It was hard to pick which photo I was going to post of Calin’s (_Tiler) sleek BMW rat rod, because as Vaughan James so accurately described, his “photography is like LEGO car porn”. So I will just post a small selection.
I am admittedly not a ‘car guy’, but I do enjoy a gnarly looking vehicle like the best of them. Also the fact that Calin was able to fit an entire minifig in at this scale earns big time bonus points.
Check out the rest of the ‘LEGO Car Porn’ in the full photoset.
Since both brickshelf and flickr seem to be down right now, I went outside my comfort zone and had a look at MOCpages. And after discussing the excellent “Guardian of the Emerald” creation by LukeClarenceVan I’m very glad I did. The sea serpent uses a great set of multiple textural techniques, including some nice water effect, and the diorama itself is well set up. Great work all around.
Sean and Steph Mayo have cranked their building skills to overdrive to bring us two back-to-back creations featuring real fire and water. The first is a spinning flame sculpture called Green Fire Tornado, and the second is a beautiful terrarium with a working waterfall. There are no limits to what can be built with Lego when these two are at work.
Régis Gamba (Anio) is a French builder whose UCS Star Wars models were first known to me through Brickshelf. His latest is a UCS speeder bike, which you can see more photos on his Flickr set.
Thanks for the tip TheBrickAvenger!
One of the things I noticed fairly soon after I moved to the UK (not being a native speaker of English) was that, despite being taught English in school, watching too many American TV series, reading English books and being able to hold my own in conversations about my work in English, I still had some gaping holes in my vocabulary. My job in the UK involved doing experiments in a wind-tunnel, which included working closely together with lab technicians. I could handle their southern English accents, but the names of tools were often completely beyond me, apart from really obvious ones such as a hammer or a screwdriver. If MacGyver never used one, I was basically lost.
David Hawkins (davidhawkins. 1964) has built these very accurate-looking carpenter’s tools in LEGO, which, besides being nice and decently photographed models, instantly reminded me of the time I didn’t know what a wood plane was called and went: “It’s one of those things you use to remove the surface of wood”, only to be handed a chisel. Anyway, you try to name all of these tools in a language that isn’t your own!
I don’t think I’d want to be on the wrong side of this one. It’s not often that I see a helicopter design that looks original, but this one by flickr user piratesxlovexrum is awesome. It’s aggressive and bold, and looks vaguely Soviet-inspired. And I have to point out that great bit of photography.
This mind-blowing working compound crossbow is completely LEGO, and made by builders extraordinaire Sean and Steph Mayo (Siercon and Coral). Be sure to check out the video of it in action! Not only does it shoot, even the cables are made from LEGO train electronics wires.
The Brothers Brick snagged a quick interview with Sean and Steph about this awesome creation:
The Brothers Brick: Where did you get your inspiration?
Sean and Steph: We wanted to use LEGO to shoot a projectile, building something other than a catapult or a trebuchet. We’ve seen lots of epic brick built guns online, and thought it would be tons of fun to create a custom Lego compound bow. This quickly evolved into crossbow for extra stability, as the bow is under tons of tension.
TBB: How long did this build take?
S&S: We probably spent a week playing around with the different mechanics. We had a lot to figure out about the flexibility of LEGO pieces under stress, how much the train cables could take, and which pieces would be useful for the cams. Once that was sorted the actual construction in a couple days.
TBB: Why a compound Crossbow, wouldn’t it have been enough to just create a bow?
S&S: A regular bow honestly would probably have been more effective as a lot of the natural flexibility of the LEGO pieces makes them more conducive to a recurve bow rather than a compound bow. But for ages we’ve been fascinated by the cams, idler wheels, and the mechanics of a compound bow, so we wanted to give it a try!
TBB: How many pieces did you use?
S&S: We usually don’t count the pieces we used, and have no clue how some builders do it, but we estimate around 1700 pieces.
TBB: How far can it shoot/how much would it hurt?
S&S: Disregarding the outliers, it can shoot around 40 feet. As a bow without the compound element it could shoot farther, but we couldn’t resist trying to build the cams. As far as how much damage it can deliver, we’re not entirely sure. We have yet to shoot anyone with it, and it is tipped with a flexible rubber lego (both for the competition this was built for and to minimize any accidental injury). It can likely stick into drywall with a sharp enough tip, but not much else.
TBB: What is it designed from? Is this from a video game or something similar?
S&S: This is an original design, but influenced by the Spartan Laser aesthetic from the Halo series. We also wanted to use the green spikes as viper fangs, so we tried to stick with venomous snake inspired highlights. We picture this to be something a Green Arrow vigilante might carry around.
Be sure to check out some of Sean and Steph’s previous insanely awesome creations, like the giant sushi roll and Cortana hologram.
Mark and Steven Erickson have done it again. This castle is gorgeous…truly a piece of art. I love how each feature is seamlessly integrated in the an outstanding whole. Rockwork, mottled walls, foliage and figs are all crafted into a spectacular sum that is greater than its parts.
If I were to describe the work of Jonas (LEGOLIZE IT MAN) I think the most appropriate word would be ‘stylish’. It is relatively easy to make a LEGO spaceship and take a picture of it. It is another thing altogether to make it look legitimately cool. Perhaps I am biased, but I would tend to think that your average person seeing this (whether being a LEGO fan or not) would say, “Well that looks rad!”
If Jonas were to publish a coffee table book full of prints of his work, I would buy it immediately. I would read it…and then I would be inspired to build cool LEGO sci-fi things.
I like it when people’s builds make me want a coffee table book full of them.
This sweet mobile fighting platform by Garry features the same cockpit and hull, and then adds legs, rotors, and whatnot onto it to turn it into different weaponized vehicles, all of which look totally BA.
Apparently, there’s more than one contest involving the new small VW camper set going on right now. In addition to the Star Wars Contest mentioned by Tromas, it seems that Eurobricks is hosting a contest, too.
I was tipped off when I spotted this cool moon camper by Tyler Sky (Bricksky). The idea of a moon buggy hauling around little habitats really struck my fancy, and I had to post it here.
Harley Davidson is still going strong, but in the sixties competition by Japanese motorcycle manufacturers almost drove them out of business. Japanese bikes, such as this Kawasaki Vulcan modeled by LegoMarat, don’t have the same ‘swag’ as hogs, but there’s something to be said for a bike that works every time you start it and that doesn’t make your teeth rattle when idling (or so I’ve been told). Irrespective of whether you like Japanese bikes or not, this one does make for a very nice model.
When I first saw it, I wasn’t quite sure I was looking at LEGO. Part of that is due to the windscreen, which indeed isn’t LEGO, but it’s also because of the nice amount of chrome, clever combination of parts for the headlight and just the right level of detail.