Just a reminder that the annual speeder bike contest, run by the good folks over at the LEGO Speeder Bikes Flickr group, is drawing to close at the end of the month. We’ve seen some great entries so far but there is still time to get your rear in gear and build some awesome bikes! There are great prizes up for grabs, donated by The Brothers Brick, as well as all sorts of other swag!
Black is one of the basic LEGO colors and one of the most common among all types of pieces. But owning a colossal amount of black parts doesn’t mean you’re good at building in black. Timofey Tkachev shows us how one should treat the color by using nearly a hundred various parts available in black. Arches, handlebars, even windows — you name it. Actually, I’m not sure if there is any LEGO piece in this ship that is used ‘regularly’. This is why Timofey’s creations are so captivating to examine.
One of the most active builders in the current Febrovery building month, Billyburg presents us with another Classic Space inspired rover — and this one is also a hotrod! What appears to be a bare internal combustion engine (how that works on the moon, I do not know) is excellently made — just enough detail to be interesting, yet simple enough to look clean and streamlined. The best part might be the white stripes in the tyres, but equally don’t miss the syringe piece as the antenna on the radar arrays.
It’s always interesting to see minifigure-scale vehicles that can transform and look great in both modes, like James Zhan’s spaceship/mecha hybrid. I enjoy the angles throughout the fuselage and minimal greebling on the prongs, focusing on a beautiful overall profile.
Much like a Vulture Droid from Star Wars, the prongs on James’s ship fold downward as the legs of a mecha. The well-hidden arms and feet fold out, making mecha mode look just as interesting as flight mode.
Two years of hard work went into the construction of this 1.75 meter long spacecraft/gun platform built by Alexander Safarik. The size is impressive, but the plentiful interesting details and beautiful lines make his build one of the best LEGO spaceships I’ve seen. I don’t know how long I’ve scrolled back and forth studying the craft at the highest resolution, noticing another great parts usage or detail with each pass.
Be sure to explore Alexander’s Flickr album showing more views of his massive creation as well as photos detailing the building process over its two year construction.
Sometimes big things come in small packages — especially highly explosive things. This adorable little space rover built by Pascal for FebRovery no doubt packs a serious wallop with its integrated missile launcher:
The smiling minifigure is absolutely fitting. As the builder suggests, who wouldn’t be happy driving a rocket equipped go-kart?
I can’t lie, I’m in love with this blue armored vehicle by Andrea Lattanzio. Based on the S.H.A.D.O. mobile from the 1970 British sci-fi series, UFO, this tracked creation has a ton of great details and features wrapped in a classicly pleasing color scheme.
The builder did a great job staying faithful to the original S.H.A.D.O. design while incorporating a few extra touches such as the bubble dome and radar array. Also, the canopy opens to expose a detailed little interior – very cool! With such an assortment of high tech computers and equipment (well, at least for the 70’s) this tracked command center looks more than ready to lead the fight against the alien invaders.
It’s February and that means one thing – no, not romance and chocolate, but space exploration rovers! Yes, it’s FebROVERy again and we’re seeing a ton of sweet entries into this annual event where builders focus on creating strange and fun little space exploration vehicles. First up, check out this awesome insectoid-style rover by F@bz.
See more awesome LEGO space rovers
Today we are fortunate enough to get the chance to explore the mind of Master Mech builder, Mark Neumann! Mark lives with his family in western Washington State and has been a prominent member of the Adult LEGO Fan community for many years. While being know primarily for his awesome Mechs, Mark has also planned and organized many collaborative builds as well as the first BrickCon. In addition to his other efforts, He also recently finished a massive Classic Space SHIP known by her call sign “LL-2016”. Without further ado, let’s dive in.
TBB: Hi Mark, glad to talk to you today! To kick things off, can you tell our readers a little bit about yourself?
Mark: Well, ok. Hiya. I have been an adult fan of LEGO since around the year 1999. That would have been when I was walking through a Fred Meyer with my (at the time) girlfriend and spotted something cool in the toy section. Star Wars LEGO. I could get a X-Wing, with Luke Skywalker! Yeah, I racked up some debt on the credit card that day.
We’re in the pipe, five by five, with Daniel Schlumpp‘s stunning UD-4L Cheyenne Dropship from the movie Aliens. Featuring fold-out missile pods, working front landing gear and a fold down ramp, this amazing replica looks like it could be coming around for a seven zero niner any minute.
Daniel designed his creation digitally first, and experimented with rendering it with this great night-time shot.
If you liked this UD-4L Cheyenne dropship, you might like these LEGO versions featured on The Brothers Brick previously:
Everyone has a different process for building. Some people start with a piece of reference art they find inspiring, or a drawing they’ve made. Some people start with a technique, or a combination of parts and just keeping adding pieces until something takes shape, which is the route I took in designing this small starfighter, which I call the Wyvern.
I knew I wanted to build something dark green, so I sat down with the dark green bin and looked for interesting elements. What I found were a surprising number of minifigure chairs, so I began stacking them. Continue reading
One of the most interesting aspects of LEGO is the opportunity builders have to recreate and expand the universes of their favorite books, movies and TV shows. It’s awesome watching builders bring these stories to life and creating whole new elements through the use of bricks. Shannon Sproule does just that with a series of spaceships inspired by the book/TV series, The Expanse, such as this United Nations Navy fast transport vessel:
The builder has chosen to design an entirely new ship to the UNN fleet, which, though numerous, is less technologically advanced than its counterparts. That is evident in the utilitarian design of the ship and its appropriately blocky shape. The cargo containers help round out the imagined role of this UNN workhorse. The builder is working on a series of The Expanse-inspired ships, so make sure to take a look at his Flickr for more.