Category Archives: LEGO

You’d probably expect a lot of the posts on a LEGO website like The Brothers Brick to be about LEGO, and you’d be right. If you’re browsing this page, you might want to consider narrowing what you’re looking for by checking out categories like “Space” and “Castle.” We’re sure there’s something here that’ll fascinate and amaze you.

LEGO Ninjago 71747 The Keepers’ Village [Review]

Lately we’ve been working our way through the new wave of Ninjago sets based on the latest island-themed season. Today we reach our final destination of Ninjago 71747 The Keepers’ Village. This 632 piece offering features five minifigures and a playset full of surprises. It’s available now from the LEGO Shop Online for US $49.99 | CAN $69.99 | UK £44.99. Is this a fitting conclusion to our Island adventures? Are there interesting perks for non-Ninjago fans? Read on and see!

The LEGO Group provided The Brothers Brick with an early copy of this set for review. Providing TBB with products for review guarantees neither coverage nor positive reviews.

Click to read the full hands-on review

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LEGO to stop using black backgrounds in instructions [News]

As reported by our friends over at Brickset, LEGO appears to be making plans to transition away from the use of black backgrounds in instruction manuals. Earlier today, LEGO customer Sam Walker posted an image in a Facebook group of a response he received from LEGO customer service, in which the company states “we’ve been listening to feedback about the background colour in our building instructions. We’ve done lots of testing already and have plans to move away from the black backgrounds entirely.”

The dark backgrounds have been part of the theming for 18+ sets in LEGO’s newly rebranded adult product portfolio that began rolling out last summer. The black manuals have been the source of much frustration for builders, as the low contrast has made it very difficult to discern darker-colored elements, with some disappearing entirely, as we noticed in our review of 10275 Elf Clubhouse.

LEGO has been trying a variety of things to combat the issue, including adding more outlines to elements. Some recent sets, such as 10295 Porsche 911 Turbo & 911 Targa, shipped with black backgrounds in the instruction manual, but the version available for download from LEGO’s website has been updated to include traditional light backgrounds. Other recent 18+ sets, such as 21325 Medieval Blacksmith, included light backgrounds in the printed manual that shipped with the set, though it’s unclear if this is a result of the change already being put into action, or because that set is part of the Ideas product line rather than Creator Expert.

In the response to Sam Walker, LEGO also says that it is working with LEGO designers with color impairment in creating revised manuals.

Waia Konekta

Joss Woodyard shows us that he is not afraid of using color in his LEGO creations. His creation titled Waia Konekta is very vibrant and lovely. There are a few parts in this creation that are used very creatively. The wire connector is used to create a grass necklace of the Waia Konekta. Next to that the wing with feathers gets used quite a lot in a range of different colors. It is used in the grass skirt and in an elaborate headdress. The use of the 12 tooth gear for teeth is quite ingenious, and there is just something about those eyes. They appear to follow you, and it looks like the Waia Konekta can see straight through you. Did I mention this creation reminds me of the mask in Crash Bandicoot?

Cable Clip Chameleon

Builder Joss Woodyard has made a chameleon out of LEGO and it’s simply a small work of art. There are a lot of axle connectors used in this build for the tail and the spine of the creature. I love that it manages to stay true to the color scheme of an actual chameleon. White wedge plate create gaps that resemble the mouth and there is great part use with the pumpkin part used to portray the characteristic eyes which bulge out the side of their head and appear to swivel about in all directions.

The next LEGO House exclusive set revealed: 40502 The Brick Moulding Machine [News]

Today, LEGO reveals the new 40502 The Brick Moulding Machine set. The set becomes the second LEGO House Limited Edition product (joining 40501 The Wooden Duck) and will sell exclusively at the LEGO House starting March 4 for 599 DKK (approximately US $99).

Continue reading →

LEGO Marvel Avengers 76170 Iron Man vs. Thanos [Review]

Younger Builders….ASSEMBLE! The LEGO “4+” line is aimed at junior builders, with simplified designs and larger pieces. Marvel Avengers 76170 Iron Man vs. Thanos is one of them, and will be available March 1st from the LEGO Shop Online for US $19.99 | CAN $24.99 | UK £17.99. But this is a Marvel set, and that means a wider range of fans are going to consider it as well. Is there anything here to tempt them? And what about non-Marvel builders? Come along as we examine just what LEGO has squeezed into this 103 piece set.

The LEGO Group provided The Brothers Brick with an early copy of this set for review. Providing TBB with products for review guarantees neither coverage nor positive reviews.

Click to read the full hands-on review

Parfait por favor

Nobu Tary makes us long for summer with their latest LEGO creation. This built doesn’t use a lot of pieces and it is actually fairly small. The main piece in this creation, which is used beautifully, is the Ninjago tornado spiral. Which works perfectly as an ice cream coupe glass. The white swirl towards the bottom looks like slowly melting ice cream dripping towards the bottom of the glass. The classic baguette piece gets used as a ice cream wafer stick which to me is just brilliant.

Ten years of Ninjago in a single build

How’s this for dedication? Lee Chi Wing (city son) binge-watched all 14 seasons (160 episodes) of Ninjago to make sure the stories and characters were represented correctly in this amazing tribute. The build itself was accomplished in just seven days, too. Take a little time and treat yourself to a close look at this masterpiece.

Who can you spot? Can you name everyone? Identify the seasons? Want some hints? Lee Chi Wing has you covered with a host of images as an answer key!
Continue reading →

From animation to automata [Video]

In 1878, Eadweard Muybridge studied animal locomotion and took a series of pictures of a trotting horse to see every phase in a stride. How? He placed 24 cameras around a racetrack, each 27 inches apart. As the horse trotted past, a tripwire each shutter was snapped. Combined, those pictures became a precursor to motion pictures, and technically, the first GIF. In honor of this, Tobias Munzert has built a mechanical LEGO version that gallops in stride with the original animation.

The mechanics are timed really well to get that genuine look of a horse in motion. If you look closely, you can see that even the head pushes forward slightly. You should also take a closer look at the excellent parts usage on the neck, head, and feet!

While you’re here, check out some more cool horse builds, and other mechanical models.

Functional Febrovery

Febrovery – the annual event where people build space rovers from LEGO. I (Mansur “Waffles” Soeleman) couldn’t say no to building a wheeled space vehicle this month. However, I decided to take a different approach: make it move, make it work, and make it Technical. The result is the Horizon Chariot – a massive, greebly shuttle transporter in a LEGO Classic Space livery. On the outside, it looks like a jumble of layers and pipes, but it’s merely a shell for a complex Technic frame with a working four-wheel drive with a double V8 piston engine, working steering, and soft pendular suspension. My favourite feature turned out to be a working tipping flatbed which launches the small LL-64 Arcade Hopper.

The spaceship belonging to the Horizon Chariot was more of a distraction than an afterthought. I wanted to incorporate a NinjaGo arcade pod into the build as the blue airtight section of Classic Space vehicles. I found it was too small for a big vehicle so why not make a smaller vehicle as part of it? That’s how the aptly named LL-64 Arcade Hopper was born. I just couldn’t stop myself from building a spaceship! With swing-down wings and a smooth underside, it’s really a step away from my usually greebly builds, but it turned out to be a beautiful two-seater shuttle.

Check out the Flickr album to see more photos of the rover and the spaceship!

A plucky little space patrol craft

Flying through space is not at all like dusting crops, junior. While any self-respecting spaceship tasked with defending a planet wouldn’t be seen without a decent cannon, there are other dangers outside the safety of the atmosphere. Alvaro Gunawan knows about some of these dangers, like solar radiation, and maintaining full power at all times, so they equipped their patrol ship with shields, solar fins, and a couple of big engines. This craft even looks like something NASA or SpaceX might come up with… maybe we’ll live to see something like this sweeping the space around our little rock someday.

You see cake, I see ghosts

There is a neat LEGO part that comes with the Friends Baking Competition set as well as a couple of others. It’s the 2×2 cake topper. Most of us see that part and may likely use it for what it’s intended for; a cake bit. But Seung Hun Park saw it as something a bit more unsettling. He artfully constructed a Candle Ghost using the cake topper as melted wax. It’s as is Lumière from Beauty and the Beast had morphed into something from Silent Hill. The single eye on each candle and the tongues made from minifig flippers make for a nice, creepy touch.