Tag Archives: Scifi

A city with its head in the clouds

Once you get above 300,000 ft in the atmosphere, there’s nothing around to cloud your vision. Thus, the views from this micro LEGO city by Redverse must be outstanding. With micro building, the choice of parts makes all the difference. I particularly like the use of paint rollers to suspend the outer ring, and the bush with foil connector used on the front-and-center tower. I wonder what the stars look like from that highest height?

Sky City

Familiar ideas on unfamiliar planets

The fun of science fiction is to imagine how things could be, and LEGO is a great medium to realize these ideas. Take for example this bright build from Bart De Dobbelaer and its fantastic mining machines. These devices can mine the ore and resources of delicate planets with minimal destruction to the environment. This is the best hope for extracting resources from other worlds should we travel the stars. LEGO is wonderful for this build, given the fun shapes and colors of the bricks and pieces. The purple and transparent blues give the planet a unique presence, while the machines themselves look almost insect-like with their rounded edges and curved backs holding all the extracted minerals.

Strion 3B geode mining

Exploring strange new worlds

The universe, much like LEGO, is full of possibilities for all sorts of amazing and mind-bending wonders. Bart De Dobbelaer captures this well in this alien landscape build. The strange new world is full of bright and bizarre plant life growing up wherever. Using bright pink and green pieces, the alien plants come to life and stand out against the white and greys prevalent in the build. Technic, Bionicle, and Hero Factory pieces give the large formations on the planet’s surface an otherworldly appearance, twisting and turning every which way. Who knows what other wonders these explorers will find on their adventures!

Exploration

Sail through the skies with some cyber wings

Taking off at the nearest cyberpunk runway is this lovely LEGO plane from Sylon_tw. The build blends the cyberpunk theme with the classic aviation look to get this tight little flyer. You have the more classic aviation look from the 1930s and 1940s in the overall shaping and especially the blue in the front. The rest of it is definitely cyberpunk in theme! I do love the exposed wings to see all those details, and those wingtips remind me of starfighters. This thing looks like it can really move, pulling all kinds of stunts as it flies around. This is some great styling, and I hope to see more in the future.

[cybersky] Tomtit - main

Check out some of the details on this slick jet below, including shots of the cockpit and landing gear.

[cybersky] Tomtit - details

Your standard stylish resource collector

Everyone needs a collector for those resource rich dead planets, like this nifty LEGO one from BetaNotus. There are all kinds of resource collectors, but the best ones have both efficiency and style in mind. First off, love the blue color blocking! Blue always goes well with grey, and looks especially nice with the gold bits of the collector, like the drill and accent details. This collector also has some nice symmetry going on, which doesn’t hurt keeping it balanced as it drills down. Overall, the whole thing has really cool textures and layering, making me wonder how the mechanism might work. Just plop a few of these down on a dead planet or an asteroid and you’ll have quite a haul in no time. Then it’ll be time to collect the collectors and move to another location.

Calamercantile Resource Collector

“Many have said that. But you are the first I believe could do it!”

My birthday falls in May and this year was particularly special thanks to my good friend Michael, who asked me what I wanted for my birthday. We’ve taken to crafting each other’s gifts lately and he recently started building BrickHeadz as Capn Brickard on Instagram. With this in mind, I thought it would be awesome to have BrickHeadz for one of my favorite science fiction series, Stargate: SG-1. He gladly accepted the task and I eagerly awaited the results. So, in addition to becoming a contributor for The Brothers Brick in May, I was gifted these designs that I immediately wanted to share with TBB’s readers! Since they’re particularly special to me and I know the builder personally and could get some behind-the-scenes info, I want to go into a little more detail than our typical articles. Plus I want to geek out about Stargate a little, if you’ll indulge me.

Continue reading

A race to the Moon? Challenge accepted.

Noblebun is one of the best sci-fi LEGO builders out there, proving that title with his newest creation, the V-X Vera.

V-X Vera

“Roaring into the spaceport was the most beautiful ship I’ve ever seen in all my days. With a lean white bow and gleaming engines, she settled down into my docking bay. I thought I was lucky to just catch a glimpse of her, but now she could be mine to care for,” — Rhys Wheelright, chief of maintenance, Colony One.
Continue reading

Diamonds on the water are falling from the sun

Those are lyrics from a song by Enya that I was listening to when I saw this diamond-shaped spaceship build by Roanoke Handybuck. This build is very fitting to Enya’s music, as both are beautiful, ethereal, and simultaneously dark and light. The spaceship is bright, smooth, with just enough greebling, and is adorned with gold cannons, antennae, and engines. The shaping is definitely alien; not scary and menacing, but rather welcoming and beautiful. With a small yellow frog as the pilot, I doubt this poses a threat. I like to imagine the frog is also listening to Enya inside the cockpit.

The Maze Hopper

The builder packed this small ship full of interesting techniques to give it a unique look. The end connections of croissants form 45º angles with rounded edges, so that the diamond shape of the ship isn’t too sharp. A smooth windscreen that sits flush on top of the ship, and blends well with the smooth surface. The bright ship hovers above a dark maze, which provides a contrast between vehicle and the environment. The end result is truly a work of art. It makes me want to listen to Enya’s music, hoping the spaceship I build will be just as beautiful.

Cruisin’ cyberpunk style

Ever wonder what the Batmobile crossed with a DeLorean would look like? I think Jerry gives us a good idea of what that thought experiment would physically yield with his LEGO cyberpunk vehicle build.

The back of this car is what really gives me the DeLorean vibes with its boxy, beefed up rear. I enjoy Jerry’s use of the red 1×2 grille pieces for backlights — this color choice really pops against the black and grey color scheme, yet also compliments the yellow that’s accented briefly throughout the work.

Jerry also utilizes different rims for the front wheels versus the back wheels which is a bit of a visual trip from the norm. Overall the work can be construed as a fusion of multiple fantasies as well as a good mix of parts from different vehicles in the LEGO Speed Champions line and perhaps some other themes, who doesn’t like a good mashup?

Yes, she knows it’s a multipass. Anyway, we’re in love.

When you’re having a bad day, sometimes it’s nice to just sit down and watch a fun science fiction movie like The Fifth Element. There are great characters, an engaging story, and a universe that is willing to give us flying cars. Davdup brings that love of the vehicles into LEGO form with renditions of a police cruiser and Korben Dallas’ taxi. Slightly bigger than minifgure scale, these beauties feature smooth curves, complex angles, custom stickers, and build details straight from the movie.

IMG_5324-Modifier

The police car is a solid build (I love the grille tiles in the window) that accurately captures the utilitarian vehicle. Davdup has chosen to also include a window-delivered to-go order from McDonald’s, giving us a great callback to the movie. The interior is also pretty sweet, using a Technic pilot’s yoke for the steering wheel. Continue reading

From the dark Matrix

I’m always fascinated by how skilled LEGO builders can create interesting backgrounds for their models using simple pieces. Builder why.not? has made this awesome cyberpunk scene of a figure staring down a robotic eye, but then filled out the background to truly make the scene immersive. One wall cleverly uses the holes in Technic plates to make a Matrix-like cascade of lights, while the other uses minifigure stands and turntable bases to create an interesting texture. And finally, the presentation with careful lighting is as important to this creation as the build itself, and it all comes together marvelously.

untitled

Awesome minifig-scale Bubble Ship from Oblivion

No matter what you might have thought of the 2013 sci-fi film Oblivion, starring Tom Cruise, you can admit it featured some sweet tech. From the electric motorbike, to the huge water hoovers, to that giant upside-down pyramid, the film’s visuals were stunning. One of the most iconic vehicles was the super-maneuverable light plane which was quickly nicknamed the Bubble Ship. This stunning model by Riskjockey captures the stark, delicate visual aesthetic from the film, including swiveling landing gear. I love the smooth engine pods and the clever use of the new gyro-sphere and hatch from the Jurassic World theme for the cockpit.

Oblivion Bubble Ship

Another nice part use is the large triangular panels used to create the geometric symmetry of the fuselage of the ship.

Oblivion Bubble Ship

This is not the first version of the Bubble Ship–or even the second–that has been featured here on TBB over the years since the movie’s release in 2013.