Tag Archives: Animals

Cute forest animals abound at the Everdell Castle

I love how hobbies or interests are able to bring people together. I am quite the LEGO nerd and thanks to LEGO and its community, I’ve met so many lovely people. My partner on the other hand is quite the board game geek and thanks to him I got sucked into the community that comes with the dice. What never stops to amaze me is the amount of love that goes into designing board games. John Snyder and Isaac Snyder drew inspiration from the game ‘Everdell’. The game is filled with cute forest critters and almost magical surroundings. For their latest build, they decided to give the ‘Castle’ card the LEGO treatment.

The castle wall looks really organic and irregular at the top due to a fine selection of pieces. We can find dinosaur tails, spider legs and plant limbs used for the wooden castle gate. Each wooden beam gets adorned with a white horn, claw, cone, lever base, or a bulb to represent fresh snow. The main tower has a crazy angle to it and I can’t figure out how the bricks are connected at the place of the angle. My guess is flex tubing but I might be wrong. It may as well be friction and gravity. There are cattle horns used in brown as architectural details. We get flags made out of pentagonal tiles with a little crown attached to it with a rubber band, which looks like a little layer of fresh snow on the top of the flag. The inhabitants of the castle are LEGO animals, which makes this build less than minifigure scale, which allows for parts to be used in a very original way. The skis used for doors look massive and add a sense of grandeur to the castle. Have you spotted the brave little blue hamster defending the castle?

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Happiness is a puppy under the Christmas tree

Dog owners know how much joy a new doggie brings to the household. They can be a lot of work at times, they get into things you wouldn’t even imagine, but when your new pup finally settles in that’s when the magic happens. LEGO builder Timofey Tkachev likely knows what I mean as evidenced by this darling little fur baby under the tree. That playful expression, the squeaky ball, even the DOTS watchband used as a collar are all brilliant details.

You can see this precious little scamp from all angles with this short video.

Brachiosaurus the Zoid Destroyer

Oh, Zoids. For those hip to this classic mecha series, it’s hard not to get excited when you see something like this pop up in your feed. When I see builders like Juan Fernando Vargas Correa celebrating the series with such massive LEGO models, I swell with nostalgia. I mean, Gundams get tons of love (as they should) but Zoids are rarely celebrated as much as they deserve. This model, which he calls a Brachiosaurus, is based on the Ultrasaurus. It’s giant body is designed to serve as a mobile command center with some serious armaments. Two massive, long-ranged Supercannons are mounted on its side along with a plethora of other weapons lining its shoulders, tail, and chest. Not only does it pack a punch but it can take one too. The builder’s color blocking and plating show off the massive amount of armor necessary for such a ginormous, lumbering beast to defend itself in battle.

This thing is truly large and would be a beast to build. Hopefully it has lots of little vehicles and tiny Zoids to go with it, just like the kits would. That launch pad on its back certainly would hint at it, right? Builder Juan Correa will surely continue to impress with his awesome recreations and re-imaginings of these beloved toys.

MPU: mammoth parts usage...

We like builds with NPU. They showcase the limitless creativity of people when it comes to utilising a weird LEGO element in a unique way. Character builder Eero Okkonen is no stranger to odd but innovative parts in his wonderful builds. And he is no stranger to Bionicle either, from which his myriad of character builds originate. This time he takes this opportunity to include a part many had difficulty integrating into their creations: the Rahkshi back. And it works so well that I will now think of that part as “Mammoth forehead.” Thanks Eero!

And also thank you for planting the idea of Bionicle x Ice Age crossover in my head.
It was Scrat who awakened the Bohrok swarms…

I never get tired of a good octopus

I can think of no creature on this earth more mysterious and otherworldly than the Octopus, with its lack of any bones, three hearts, and 8 seemingly autonomous arms, and a magical grace in the water. I’m not the only one who is a fan of the octopi (one of few creatures with multiple plural forms to go with their other multiple parts) Jens Ohrndorf has put together a simple but interesting model of an octopus seeking a crab lunch. While the use of tires is great at the base of the arms, I am most impressed with the clever use of a space rock to form the large body.

An adorably unconventional couple

The holidays are approaching and gifts are on everyone’s minds. Though this time of year always brings its challenges, any gift-giving occasion can be a builder’s excuse to create something personal with LEGO. For instance, figure builder Mike Nieves recently gifted his newlywed friends this elegant fox posing in the snow with a fluffy penguin. Presumably their favorite animals, I’m sure the couple was delighted to receive this gift. I do wonder if they used them as cake toppers though.

Taking a look at the models individually, we can see that the builder had a good idea of the necessary forms and connections. The penguin’s thick, grey body consists of two mirrored sections of stacked plates and slopes. Modified plates are used as happy little feet peeking out from under the body. The wings’ connections are hidden but hinged, allowing it to flap about adorably. The rotating head even has a tiny opening mouth, which is pretty cute.

The fox is rather impressive. The slender, brick-built face closely matches the natural angles of the animal and this trend continues down the body. Clever connection points allow Mike to build out from a central core to achieve the fox’s figure. The chest is fluffy and the paws really stand out but that tail is the true star. I mean, the way the color blocking takes advantage of the structure is just smart.

It’s worth taking a look at the back of the fox to get a better idea of how it’s put together. Plus, I just wanted to look at that tail again. Achieving curves like that with LEGO is difficult and Mike really did well with both of these. What a great wedding gift for LEGO fans.

A silent raven’s call

This brick-built model of the common raven is a bit deceptive. Builder Felix Jaensch has a portfolio of impressive animal-inspired models but this raven seems to break the mold. Cleverly concealed in the sloping bricks along its back is a hidden button that allows the raven’s head and jaw to move. Pressing it gives the impression the model is calling out, albeit without the gurgling croak this bird often makes. This silent figure can’t audibly torment you, but it’s still a perfectly creepy build for this season.

Just looking at the model, it’s almost impossible to tell that it can move. The whole thing is a sturdy, brick-built structure that renders the bird in the traditional LEGO cuboid, pixelated form. Compare the below image with the above and you’ll only see tiny bits of movement in the neck. A change in angle of the structure holding the beak as the head moves down makes the smallest movements have big effects. Continue reading →

In the belly of the bass

Okay, so maybe it’s not a bass – it’s a European perch. But I couldn’t help using the alliteration there. This LEGO recreation of the perch, built by Jannis Mavrostomos, has some nice body-shaping and a good use of parts. But it’s really what’s on the inside (or flipside) that makes this build unique!

Click to see what the other side looks like!

Unwind your day with a wind-up penguin

Weekends are the days that I reserve to unwind from a busy week, and what better way to do it than to let the pressure off and wind up someone, or in this case, a feature of a wind-up penguin. This cute and clever waddling was created by Peter Zieske . It’s always a delight to see how the LEGO curvy shell element is used to shape the belly of this flightless bird.

Watch it in action, and don’t forget to wait to the end for the blooper reel.

The mechanical Huntsman never stops its search for prey

In usual fashion, builder Mitsuru Nikaido is back with another Mechanical Creature. This time it’s a Huntsman spider with some heavy Matrix vibes. This builder always has clever parts usage paired with an iconic color scheme that is simple but recognizable.

This model’s feature part would probably be the skis used in each of the spindly legs. But if you look closely, they’re also in the mouth of this creepy guy. Runner-up for parts usage would be the hinged bar holder, which is used to add some rigidity to the legs as well as to emulate the spider’s eight eyes. That Sentinel-style cephalothorax is a tight build that uses a Hero factory chest plate and hinged panels to hide its inner workings.

The abdomen continues the trend of the hinged panels to capture its curves. I always love how Mitsuru uses hoses and angled tiles in his models.

Hopefully, we never have these running around like the Boston Dynamic Spot bots showing up more prevalently nowadays. I will have no defenses against their terror.

Toucan play that game.

A childhood spent watching sugary cereal commercials has conditioned me to believe that toucan beaks are some sort of highly advanced, fruit-detecting radar system. If that’s not true, don’t tell me. I’d rather not know. Regardless, Lee Nuo’s take on the keel-billed variety of toucan has got enough bright colors to give me some serious Saturday morning flashbacks. And they’re all pretty spot-on accurate to the real thing; from the lime green bill to the medium blue legs and toes (which make clever use of some minifigure hands). It all pops brilliantly against the body, made mostly from black Technic panels.

The delicate hum of nature

Hummingbirds are truly miraculous little creatures. It’s incredible how something so small and delicate can achieve such monumental tasks. For example, they can migrate hundreds of miles between the summer and winter seasons. Builder LEGO Monkey pays tribute to these little guys with this great vignette, and the composition is nicely done. The tall blades of grass, “large” flower, and broken stick set the scale well. I’m particularly fond of the little ladybug, created using the minifigure costume element attached to a stud with Black Panther ears to cap it off.

If you like this, check out our other nature related builds! In particular, we have loads of examples of excellent LEGO birds.