Years in the making, Blake Foster presents one of the finest examples of LEGO spacecraft masterwork with the Ugly Duckling Long Range Research Vessel. It’s a rare achievement; it boasts impressive measurements at 168 studs long, 47 studs wide, and 45 studs high (approximately 52.5×14.5×14 inches), yet its size doesn’t prevent Blake from carefully considering every stud on his craft inside and out.
See more photos of this amazing and huge LEGO spaceship
Let’s take a moment and go back to 1992. If you’re about my age, you were probably sitting on the floor surrounded by a huge pile of LEGO bricks building literally the coolest spaceship ever. With the hindsight of 20+ years, it probably wasn’t that great, but to my childhood imagination, it looked a lot like this Space Police II ship by spaceruner, which is definitely the coolest spaceship ever. Inspired by classic sets 6781 SP-Striker and 6897 Rebel Hunter, it’s the perfect mashup of outlandish design and wickedly cool styling. Plus, who doesn’t love those classic Space Police II colors?
The title doesn’t lie, because although this vessel by the name of USS Fontana may look like it flew straight out of one of the many Star Trek screenplays, Ben Smith has built what no man has built before, because this ship is actually of his own design. Complete with working lights and custom stickers, the builder has done an excellent job capturing the Star Trek aesthetic. The signature round body of the ship is expertly built; take note of the beautiful tan and sand green stripe around the bridge, which I imagine wasn’t easy to accomplish.
The back of the ship is fully detailed as well, with a hanger bay for research shuttles to launch from and explore the unknown planets below.
These Cryo Pods built by Peter Reid evoke the eerie feeling of Ridley Scott’s Alien hiding in the corner ready to pounce. The abundant use of grey paired with dramatic lighting gives off the feelings of being far away from earth and long travel in cold reaches of space. The scene is built with almost no LEGO studs visible, which also tricks our minds to believe that this could be larger than what it actually is — at first glance almost close to a movie-scale prop.
Are you ready for The LEGO Movie 2? We know builder yu chris is, because he’s already built an amazing spaceship for Emmet, and has captured the spirit of the master builder perfectly. Seriously, if someone had told me this model were actually the main spaceship in the movie, I’d believe it. It’s made of five smaller ships from their own themes which come together to form the letter E.
The smaller ships are, clockwise from the left, Metalbeard’s Seacow 2.0, Emmet’s Construction Ship, Unikitty & Lucy’s Aircraft, Benny’s Spaceship, and Batman’s Batwing. Each ship is invested with its pilot’s aesthetic, but can pull together like Voltron and form a super ship to fight the powers of Duplo. Side note: check out that awesome backdrop.
If intergalactic asteroid mining sounds like an interesting prospect, Scott Wilhelm’s LEGO microscale New Bedlam Mining Hub delivers the goods. According to the builder, the mining colony of New Bedlam earned its name for the lawlessness and chaotic growth that comes with rapid development. Scott’s city fits the part, with foreboding dark towers covering the asteroid’s surface. Thanks to an extensive use of black and trans-neon colored elements, the colony also has all the grittiness of a red-light district in the stars.
I’m not quite sure how the mechanics of a steam-based industry work on the moon, or how exactly a lighter-than-air vehicle like a zeppelin would float above an airless surface, but Dwalin Forkbeard certainly makes such a fantastical idea believable with this steampunk city on the moon.
See more details of this steampunk city on the moon
2019 is already proving productive for the prolific Inthert who has unveiled another stellar model after the chrome-enhanced Naboo Starfighter earlier this week.
This time it’s a gorgeous explorer ship in Classic Space livery. The builder crafted this ship from leftover table scraps from an earlier build, and we’re all lucky he found a use for them. You can see one notable chunk composed of rocket cones with vehicle brushes embedded inside, which was apparently a happy accident in the parts bin.
Another cool bit can be found at the rear of the ship where the engine nozzles are built from a ring of scythe blades. There are even more details to be found, I invite you to take a closer look to explore all the creative parts uses while this ship explores the stars!
Triangular shapes are never the easiest structures to put together in LEGO creations, so it’s always refreshing to see a fancy tri-wing spaceship design. LegOH!‘s latest model is a cool little Space Police creation — which looks just about perfect for chasing down any ships in breach of close-orbit speed limits. The bubble canopy is great, but it’s the way the lower wings curve around it, and the tall vertical fin which make this model really pop.
The spaceship doesn’t look too shabby from the rear either. The single thruster is simple but effective, and those red fuel tanks are a lovely touch…
If you will insist on picking flowers on alien worlds, at the very least you should check they’re not the offspring of some larger carnivorous plant. That’s Paddy Bricksplitter‘s advice — as depicted in this great little scene. An unsuspecting pink-clad astronaut skips through an excellent alien landscape, seemingly oblivious to the floral horror her pruning has awakened. The giant flower beastie is a cracker — all spikes and teeth and sinister tongue-stamen thing. I love the use of balloon panels as petals, and the ring of teeth at the top is nicely done. The purple rocks add a wonderful splash of otherworldly colour to the backdrop.
A new year brings us a (belated) new cover photo for The Brothers Brick’s social media channels. This month’s cover photo by Finn Roberts takes us high above the earth, to the interior of a spacecraft preparing to depart our planet’s orbit.
This scene is also built to fit the interior dimensions of an inflatable habitat module that Finn featured in a previous LEGO model, alongside a fantastic spacecraft used to assemble an interplanetary cruiser under construction. We can’t wait to see what the finished cruiser looks like!
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What’s Benny the Spaceman so pleased about? Maybe the arrival of the brilliant 70841 Benny’s Space Squad set? Or, just as likely, he’s absolutely stoked at the cool space speeder captainsmog has built for him. This is Classic Space building at its best — a spot-on colour scheme, a depth of greebly detailing, and a huge sense of fun. The ranks of angled clips along the sides at the front are a smart choice, their textured sections provide a touch of tiny detail which make this look more realistic. (Or at least as realistic as anything can be in outer space where helmets don’t need visors!)
