I wanted to use the unique canopies from the UCS Slave I set. They formed a nice bubble so I decided to build a futuristic bubble boat. The initial photos taken against a standard poster board backdrop didn’t do the model justice, so I decided to photograph using real water dyed with food coloring.
Every week this month, we’re giving away a signed copy of the new LEGO Star Wars Build Your Own Adventure. Every model in the book was designed by our own Rod Gillies! To enter the second copy we’re giving away in August, click here.
We’ll also send each winner a snazzy TBB T-shirt and other cool swag, but thanks in particular to Rod and our friends at DK for the books!
Every so often you come across a model which makes you sit up straight and PAY ATTENTION. This unusual mech from tankm does exactly that. The combination of atypical shaping, the double cockpit, and the in-your-face color scheme creates immediate standout from the crowd of regular LEGO mechs which appear on a regular basis. However, this model isn’t all just bluster and noise, there are also some great building details which reward a closer inspection.
I’m not sure if this is a walker or a flyer, or some sort of chimeric combination of the two — the rear view suggests this bad boy can take to the air if it needs to. All I really know is this thing looks like a two-headed death pigeon decked out for a Blacktron parade. I like it.
Johnnie Brick Xavier shares with us an unusual ritual of petal harvesting as it seen on some faraway planet inhabited with robots. We don’t know why they need these petals, or what they call these weird looking flowers, but at least we can be sure that the harvest will be rich this season.
Technically speaking, using of a specific part in high quantities doesn’t always result into something this beautiful. Johnnie made a great choice of pieces for this vignette and managed to recognize an unusual shape of quite an ordinary plate 1 x 2 with towball on side.
Michał Kaźmierczak has posted this lovely security base, orbiting the sun in the Kuiper Belt. The base has tucked itself into one of the many, many objects in the belt, which I imagine is hugely helpful, given the amount of raw materials one could find there. The presentation is just lovely. I particularly like the thought and care given to how to build the security base as if it’s part of the rock itself, which gives the whole build a very otherworldly feel.
…but these Star Wars figures just may be the coolest ones around. We covered Omar Ovalle‘s Endor Trooper last month, but Omar’s been busy since then converting lots of LEGO Technic figures into awesome Star Wars characters. The Technic figures, which LEGO produced from the late 80s to the early 2000s, are considerably larger than traditional minifigures and have a lot more poseability. The size also allows more accurate scaling with small characters, like Yoda and the Jawas, who both look quite good as minifigures next to the Technic figs. Boba Fett definitely takes the cake for the best looking figure though, as he blasts his way out of the Sarlacc pit.
Click to see more Star Wars Technic figures
Kołobrzeg Lighthouse is located in Kołobrzeg on the Polish coast of the Baltic Sea. Piotr Machalski has build a very nice rendition of this landmark in LEGO, capturing its curvaceous architecture in brick form. The real lighthouse is is a red brick cylindrical tower that emits a light that can been seen nearly 30km away. There are lots of techniques for creating curves from LEGO, many of which hail from builders who favour castle-themed creations, but it’s always nice to see similar techniques used for other types of building. The main central portion uses a mix of round and regular bricks but the outer wall is all about the power of bending LEGO.
This lighthouse we blogged previously uses a similar technique as the main tower in Piotr’s build.
Fresh from delighting us with a rusty hot rod, Austrian builder sanellukovic turns his building skills to more organic shapes with his Midgardsnake creation. The curves and scales of this mythical water-serpent have been captured brilliantly with some nice use of slopes and smart color choices. Whilst the splashes and water running from the serpent’s body are well made, the mix of trans-clear and trans-black plates used for the water itself is just inspired. I can’t say I’ve ever noticed that particular combination being used like this before — it certainly creates a great impression of water in motion. Lovely stuff.
Jason Briscoe has shared an excellent space rover featuring multiple trailers. It was part of a collaborative display at the recent Portugal fan weekend, with many of the attendees bringing along a trailer design based on the common chassis. I was lucky enough to see Jason’s contribution “in the brick” at the Bricktastic show and they’re lovely little models.
Miguel Reizinho came up with the original design for the trailers. It’s a smart little build and clearly made for a good solid base for the participants to riff on. Nice work. I love when little collaborations spring up like this — especially ones that cross borders. It reminds me our hobby is an international one, and that plastic bricks speak their own language.
When The Matrix came out in 1999, it was groundbreaking for many reasons and gave rise to plenty of cultural references. And then they made two more movies: The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions. Regardless of your opinions on the quality of the later movies, they both had some redeeming features. This little version (by David Lipton) of an epic truck crash happens to be one of them.
I particularly love the use of cheese slopes to emulate the crumpled truck effect. It works very well! I’m also strongly reminded of Mythbuster’s Compact Compact myth, which was equally awesome.
Soviet engineers were people with great imagination. Of course, at that time they didn’t have access to LEGO bricks, but even today their peculiar projects look awesome in plastic. Polish builder Ciamosław Ciamek presents Ushakov’s Flying Submarine — a hybrid of a military airplane and a submarine. Not only does it sound cool, it also looks cool. It’s gray, cold and bizarre even for an ambitious Soviet project.
Lee Young has nailed it with these super-cute chibi Mobile Police Patlabor mecha models. Despite the dinky scale and super-deformed proportions, these guys still have an impressive chunky heft about them. They look like they’d just relish the opportunity to suppress your street protest.
Lee has been building a few mecha figures at this scale recently. Check out this pretty damn awesome rendition of Optimus Prime using your local downtown for cover…
