My photostream is currently flooded with Vic Vipers so I felt impelled to post two that really jumped out at me.
Christoph Monnaie’s (stenrtje) is loaded up with all sorts of awesome detail and greebly goodness.
Rodney Bistline’s (Buster®) contribution literally leaps out of the screen in this lovely homage to vintage space box art.
Dead Frog inc. has rolled out the cutest little tank ever. Dubbed “T3f”, it incorporates are the all the essential features of a battlefield death-dealer with the drop-dead cuteness of a kitten.
This 19th of November marks the 150th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. The Battle of Gettysburg, which took place several months before, was the bloodiest battle of the American civil war and many of the dead were hastily buried in temporary graves. They were subsequently reburied in what was to become the Gettysburg National Cemetery. The Address was one of several speeches that marked the official consecration of the cemetery.
Gary Brooks (Gary the Procrastinator), who is no stranger to TBB, has expertly recreated the scene of President Lincoln giving the speech. At the time, the reception of the speech was mixed, but it has gained a prominent place in the history and culture of the United States.
For some reason, a lot of military builders choose to build their military vehicles in dark grey. I suspect that it is because more suitable colors, such as tan, dark green or olive green, are expensive and because relatively few parts are made in them. Of course, if you do want a color that is available in vast quantities, you could always opt for a United Nations color scheme. This is exactly what Project Azazel has done for two of his new vehicles: an M113 Armored Personnel Carrier and a Armored Infantry Fighting Vehicle (AIFV).
The M113 was developed in the mid-fifties, when the US Army needed a new Armored Personnel Carrier. It had to be smaller and lighter than existing vehicles, so that it could be transported aboard the then-new C-130 Hercules airlifter. The key to keeping the weight of the M113 down was a new welding technique that allowed using aluminum for the armor instead of steel. It first entered production in the 60s and is still in use with the US Army and many export customers all over the world. It also spawned many different versions, including the AIFV. This was a more modern and more heavily armed version. It wasn’t adopted by the US Army, but was further developed for export customers, including the Netherlands, Belgium, Turkey and South Korea.
One thing I like about the model vehicles, besides their refreshing white paint scheme, is that they don’t appear to be ridiculously large.
Considering this car is built on a 4×7 stud footprint and is still instantly recognizable is quite the feat. I am not even a huge car guy and I immediately knew what it was. But should we expect much else from Raphy Granas?
Back in June, I posted a collection of Eighties film and TV vehicles, which at that time consisted of four cars (and fifth one that wasn’t in the picture). Lots of people offered me suggestions for which vehicles to build next and I kept going.
Top row from left to right: American Graffiti, The A-Team, Back to the Future, Batman (1989), Blues Brothers, The Dukes of Hazzard; middle row: Ghostbusters, Gone in 60 Seconds (2000), Inspector Morse, Knight Rider, Magnum P.I., Miami Vice; bottom row: Mr. Bean, Only Fools and Horses, Starsky & Hutch, Terminator II Judgement Day, Tomb raider and Top Gear.
By now, a few months later, I’ve got 18 vehicles. They are not all from the Eighties anymore and a few British ones sneaked in. I am really enjoying building these. Unlike many LEGO car builders, I don’t have it in me to come up with my own cool or custom car designs. I tend to build scale models of existing vehicles and most are bog-standard production versions. The cars that are the stars in movies and TV series, however, are often a bit more flamboyant. Building them means I still get to build the scale models I like so much, but with a few extra sprinkles on top and the often funny characters that go with them. There are a few obvious vehicles still missing from my collection, such as cars from any of the James Bond movies, but I am not about to stop this any time soon.
I am currently enjoying reruns of Star Trek The Next Generation on Belgian TV. When I saw the first episode a few weeks ago, many years after I first saw it, I was a bit surprised at how dated the series looks nowadays and how young most of the actors were. Of course, many Trekkies consider Captain Picard, Cdr. Riker and their crew to be young upstarts. The real Starship Enterprise is captained by Kirk, with Spock serving as his first officer and Uhura, ‘Bones’ McCoy, Chechov, ‘Scotty’ and Sulu making up the rest of the cast.
Ryan Ziegelbauer (rionz) has recreated all of them in miniland form. Despite the limitations inherent to building miniland figures, to me they are all instantly recognisable. The only thing missing is a cardboard set that wobbles slightly!
Welcome to another action-packed night in The Brothers Brick Arena. For you, our faithful fans, we have some stealthy, high-flying action as our competitors duke it out in the air! In the Red Corner, raining down death from above, we have Dan Siskind‘s Black Hawk. In the Blue Corner, with an awesome 80s theme song, Alex Jones and his Airwolf. So get comfortable there on the edge of your seat, as rotors fly and giants collide in this week’s edition of Friday Night Fights!
“UCS Stealth Black Hawk”
“Airwolf”
Last week, Karf’s grasshopper got crushed and eaten by Mihai’s Owl with a score of 7 to 1. Cast your vote, via the super secret ballot box/comments, to decide who rides the waves of victory and who goes crying home to mama!
Builder Patrick Biggs (DViddy) says this was is meant to be a representation of a fellow fan, but whatever it is, it’s pretty awesome. The blue and yellow make a snappy color scheme, and I love the integration of System and Bionicle elements in a nearly seamless fashion.
I haven’t posted one of my own builds in awhile, so thought I would share this one. I had to build a Medieval Feast with a 16×16 stud footprint for a challenge in which I’m involved. I have to say that I’m liking the Lord of the Rings elves much more than I expected.
As a child, back in the Eighties, I had a poster of Lego set 5580 Highway Rig, above my bed and I know I’m not the only LEGO car builder who fancied that particular model. However, if there would have been poster of the Lamborghini Countach built by Rolling Bricks back then, I might have replaced the poster with its image.
The Countach was the maddest supercar of the Eighties. It was super fast and hugely impractical and had a shape that was out of this world. The LEGO version is pretty much super too. Check out the clever half-stud offsets for the front fender and the SNOT work used for the rear one as well. In fact, every time I look at this model I notice some clever combination of parts and it wouldn’t be complete without working scissor doors. It’s hard to imagine this car being done better on this scale.
Shelly Timson is the creator of this work of art. She wanted to build a Tardis for the upcoming 50th anniversary of the iconic show, Doctor Who (just ten days away as of this writing!). She asked Rob Deakin, founder of the studio Inside the Brick, if she could use the studio’s supply of Dark Blue bricks. Over four thousand bricks and three weeks later this lovely Tardis emerged. The TARDIS, along with other creations, is on display at the Studio in Fairfield, a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria in Australia.
Check out the Flickr Set for more pictures and detail. Flickr comments have been disabled on all the pictures except for this one. If you want to tell Rob how awesome this build is, I’m sure he will be passing the comments on back to the builder.