Tag Archives: Whale

Pixelated whale is a symphony of light and LEGO

LEGO artist FukuTaku is a master of 3D models in the pixel art style. What makes his builds truly special is how he uses color to simulate video game lighting, which combined with studio lighting of the bricks, make his models positively glow. Like ray tracing you can touch. Until now, most of FukuTaku’s work has focused on video game tributes, like his Dragonlord, which wowed us with its searing heat. For his latest masterpiece, FukuTaku turns to the natural world with a pixel whale that honors the colors of the sea with a cool and tranquil glow.

White Whale

Dive in to see the White Whale from every angle!

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An arctic diorama full of life

Dive into the chilly waters of the far north with this adorable LEGO build by seb71. This build features a host of micro-scale fauna for you to enjoy. The whale is made from a pair of balloon panels, and the extremely lost penguin is mostly made of black and orange teeth. The local Inuit is using a wand to fish for supper under the watchful eyes of a walrus and polar bear. I sure hope they have a plan to get back to their igloo; that polar bear looks hungry!

Arctic

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Have you seen this whale’s baleen?

Whenever a LEGO set hits the shelves with new parts or recolours, you can be sure that Thomas Jenkins will make short work of them! The idea behind this whale was to show off the black Technic panels in last year’s Porsche Formula E car. These parts have of course been great for Technic builders, but they pop up almost as often in creature creations like this one. Thomas hasn’t contented himself with making great use of these pieces though. Take a look at the mouth (or baleen, to be specific). This is a cloth piece from 75113 Rey. Two awesome parts uses in one awesome build? Now that’s just showing off!

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A whale of an idea

As an artist and a LEGO builder, I really enjoy refreshing approaches to building. This bold piece by filbrick looks as if it was made with cut paper. There are eight visible colored layers of brick here, including the stylish white frame. Each is spaced out a bit to create shadows between each distinct layer. I love how some layers showcase various coral and sea plants. And that bold white humpback whale, diver and fish against the dark background is a superb and striking effect. I imagine this could look lovely standing on a table or as a wall hanging. If you like this as much as I do, the builder leaves a not-so-subtle reminder that this can be voted as a LEGO Ideas set. You can use that information as you see fit. This is not the first time we’ve been in awe of filbrick’s work. Click the little blue link to see what I mean.

HUMPBACK WHALE 2/3

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A whaley cool flying creature

If you ever watched Avatar: The Last Airbender, you probably thought that things like flying bison sounded cool. Because bison are cool, and things that fly are even cooler, right? Or perhaps you loved Fantasia 2000, with the flying humpback whales. Whales don’t fly, but wouldn’t it be neat if they did? Perhaps that was the inspiration Tim Schwalfenberg had, as he created this delightful build of one of the great flying whales of the Eastern Cloud Sea, carrying a passenger who could well be from The Last Airbender based on his looks. Rolled up cloth and vinyl elements make for a nice detail on the back, and I always love seeing barrels made from two half-barrels joined together. Add in a spectacular harness, and you have a creation ready to soar above some lands, gallivanting through some airwaves.

Balaenoptera Levosia

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Call it Leviathan

Many LEGO fans talk about hunting for their white whale – that one set they’ve been searching for all their lives. This is, of course, an allusion to Captain Ahab’s ultimately fatal obsession with finding an actual white whale in Moby Dick (do 168 year old books need spoiler warnings?). It would seem that that fairy tale whale is still out there hunting ships, as Oliver Becker demonstrates.

"Thar She Blows..."

Has the white whale grown to such an immense size to dwarf the ship? Or is she a regular-sized whale and it’s the ship that’s actually tiny? We’ll never know for sure, but we do know that there’s some excellent parts usage at play here. Dead center in the frame of the shot is a white lever base, expertly used as the whale’s eye. I really love the swords with jagged edges used to create a splash – those few parts convey the creature’s movement. And it’s a big splash, so maybe it really is a larger-than-life whale.

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A whale of an opportunity at the Pick-a-Brick wall

If you have ever visited a LEGO store you probably would have noticed the formidable floor-to-ceiling Pick-a-Brick wall. One bin may contain thousands of flower stems and another may have a crap-ton of these pointy bits (metric crap-ton if you’re Canadian). There’s no telling what you’ll find there and you can take this stuff home by the cup loads. For me, I’m like a kid in…some kind of store. While loading cups full of LEGO bricks can be exciting, building something cohesive exclusively with what you found at the Pick-a-Brick wall can be a tricky endeavor, but Mansur Soeleman clearly saw…a whale of an opportunity.

Pick-a-Brick Whale

I see plenty of white 2×2 corner plates, lots of 2×2 plates in light bluish gray and plenty of clips make up the baleen. The end result is a pretty good facsimile of a blue whale. You can say Mansur had…a whale of a good time with this. You see, brilliant puns like that is why I am the highest paid Brothers Brick contributor ever. At least that’s what they told me…or at least that’s what I understood when they said “voluntary”. Wait, what does “conditional trial period” mean?

And if you liked this cetacean built from a limited palette of bricks as much as you enjoyed my puns, we’re sure you’ll also enjoy André Pinto’s bonsai tree, also built from nothing but Pick-a-Brick parts.

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Whale watching without getting wet

Creating organic natural shapes using plastic bricks is not a simple thing, and making those shapes fit together into something simple and beautiful is truly an art form. Despite being monochromatic, this sculpture of a Humpback whale by Anthony Séjourné does an amazing job of capturing the majestic grace of one of the world’s largest marine mammals. I especially liked the use of so many hollow studs to represent barnacles. And the fluke is quite nice as well (that’s the whale’s tail, for those less well versed in whale biology).

Lego HumpBack Whale - atana studio

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How small can you go?

Sometimes, the leviathan is small. In this magnificent tiny vignette by Grantmasters, a lone ship rides a ferocious ocean. It’s a safe bet that it’s the Pequod, since it’s hunting a white whale. As usual, Grant’s build is rife with excellent parts usages, from the little known Belville figure feet making most of the whale’s body, to the beard for a tail, or the axe blades for water.

Leviathan

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This orca is set to create some killer waves.

When it comes to ocean-dwelling mammals, the majestic black and white killer whale (also known as an orca) is a fan favorite. The killer whale’s beauty is matched by its power, which can be seen when they breach the surface. Both of these characteristics are expertly captured by timofey_tkachev in his model of an orca leaping out of the waves. I am especially impressed by the builder’s ability to use a variety of curved and angular slope elements to capture both skin color patterns and the sleek shape of the whale’s body. The brick-built base with with waves following the whale’s trajectory is also a wonderfully believable touch, plus the builder included instructions for an added bonus.

Orca / instruction available

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