Tag Archives: BrickCon

BrickCon happens the first weekend in October every year in Seattle. BrickCon is the longest continuously running LEGO fan convention in the world, and it’s also our favorite LEGO con! Learn more (and consider attending yourself) at BrickCon.org.

Chicago Vic Viper fly-in remembers nnenn – fly-ins coming to DC and Seattle [News]

To commemorate the passing in April of Nate “nnenn” Nielson, each of the three LEGO conventions over the summer and fall are hosting Vic Viper fly-ins. Keith Goldman gives us a glimpse into the Chicago fly-in earlier this month.

Two weeks ago in Chicago, I had the pleasure of organizing the first Vic Viper fly-in, in honor of our departed friend and fellow builder Nate “nnenn” Nielson.

LEGO Vic Viper missing man formation

72 Vipers from 66 builders joined the missing-man formation from a total of 7 countries: Australia, Bermuda, Canada, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, U.K. and the USA. We kept the center of the layout open in the tradition of missing man formations, with nnenn’s rubber-band holder avatar as a placeholder. The public was drawn in by the amazing Vipers, and more often than not stayed for the story behind it.

Thanks again to all the participants that made the formation an outstanding tribute to Nate. Special thanks to Ley Ward for his time and patience, and skill with the dozen or so Vipers that arrived with “some assembly required”. For a detailed list of participants, please follow the link to my Flickr-posting and check the notes.

The formation was a moving experience for many of the builders involved, and we’d all like to express our condolences again to the Nielson family. Nnenn was missed in Chicago and will clearly be missed around the planet.

Both of the upcoming LEGO conventions, BrickFair in August and BrickCon in October, will also be hosting missing man formations to honor Nate. If you would like to participate in either of these formations, you can contact Dan Rubin (for BrickFair) and Andrew Becraft (for BrickCon).

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AFOL: A Blocumentary by Jess Gibson

Documentary filmmaker Jess Gibson has just completed a 30-minute movie about adult fans of LEGO here in the Pacific Northwest. You can watch the complete “AFOL: A Blocumentary” right here:

AFOL A Blocumentary from Jess Gibson on Vimeo.

Jess attended BrickCon 2009, joined us for a SEALUG meeting, and interviewed many fans who’ll be familiar to readers of The Brothers Brick:

The description on Vimeo says that this is the “first in a series of Blocumentaries about the Adult Fans of LEGO,” so we’re looking forward to more from Jess Gibson in the future.

Announcing “Big in Japan” – collaborative display for TBB readers at BrickCon 2010

A LEGO zombie apocalypse is so last year (and the year before that). We’re pleased to announce that the collaborative display that The Brothers Brick will be coordinating this fall at BrickCon in Seattle will be inspired by the rich history and culture of Japan.

Like these wonderful characters from Hayao Miyazaki’s My Neighbor Totoro by Iain Heath (Ochre Jelly) — elements of the “Miyazakitopia” section Iain is planning for the display — we’ll welcome creations spanning many different eras and building styles. Part of the fun of a collaborative display is figuring out how to fit it all together once all the builders and their creations arrive at the convention!

From the epic Battle of Sekigahara to Godzilla battling Mothra in retro-future Tokyo, both reality and fiction from the Land of the Rising Sun provide plenty of inspiration for great LEGO creations.

Many of my earliest posted LEGO creations were inspired by the legends and history of land where I was born, and I’m personally looking forward to building again from that cultural heritage.

This is the earliest we’ve announced a collaborative display — for good reason. We hope that Big in Japan will inspire some truly different LEGO creations (like Proudlove‘s dekotora), alongside the iconic samurai and mecha we expect. From sketching designs to buying the parts you need on Bricklink, planning substantial contributions to the display may take the next eight or nine months.

As in years past, we’ll have prizes and giveaways, though we’re still working out the details about what those might be. In the meantime, break out those Kurosawa DVDs, crack open some Natsume Soseki novels, and start building!

Weekly LEGO news roundup for October 10 (and 2), 2009 [News]

We skipped a week last Saturday for BrickCon, so here we go with a two-week roundup.

Dan & Nannan in LEGO Book: Our fellow bloggers Dan and Nannan are featured in a new LEGO Book from DK.
Ben 10: The new Ben 10 figures evoke the dreaded Galidor for many of us. But are they really that bad if they help sell LEGO?
LEGO Atlantis: Reactions to the first high-res pics of 2010 LEGO Atlantis sets are rather more positive. They’re kind of like Space Police … under the sea!
BrickCon 2009: The biggest LEGO fan convention west of the Mississippi happened in Seattle last weekend, with five of our seven contributors in attendance. I’ve written a wrap-up, as well as an “after-action review” of Zombie Apocafest 2009.
LSWVD out: The new LEGO Star Wars Visual Dictionary has also just been released, and includes an exclusive Ceremonial Luke minifig (though early reports indicate some issues with the fig’s quality).
Yarrr!!!: A new LEGO Pirates set, 10210 Imperial Flagship, was unveiled at events in the US and UK. Pirate fans rejoice the world over.
Winter Toy Shop: Though the Pirates Advent Calendar won’t be pillaging American shores this year, 10199 Winter Toy Shop may assuage the holiday LEGO needs of North American LEGO fans.

Doctor Who visits BrickCon 2009

Through a fortunate series of events, Alan McMorran was in Seattle last weekend and dropped by BrickCon for a day. When he wasn’t hanging out with the zombie overlords, he was taking a really cool set of pictures featuring his Doctor Who minifig and LEGO TARDIS.

Here, the good Doctor manages to avoid Josh’s motorized dragon in a cave, part of a massive LEGO Castle display with a 2,000-minifig battle.

Check out all of Alan’s Doctor Who adventure photos on Flickr.

(And in case you’ve missed it, I’ve updated my BrickCon 2009 wrap-up post with more links.)

Zombie Apocafest 2009: After-Action Review

Zombie Apocafest 2009 has come and gone. The undead have been blown up, shot up, and mulched to oblivion. The humans stand victorious among the ruins of their civilization. Fortunately, that civilization was, by good fortune, built from LEGO, and it can be rebuilt, brick by little plastic brick.

Check out the full gallery of Zombie Apocafest 2009 photos in Thanel’s photostream on Flickr.

The display this year was more than double the size of last year’s, with 17 tables covered in all manner of buildings and vehicles, ranging from little mini-tanks to a fig-scale tanker. Once again, we had the organizational genius of LEGOLAND Master Model Maker Gary McIntire laying out the city, with major contributions from other LEGOLAND staffers, including Ryan Wood (Port ChiefLUG) and Joel Baker (awesome zombie head).

As announced before BrickCon, we had four prize categories. Here are the winners:

Best Original Vehicle: Lino’s Zombie Killin’ Gay Pride Float
Best Apocafied LEGO Vehicle: Tommy Williamson’s motorized 7636 Combine
Best Original Building: Abandoned factory by Justin Pratt
Best Apocafied LEGO Building: Paul Hetherington’s Dark Carousel (hard to believe it’s an undead 10196 Grand Carousel!)

A huge “Thank you!” to BrickArms for their awesome contributor’s weapons packs, and to Valve for a batch of wicked Left 4 Dead 2 T-shirts!

So, how do these things work? What does it take to pull together a collaborative LEGO layout that covers a couple hundred square feet of display space? What have we learned after running a display at a LEGO convention for two years? Off we go…

It’s not as easy as it looks

Soliciting “cornerstone” LEGO creations, recruiting lots of good builders, and working with sponsors and partners is hard work. Similarly, planning for enough space with convention organizers takes time.

Know your audience

Despite my rather chirpy online persona, I have a subversive streak a mile wide. This manifests itself in my political vignettes and the occasional snarky comment. Before BrickCon 2008, a large-scale collaborative display of undead LEGO minifigs overrunning a Cafe Corner city, built by the adults who read The Brothers Brick, seemed like a reasonably subversive idea. I think last year’s display worked so well because that’s precisely what it was.

As cool as I think this year’s display turned out to be, it was a little spread out, and it was rather heavy on the small vehicles with spikes and ladders. The world really needs to be a nicer place than the purely ironic perspective some espouse, but really, some measure of self-referential irony would’ve been welcome.

I’m not a parent, and I don’t judge others’ parenting styles (okay, I do, but only a little bit). But it’s hard for me to imagine encouraging interest in the hyper-violent world of flesh-eating zombies and brain-smashing survivors. The subversive and ironic aspects of a zombie apocalypse built out of LEGO are likely lost on the 11-14 set.

A good idea is better than free stuff

Let’s be honest: The kiddies like the BrickArms, and will do just about anything for prototypes.

We’re big fans of the high-quality custom accessories produced by Will Chapman and his team, and can’t believe how generous they are. Will donated 35 packs of weapons for contributors, including hand-produced cricket bats at our request. Wow.

Nevertheless, we’ve all seen the “wil U trad wit me? kthxby” mentality on display in recent months, and I have to admit that the display this year seemed to attract a bit more interest from the 11-14 set than I’d anticipated.

In fact, there were at least two kids who leaned over the barricades during the public hours, asked to put one minifig on the display and asked for a contributor’s pack. Seriously, kids? The answer to both questions was — and will remain — a firm “No.” (I did let them take a picture of their figs on the display. I’m not a total jerk.)

Overall, I’m happy about how things went with Zombie Apocafest 2009, but it will be the last Zombie Apocafest, and I don’t plan for us to repeat themes from year to year. I’m even happier to report that we’re changing things up for next year. We’ve run our BrickCon 2010 display idea by a few attendees, and we’ll be announcing next year’s theme shortly. Plans are already underway…

BrickCon 2009: Andrew’s wrap-up [News]

Like years past, BrickCon 2009 was both exhausting and exhilarating. Bear with us as we travel home, sort through photos, and put our thoughts in writing. I’ll update this post over the next couple of days, along with a full write-up of Zombie Apocafest 2009.

In the meantime, please enjoy the photos we’ve all been uploading. I dropped my camera on its lens first thing this morning (Khaaan!), so Thanel has kindly given me permission to upload a few of the photos we took together of the zombie layout.

Thanel acted as The Brothers Brick’s official photographer for the weekend, and has pictures of just about everything.

Day 1 (setup & socializing)
Day 2 (opening ceremonies)
Day 3 (most of the LEGO creation photos)
Day 4: Wacky Racers
Day 4: Dwarf Toss

The BrickCon pool on Flickr is the best way to find all our event pics in one place.

As much fun as running the zombie layout was, the highlight of the weekend for me was winning “Best of Microscale” for my micro Battlestar Galactica hangar. My look of surprise was both genuine and absolutely ridiculous.

Here’s a quick roundup of BrickCon follow-ups from around the Web:

We are off to BrickCon!

Andrew, Thanel, Caylin, Dan, and myself are all heading to BrickCon. Therefore, you probably won’t hear us much over the next couple of days, other than brief updates.

Have fun and we will be thinking of you!

How to get from Sea-Tac Airport to BrickCon at Seattle Center for $4.50

Last year, we posted an offer to connect people coming in by air based on their arrival times, enabling people to share transportation. That was before Seattle built a light rail line that’ll get you from the airport to Seattle Center for less than five bucks. Oh, and you get to ride a monorail along the way.

Mark Sandlin‘s Infothingy has the details:

For the graphically challenged (and to help people find this from the interwebs):

Catch the Link Light Rail Connector Bus at Bus Bay 2, near Baggage Carousel 1. It will take you to Tukwila International Blvd. Station. This bus is free.
Take the Link Light Rail train into Seattle. ($2.50) Stay on the train until you reach Westlake Station, which is the last stop.
Go up the escalation and into the Westlake Center mall. Go to the top floor of the mall to the Seattle Monorail station.
Take the Seattle Monorail to Seattle Center. ($2.00)

Be sure to click through the graphic to a great discussion of other useful ways to get to BrickCon for cheap — more money for bricks!

Zombie Apocafest 2009 BrickArms Defense Pack debuts in 72 hours [News]

Why yes, that is a BrickArms Cricket Bat and M1 Carbine.

Thanks to the generous folks at BrickArms, we’ll be giving away a bunch of these to those of you who contribute to Zombie Apocafest 2009 at BrickCon 2009 later this week. Each Zombie Defense Pack will include a prototype cricket bat and M1 carbine, along with other great stuff that remains Top Secret.

The cricket bats in particular will be in short supply outside these packs, and there will be a limited number of packs, so be sure to build something awesome.

BrickCon 2009: Last-minute logistics

Well, if we haven’t convinced you to attend BrickCon next week, you’re pretty much stuck following along at home, so we’re moving on without you. For those of you who’ll be joining us at Seattle Center a week from today, this post includes a bunch of important information — especially for first-time attendees.

Past attendees will also notice that this is largely an update of last year’s post. Please forgive the repetition.

Fill out your MOC cards by September 28

MOC cards identify your LEGO creations for fellow attendees and the general public. They also help theme organizers like Josh and me plan for how much space is needed.

Fill out your MOC cards on BrickCon.org by September 28 to ensure that they’re printed on the nice card stock that will help them stand up next to your amazing LEGO creations.

Remember, only “registered” LEGO creations (ones with MOC cards) will be eligible for the various awards given out by BrickCon.

By the way, unless you want to spend the public hours explaining what “SNOT” and “MOC” are to kids and their parents, avoid “AFOL-speak” in your descriptions. Seriously.

Bring stuff for the draft and Dirty Brickster

Drafting a LEGO set allows you to get parts in large quantities that you might otherwise have to buy individually (from, say, Bricklink). Read more about how the draft works on SEALUG.org. If you want to participate, the draft set for BrickCon 2009 is 5972 Space Truck Getaway.

Dirty Brickster is a LEGO “white elephant” gift exchange. Bring something that would be worth $10-20 to the recipient, wrapped.

Pack your LEGO creations for travel or shipping

Before you stuff your LEGO into your carry-on luggage, consider reading the LUGNET post by Duane Hess and the Classic-Castle.com article by Lenny Hoffman about packing and shipping LEGO.

Wouldn’t you rather spend your time socializing and integrating your pristine creations into the display instead of rebuilding them?

Unload your LEGO at the venue

You should soon be receiving a message from BrickCon organizers with details on when, where, and how to unload your LEGO creations at Seattle Center. Last year, the loading dock was only available during the following times (we’ll update this as the 2009 times are finalized):

Thursday 8am – noon
Thursday 5pm – 9pm
Friday 8am – noon
Sunday 5pm – midnight

Given the limited space (it’s a tunnel), please only use the loading dock if you have massive amounts to unload.

Give us a tour of your LEGO room

One of the most interesting things about LEGO User Group (LUG) meetings is getting to see another LEGO fan’s building space.

If you’d like to share what your LEGO room looks like with fellow BrickCon attendees, bring a few good photos on a thumb drive for projection during the con.

Build!

With a week left, you still have time to build something and bring it for one of the many collaborative displays. Here’s a list of the various themes planned for this year’s convention:

Battle Bugs
Capital Ship Modular Project
Castle
Great Ball Contraption
Mecha
MicroCity
Model Team Motors
Operation Bricklord
Space
Town/Train
Zombie Apocafest 2009

See you next week!

Less than two weeks left until BrickCon – there’s still time to come! [News]

BrickCon 2009 starts October 1, the Thursday after next. Five of our seven contributors will be there (Josh, Dan, Thanel, Caylin, and me), making this year’s BrickCon the single highest risk to blog continuity should an alien robot invasion take place in Seattle. Fortunately, our other contributors stand ready to pick up the bricks and carry on.

Enough with the silliness, though there’s plenty of silly that goes on at LEGO cons.

If you didn’t register before the deadline for engraved badge bricks, you can still register right up until the day of the convention — you just won’t get the fancy bricks from Brick Engraver. With more than 300 LEGO fans registered so far, this year is gonna be awesome.

Finally, if you can’t take the time off from work Thursday and/or Friday, you can also register to attend private convention events with single-day passes on Saturday and Sunday.

Important notes for our younger readers: Like most other LEGO conventions, BrickCon is intended for adult fans of LEGO. Attendees under 18 must be accompanied by a parent, and children under 13 are discouraged from attending. Similarly, contributions from collaborative displays are only open to registered attendees. Unfortunately, we can’t accept contributions to displays like Zombie Apocafest 2009 and Operation Bricklord during the public display hours.