I generally don’t blog customized stuff, as I generally take issue with cutting brick or going out of system. That said, I couldn’t pass this custom Samantha Carter from Stargate SG-1 up. Nice work, Catsy.
Tag Archives: Movies
Star Trek’s USS Reliant (NCC-1864)
USS Reliant appeared in “Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan” as a vessel commandeered by the titular villain. Christer Nyberg (myko82) built his LEGO version with 10-15 thousand bricks over the course of a year.
See more pictures on Flickr, and read Christer’s write-up on Eurobricks.
If you die down there, you’re welcome to share my toilet
I first noticed Carson Hart‘s LEGO models over the holidays, but was offline at the appropriate times to blog his Christmas-themed creations. Thankfully, he’s followed it up with some other great models, including this diorama of Moaning Myrtle’s bathroom in Hogwart’s Castle.
This microscale version of The Burrow is also nice, complete with a micro-magical Ford Anglia.
More classic LEGO commercials from the Blast from the Past Project!
Now in week 3 of our collaboration with Advance, we are happy to bring you three more commercials from the days of yore. The lineup this week features ZNAP, Pirates and DUPLO. Did any of you actually buy ZNAP? I picked up some at a second-hand store once upon a time but that was about it. Regardless of the success of the line (or lack thereof), this commercial is pretty cool. The Pirates commercial has a great classic feel to it and the DUPLO ad is simply adorable. Now I want to build a giant Noah’s Ark out of DUPLO myself.
LEGO ZNAP Virus 1998
LEGO went right up against K’nex with the new Znap system featuring bricks
that could come together in all directions. LEGO were a bit worried and were
trying to redefine the brand as a cooler and up-to-date toy.
LEGO Pirates – The Islanders 1994
We shot all of this on a built set — there’s no blue-screen or compositing. The island set was pretty big and constructed out of polystyrene and joint filler. And the water was a giant glass plate. The shot at 0.14 when the pirate lands in the small rowboat had to be shot quite a few times before he landed right!
LEGO DUPLO – Noah’s Ark 1995
We shot this in the States in 1995. The house was completely built up from scratch. To me it has a very ‘ 80´s advertising’ feel — it’s got a kind of Southern warmth about it.
Welcome, there is one point left on your license
Jean-Phillippe Lajoie Dorval (zwiti) was inspired to build this can by the comic book “Les cercles du pouvoir,” which also inspired the film, The Fifth Element. It looks like they didn’t change the style much for the movie, because this is a great likeness of the cabs in the movie. It looks accurate right down to a door with a hinge on top.
Collectible Minifigs Series 6 Debut as TV Stars
LEGO has released this hilarious video introducing all the new minifigs in the sixth Series of Collectible Minifigs, set up as a parody of some well-known American TV shows. I enjoyed it, and I think you will too.
Lego Shaun of the Dead at the Winchester
Greg’s (Yatkuu) Lego creation of Shaun and the gang in front of the Winchester couldn’t get any classier. It won’t be complete without some zombie bashing.
Three new vintage LEGO commericals from the “Blast from the Past” project!
Advance just released three more vintage LEGO commericals. This week features Technic, Divers and Time Cruisers. My favorite is the Technic one. The “real” man and his car being manipulated by the boy cracks me up. On the other hand, the full-size Timmy in the Time Cruisers ad sort of creeps me out. Enjoy!
Art Director, Christian Faber tells us:
This was one of the first times we used 3D – the parking lot was built entirely in 3D and the man was shot on green screen. I think the spot has something of a voodoo feel – the boy is controlling the cars remotely. This spot is a bit different because the intro had nothing to do with toys.
Faber says:
The idea for this spot was inspired by Back to the Future – we actually built a Delorean for the set. The 2D/3D character animation was done by PDI and we shot in a plane interior in a Hollywood studio. Naked Gun was filmed in the same plane. It was a pretty chaotic set!
Faber says:
The shark here is a 2D animation shot on a 3D background – the models in the shark’s mouth are real though. This was a very simple line of sets and we felt we needed to spice up the communication, hence the real-looking sharks. We called it ‘borrowed interest’ back then. In retrospect, I think it’s a shame because I think we took attention away from the actual product.
It’s a rat circus out there, and I’m beginning to enjoy it!
Joe Klang (derjoe) has provided the perfect opportunity to sit in the hot and summery wastelands from Australia. There was a time when Mel Gibson was considered kind of cooler than an anti-semitic drunk. And Max Max comes very much from that time. In his second recent car-based diorama Joe shows why. You can almost hear the soft murmur of the thunderous engines of Toecutter’s merciless bike gang heading this way. The last of the V8 Interceptor’s is sitting calmly and waits…
Advance releases classic LEGO commercials! [News]
Advance has been making LEGO tv commercials for over 30 years and recently they rediscovered many classic commercials in their archives. They will be releasing them online over the next ten weeks, so look for them here, with a bit of commentary from the people involved in their creation.
I am a big fan of vintage LEGO ads and commercials, so I’m pretty excited about this project. Come take a trip down memory lane with Advance and The Brothers Brick!
Blast from the Past Trailer video:
Spyrius (1994):
Art director Christian Faber says:
“We shot this in London or LA, I can’t actually remember! It was one of the first motion control spots we did. At 0:15 We used a kind of ‘magic building’ technique where the bricks are held on the end of metal rods and then pulled apart. And if you look closely at 0:00 you can actually see the edge of the studio in the top
left corner.“The set filled a whole studio and we used a lot of analogue techniques — the planet is just painted cardboard and the backdrop is just a screen with
little holes in it and a big light behind it. The hands you can see moving the sets at 0:05 and 0:21 secs are actually wax hands. I had quite a lot of
explaining to do when customs asked why I had a bag full of fake arms!”
Technic Racers (1997):
Faber says:
“We shot it in a specially built 10-metre tunnel that was hand-painted and filled with smoke. While it may look straight, if you look closely at 00:15
you can see the yellow lines bending slightly — that’s because at this point we filmed the car in a carousel to make it look like it was speeding
forward! The animatronic hand was cast on a girl’s hand so it was a perfect fit and gave her the control she needed in the more complicated movements.”
Wild West (1996)
Faber says:
“We juxtaposed stills of the LEGO sets being ‘magic built’ with lots of scenes from classic American Westerns. The last few shots featuring the fight scene
were filmed and then graded to fit in with the rest of the background scenes. The magic building techniques shown here are actually illegal now —
the law today requires that toy sets that need to be constructed have to be shown being built by hand.
Gran Torino in LEGO
For his local (Cologne) LEGO brand store recently, Joe Klang (-derjoe-) built a scene from Gran Torino. What I find particularly attractive about this scene is how inorganic it feels, while reflecting the movie so well. It almost feels like a platform game version of the film with the straight lines, diagonal grid and textural elements. And the neat suburban lawn feels even more sterile than in real life.
Thanks to Alex Jones for the heads up
Resistance is Futile
I don’t have much to say about this new creation by Peter Reid (legoloverman) except that it’s just great. The use of minifig sextants to build a cube is brilliant, and makes a perfect micro scale Borg cube. It’s hard to think of a more ridiculously single purpose-part, and yet it works quite well to add detail at this tiny scale.
