Bill Ward's Brickpile » LEGO Blogs

Advent 2011 Day 20

Bill — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 18:47:41 +0000

Day 20 of the LEGO City and Star Wars Advent Calendars for 2011.

City seems to be switching to a new theme, perhaps for the final stretch toward Christmas.

In Star Wars, we have a UCS TIE Fighter at minifig scale. It seems odd to me that LEGO have never produced a TIE fighter UCS set – they’ve done an Interceptor and Vader’s TIE Advanced, but not a bog standard TIE fighter. Leave that to the fans, though… here’s a TIE Fighter MOC that looks just like what LEGO ought to have made as a set.

BrickCon 2011: Blogging Panel

Bill — Sun, 02 Oct 2011 22:11:18 +0000

I am at BrickCon, writing this in a classroom in the Seattle Center, in the audience of a panel on LEGO blogging. Josh Wedin and Andrew Becraft from The Brothers Brick (TBB), and Ace Kim from TBB and From Bricks to Bothans (FBTB), are talking about their experiences in the LEGO blogging community.

I don’t have one of those T-shirts that says “I’m Blogging This.” but I am anyway. There’s a video recording being made, so you’ll be able to watch it later if you wish.

Topics include:

Search engine optimization and blogging strategies
“Hiring” other contributors to write for the site
Using Amazon affiliate links
Shifts in the online LEGO community (LUGNET, Flickr, Brickshelf, blogs, etc.)
In-person events (BrickCon, other conventions, LUG meetings, etc.)
Not profitable to run a LEGO site
- income not enough to live on
- TBB gives back to the community instead of profiting (incorporated as a for-profit org, but run as if it were a not-for-profit)
- FBTB is a sole proprietorship
What benefit do you get from it?
- Andrew: Not the fame. Acts as a journal of his experiences in the community
- Josh: Just likes to write about LEGO, to day what he thinks
- Ace: Not a MOC builder, so it is his way to feel part of the community; also likes running contests

Reasonably Lazy

Bill — Wed, 13 Jan 2010 19:04:48 +0000

Readers of the “Brick House” comic at Reasonably Clever will have noticed that the characters are now wandering around the author’s home in Detroit. Does this mean Christopher Doyle finally got too lazy to build new sets? ;-)

Pirates Advent Calendar Petitions

Bill — Fri, 11 Sep 2009 21:14:55 +0000

You’ve probably heard by now that the Pirates Advent Calendar is not going to be sold in the US. After last year’s debacle with the Castle Advent Calendar, you’d think LEGO would know better. Well, the good folks at Classic Pirates over on Eurobricks have a petition going, and The Brothers Brick also have a similar post calling for support for the Pirates advent calendar. Post your support now!

Look ma, I’m on the radio

Bill — Thu, 18 Jun 2009 09:18:54 +0000

Listen to me being interviewed on the radio! Well, podcast really. And my mom doesn’t listen to podcasts. But anyway, I did an interview for LAMLradio shortly after BrickFest was over, and it was posted a while ago but for some reason it didn’t show up in my iTunes. But you can check it out on the LAMLradio site at least.

One of the top 48?

Bill — Thu, 26 Mar 2009 00:41:00 +0000

So, I was scanning through the #lego Twitter search results and came across this one: 48 of the Coolest, Stylish and Creative Lego Creations. About halfway down, they featured my “LEGO, Robert Indiana style” sculpture. How cool is that? There are 47 other great models featured as well, so be sure to check it out…

Winners of the Go Miniman Go video contest

Bill — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 00:31:57 +0000

The technogeek blog Gizmodo has announced the winners of the Go Miniman Go video contest. There are some really incredible videos in the winners list, and I don’t know if I could pick a favorite. They all show a lot of creativity not just with the LEGO but also the filmmaking. Check it out.

New LEGO blog: Sariel’s LEGO Technic creations

Bill — Tue, 06 Jan 2009 00:27:46 +0000

One of the most well-documented LEGO builders out there is “Sariel,” a Polish LEGO builder specializing in Technic models: construction equipment, trucks, military equipment, etc. They feature a lot of moving parts, often with motorized and/or pneumatic power. He takes excellent quality photos and even has Youtube videos of his models.

Until now, I mostly saw his models on the Klocki blog (pron. “klosskey”) that started in Poland (and written in Polish) but has expanded to an international audience and is also available in English and Portuguese. Sariel was often featured on Klocki along with other great builders from LUGPol, the Polish LEGO user group, and Comunidade 0937, the Portuguese group (hint: look at “0937″ upside-down), as well as other great builders from around the globe.

But now, Sariel has his own blog Sariel.pl: Sariel’s LEGO Technic creations where he will feature his work in great detail. Even if you don’t build Technic, it’s still inspiring. And of course I trust that Klocki will continue to feature his work as well.

My license plate: “I ♥ LEGO”

Bill — Thu, 01 Jan 2009 23:24:23 +0000

A few years ago I got a special custom California license plate that says “I ♥ LEGO.” And though I’ve had it for several years, I never got around to posting a picture of it online. Well, apparently Flickr user r0wb0t has beat me to the punch. My car was in the parking lot at the Museum of American Heritage as I was helping staff the BayLUG exhibit, and he took a picture of it and put it on Flickr.

I discovered this via the Lego Diem blog.

UPDATE 1/10: another picture of my car has turned up on Flickr.

Amazing Great Ball Contraption video

Bill — Wed, 24 Dec 2008 02:03:01 +0000

This is really a work of art – not just for the clever LEGO creations, but maybe even more so for the filmmaking. The modern classical music accompanies the images very well. By taking a series of close-up video shots of various parts of the contraption, each one well composed and from an interesting angle, our interest is maintained throughout. Exceedingly well-done!

Via TechnicBRICKs blog.

Furniture

Bill — Wed, 21 Feb 2007 21:50:22 +0000

I know it was posted a while ago but I wanted to blog about this mainly so I could find it easily to copy some of these ideas shamelessly… Last August Janey “Red Brick” blogged about these amazing minifig-scaled furniture ideas which is really just a bunch of Brickshelf links to some amazing stuff.

Speaking of furniture, that’s part of the problem why I haven’t built anything in a while. The room where my LEGO collection is kept is unusable because it’s been co-opted as storage for all the clutter around the house. I need to do a purge and/or run to the storage locker so I can dig my LEGO out and get building again….

Technorati Tags: lego, blog, janey, redbrick, furniture, brickshelf

MicroBricks Blog

Bill — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 23:52:59 +0000

Bruce, aka “Bricktales,” writer of one of my favorite LEGO blogs, VignetteBricks, has a new blog. It’s called MicroBricks and features all the latest and greatest microscale LEGO creations being made today. Here are some examples of the models featured there:

Check it out today!

(via Brothers Brick).

Technorati Tags: lego, blogs, blogging, microscale

Track Layout Geometry

Bill — Fri, 03 Nov 2006 02:44:20 +0000

Three years ago (on November 21, 2003) I wrote a page on my old site about
Track Layout Geometry showing some of the interesting things you can do with LEGO train track, for example, this method for running track on the 22.5° diagonal:

I was browsing my favorite blogs today and noticed that the page got mentioned on Mike Walsh’s blog. That prompted me to take another look at it, and I decided it really would be better to put it here on the Brickpile site. So I moved that page to this site, and changed the page on the old site to redirect to it with a 5-second delay using JavaScript. Thanks for the link Mike (and sorry for changing it out from under you)!

Technorati Tags: lego, trains, track, layout, geometry

Brothers Brick: “Have the Internet and Blogging Improved LEGO Creativity?”

Bill — Tue, 26 Sep 2006 08:00:21 +0000

Via The Brothers Brick:

“Alan Lopuszynski over at Burbanked linked to Linus’ recent post about robbed’s Terminator head and asks an interesting question I’d like to put in front of TBB readers:

Impressive? Absolutely. Yet it begs the question: were people this creative before the Internet offered an outlet with which to showcase their efforts? Because in our youth, we were lucky to construct a rocket car out of Legos that actually looked like it was capable of rolling down the upstairs hallway. We have to wonder, had we the benefit of the self-affirming effects of a blog and complimentary comments from people all over the world, whether things might have turned out quite differently in life.

So, dear readers, what do you think?”

My response:

I awoke from my last (in the sense of most recent, and hopefully in the sense of ultimate) Dark Age when my brother in law pointed me to Eric Harshbarger’s site, when it was featured on Slashdot for the Lego Desk. I looked at his works and thought “I could do that” and went out and bought a bunch of 3033 tubs (RIP) and built my Pokemon sculptures. I then found LUGNET and my local LUG and haven’t looked back since.

The thing that’s kept me from having another Dark Age is the interaction with other AFOL’s. Whether it be a LUG meeting, train show, or just posting pictures online, the fact that I’m not all on my own has made it possible to maintain momentum. And that wouldn’t happen without the Internet.

As for blogs though, I think the jury’s still out. I don’t think there’s enough of us blogging to really have an effect yet. I think that LUGNET (though not nearly as much as in the past), classic-space.com, classic-castle.com sites, etc. have more impact than blogs at the moment.

So the question I would add is, will LEGO blogs take over from bulletin boards as the venue for the LEGO discussion? I think they already have in a few small areas, such as vignettes, but overall it remains to be seen. What do you think?

Dragostea din Tei in LEGO??

Bill — Wed, 20 Sep 2006 21:29:12 +0000

The song “Dragostea din Tei” by the Moldovan band O-Zone, more widely known as “the Numa Numa song,” is probably the most widely recognized song in the Romanian language ever written. And now it has finally been done in LEGO! Do you remember Gary Brolsma’s famous “Numa Numa Dance” video? This LEGO animation is a remake of that dance using a LEGO minifig. The minifig’s mouth has been animated and the arms move in ways that LEGO just can’t do, unless you rip them off at the shoulders!! Muahahahahaha!!!! (sorry, lost control there for a moment). Anyway, here’s the video (Update 12/23/2008: The original video has been removed from YouTube, but I found another copy and have replaced the embedded video here):

The original Gary Brolsma version, to refresh your memory (or if you’ve been living under a rock somewhere and never saw it):

For more about the song, check out the Wikipedia entries for “Dragostea din Tei” and “Numa Numa.” And for more about Gary Brolsma, check out his fan site or his latest work, NewNuma.

Via The Brothers Brick.

BrickBrick: LEGO Bloggers Code

Bill — Wed, 14 Jun 2006 05:07:37 +0000

What are good ethical guidelines for blogging about LEGO? Sean Mykael over on BrickBrick has posted a proposal for a LEGO Bloggers Code to answer that question.

I read it and think I agree with the proposed guidelines. I would like to think that I’ve already been following those guidelines but if I’ve had any lapses, please point it out to me. LEGO hobbyists, like any other kind of artist, deserve to be credited for their creations. And bloggers deserve credit for finding them. So let’s all try to bear these rules in mind as we post about LEGO in our blogs…

I learned about this via The Brothers Brick (formerly DuneChaser’s BlockLog)

Technorati Tags: lego, blogging, blogs, lego blogging

Clever new SNOT technique

Bill — Sun, 11 Jun 2006 07:51:28 +0000

As I wrote recently, Unique Brick Tecniques is a great blog for discovering some of the clever ideas people have posted about.

The obvious way to connect two LEGO pieces is by putting the studs of one into the underside of another. But there are other ways. For example you can use a right-angle bracket to connect bricks at a 90 degree angle. For example, the headlights or taillights on most LEGO cars and trucks are often attached this way. In the AFOL (Adult Friends of LEGO) community, the term for this is SNOT (“Studs Not On Top”).

But the trouble with most SNOT techniques is that the bracket pieces take up bulk that sometimes you can ill afford in your model. One of the techniques featured on Unique Brick Techniques a few weeks ago is a very compact way to make a 180 degree connection between two plates. It seems to have been discovered by Brickshelf user “kerouac” (whose full identity I have not been able to find). Read more about it in the threads on Classic-Castle.com and LUGNET.

Technorati Tags: lego, snot

Unique Brick Techniques

Bill — Tue, 06 Jun 2006 05:46:22 +0000

I recently found out a bout a relatively new LEGO blog called Unique Brick Techniques and highly recommend it. The authors, “Mr. D” and “Nathan,” monitor the Net for all the latest clever ideas posted by LEGO fans.

It all starts with LEGO

Bill — Fri, 20 Jan 2006 23:50:27 +0000

When I was a little kid my great passion was building things (usually spacecraft) out of LEGO. When I was 10 I learned about computer programming thanks to the Commodore PET computers at my school. I really think that the mental process is much the same, and that my experience with LEGO led directly to my ability to pick up computer programming skills.

The basic idea is that with LEGO bricks, they fit together to build some kind of creation. And they can only fit together in certain ways and not in others. For example you can’t fit two bricks together stud-to-stud, or bottom-to-bottom (at least, not without other pieces to hold them in that position). Similarly, there are syntax rules with software that limit the ways you can put statements and expressions together. And just as you can create a given shape using a wide number of possible arrangements of various LEGO bricks, you can implement a particular software feature using any number of different combinations of statements and expressions. So if a LEGO creation is like a software program, a LEGO element is like a variable or an operator.

For years when I have talked to parents at train shows and BayLUG meetings, I have been telling them that all the years I spent building LEGO etched certain pathways into my brain which prepared me for computer programming, and that’s a reason they should encourage their kids to do LEGO. And I think the fact that we’re based in Silicon Valley is not the only reason that many of our BayLUG members come from software, engineering, or other technical backgrounds.

Today, I came across a link to an interesting article by one of the foundes of Macromedia Flash on Jake McKee’s blog. His story is basically identical to mine through his childhood years – except that he got into Apple ][ and Mac computers and I was a Commodore guy.