Jonas (Legopard), this month’s cover photo artist on our Facebook page, has just posted a beautiful rendition of Weathertop from The Lord of the Rings. Jonas says he wanted to “improve my skills in Rock-Building and also try my hands on a bigger ruin.” I’d say he succeeded rather nicely.
The campsite looks a little underpopulated in the main photo above, but there’s action aplenty on the summit as Strider battles the Ringwraiths.
See more photos on MOCPages.
Anyone who’s enjoyed the movie Scarface would instantly recognize this climactic scene made by Alex Eylar. For those who prefer the overall view, you’re not being left out.
Derrick van R. promises to bring us various adventures starring Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s inimitable consulting detective over the coming weeks, but I was immediately captivated today by this simple scene with a single minifig. I say “simple,” but what I’m so impressed by is the incredible landscaping Derrick has built around Mr. Holmes, from a gorgeously curving tree to a brook with water cascading into a frigid-looking pool. The base itself is noteworthy, for hugging the contours of the landscape.
Check out many more photos showcasing Derrick’s landscaping talents in his photostream on Flickr.
Ryxe and Sanna has been working on a Lego model of the Czech Hluboká Castle for the majority of the past year. From the looks of it the model’s footprint is larger than a twin-sized bed. While size doesn’t always make a Lego creation great, there are sufficient details to be admired such as the windows on the round towers and other wall decors. While there aren’t additional edited photos, you can find work-in-progress shots in the builder’s Flickr photostream.
We might as well build a casita out on the TBB back-40 and install Fedde (Karf Oolhu) as one of the blog’s Artists in Residence. By my count, and admittedly math was never my strong suit, the self-styled “Reformed Cthulhu” has appeared 20 times on TBB as of this posting. The model is typical Karfian boilerplate that elicited many cries of NPU!” on Flickr. There are currently 2,966 in his stream (the vast majority are LEGO realated), and 1,803 models have been placed int the LEGO Group on Flickr. While I realize that more doesn’t necessarily mean better, I can think of few builders who are as prolific and talented as Karf.
Sometimes relatively simple scenes can provide the most opportunity for showing terrific quality. Take, for instance, this beautiful diorama of the Roman invasion of Britain by James Pegrum (peggyjdb) which is really just a bit of shoreline with some soldiers. I’ve seen the trans-blue 1×1 round plates used as water many times, but James has made better use of it here than I’ve seen previously, adding waves and some flecks of green, and he also extends that technique to make an interesting gravel beach. James also puts in great little details such as the Romans wielding iron-tipped spears, while the barbarians fight with LEGO’s older, solid-color spears.
Sweden’s Lego.Skrytsson is providing the power for Saturday’s broadcast with his “Transformer” diorama. Gabriel brings the substation to life with accurate detail and just the right amount of minifig action to keep it interesting and provide some color. The varied textures help to overcome the necessarily monochromatic style, and the overall result is both pleasing and a nice respite from the mostly violent dioramas I come across while looking for models to blog.
Welcome back fight fans, to Sin City Nevada for another bruising edition of Friday Night Fights! Tonight’s bout features two up and coming fighters in the always contentious Bantamweight division. Let’s go to the tale of the tape:
Fighting out of the red corner…from somewhere between heaven and hell…Nooreuyed and his “Teatro“.
And fighting out of the blue corner…The pride of Rockford College, Illinois…Julius No and his “Plastic Prison“.
As usual, constant reader, you are tasked with deciding the outcome of this pugilistic endeavor by way of comment. On the last edition of Friday Night Fights, the judges scored the fight 4-2 in favor of Andy the D-Town Cracka
Friday Night Fights would also like to thank Chris Maddison (cmaddison), who is in the fight of his life against Bruce Lowell, for contributing to tonight’s broadcast.
I can’t think of another licensed theme that has inspired more epic dioramas than Lord of the Rings. You can add one more to the list with GOEL KIM’s interpretation of the battle of Helm’s Deep. The builder doesn’t have much to say, other than the diorama is 90% finished and contains 1700 minifigs. I deliberately selected this photo because although many of the others show the grandeur of the diorama, they also show the garage. It’s a nice garage, I have nothing against it, but it does detract from the grandeur of some of the long-shots. The size of the project makes it inherently difficult to photograph, and I’m sure the final presentation will be improved, but fans of LOTR should enjoy the rough-cut nonetheless.
Brian Williams (BMW_Indy) is more typically associated with highly detailed train models and Indiana Jones dioramas, so his recreation of the Friendship 7 launch is a bit of a departure. But I think it’s a happy departure. The LED powered flame effect really adds to the diorama.
ZCerberus built this LEGO Castle scene for the Guilds of Historica challenge over on Eurobricks. Orcs defend their home against a marauding human army (or something like that).
ZCerberus built quite a few motorized elements into his diorama, including a whirlwind, battering ram, and catapults. Check out the video for the action.
We’re fairly used to seeing large-scale collaborations between builders in the post-apocalyptic theme, as well as at events like BrickCon, but it’s fairly unusual to see a collaborative LEGO castle. This diorama by Finnish builders Panzy-boe and Finland Brick hits a lot of high points for me, including off-the-grid construction, water feature with landscaping, dynamic minifig action, and more. One of the things I like most about the main castle structure is that the top of the wall isn’t straight — it incorporates a rock outcrop in the upper-left corner that forces the castle wall to follow the terrain.
My only complaint is that there aren’t more pictures. A large LEGO build like this is an opportunity to create little scenes throughout the diorama. From the overview picture, it’s clear that the builders did so (I’m especially curious what’s going on in what appears to be a little cave in that rock), but without close-up photos, we can only admire this excellent scene from a distance.
This diorama was unveiled this past weekend at Model Expo 2013 in Helsinki.
