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!
Technorati Tags: lego, blogs, blogging, microscale
Holger “HoMa” Matthes raises the bar yet again.
This is a model of the Dresdner Frauenkirche (or “Church of Our Lady in Dresden” as you might say it in English), a Lutheran church in Dresden which was bombed out during World War II. It was left in ruins for decades and recently rebuilt to match the original. The parts modeled in dark grey represent the ruins that were incorporated into the new building; the tan parts are the new parts that were added to restore the church. The model is 1.45m or 4’9″ tall!
He posted about this on LUGNET two weeks ago so it isn’t exactly news but I’ve been meaning to blog about it for a while and am only now getting around to it.
Apparently, LEGO’s master builders had made a model of the church before, which was on display in a department store as part of a fundraiser to pay for the reconstruction. The one from LEGO was about twice as tall, but I think HoMa’s is at least as good. For pics of that model and more info see this sub-thread from LUGNET.
I have a personal connection here: I visited HoMa and a few of his friends during my trip to Germany in 2001. I was impressed with his talent then, but he’s really excelled in the years since! The detail work on this model is just exquisite.
So if you’ve seen this already, click the pic and take a closer look. It’s impressive enough to deserve a second glance. And if you haven’t, you’re in for a treat.
Technorati Tags: lego, dresden, frauenkirche, holgermatthes, homa
The LEGO company has set a challenge to their own designers – create a moonbase module and present it at Brickfest!
I think this is the first time that LEGO has embraced a fan-created system like this. It’s great news for the relationship between adult fans of LEGO (AFOLs) and the LEGO company.
You can vote for your favorite of the designs presented. Here are the candidates; click the images to see more pictures:
 1. The Loony Luna Knight |
 2. Command and Defence |
 3. Squidman Module |
 4. Space Hungry Hippos |
 5. Ice Planet Dome |
Personally I voted for the Hungry Hippos. Remember that game from when we were kids in the 70′s? See the video if you’re not convinced just how cool this LEGO model is!
On June 18, the Space contingent of the Bay Area LEGO Users Group had its first Space-only meeting.
We met on a Sunday evening at the Round Table Pizza parlor in Mountain View. They have a nice back room that you can reserve for free if you call ahead, which we’ve used for various members-only events in the past. Besides bringing our latest Space models to show off, we also had a contest and a parts draft.
 My winning “top greeble” contest entry |
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The contest was for “best greeble” and there were two categories: top greeble and bottom greeble. But what is a greeble? When they were building the models for use in the Star Wars movies, the modelers used the term “greeble” for the little bits of detail used to break up the otherwise smooth skin of the spacecraft. Read more about it on Wikipedia. Members brought examples of greebles on both the top and the bottom of their models (or looking another way, studs-up vs. studs-down). I won in the “top greeble” category!
 Parts laid out for drafting |
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The parts draft was an opportunity for us to leverage our buying power to get large numbers of interesting parts. A parts draft is where each person brings a particular LEGO set and then we sort the contents of the boxes into piles, and take turns drawing from the piles. We used Set 4881 “Robo Platoon” since it could be obtained for $5 at the local LEGO store (it sold out before the meeting was held though, so some members couldn’t get a copy), and had a lot of great parts. We limited it to 2 copies of the set per person, to keep things fair. We sorted the parts out into baggies and literally drew straws – Pizza Hut drinking straws cut to various lengths – to determine the order for selecting. Even though everyone got at least one unwanted bag (toward the end the choices were pretty limited), I think everyone was happy with what they got for their $5 (or $10 for those who brought two boxes).
The meeting date for our next Space meeting hasn’t been set yet, but it will probably be later in the summer. We did select a contest theme though – build a spaceship without using any grey (light grey or dark, old or new).
Technorati Tags: lego, space, baylug, meeting, partsdraft, greeble, greebles, contest
Hey, your chocolate got on my LEGO! Hey, your LEGO got in my chocolate! Two great tastes that taste great together.
Well, one that tastes great, one that’s great to build with I guess. Anyway, this is one of the most novel uses of LEGO I’ve ever seen – and one of the most novel uses of chocolate at the same time! It is a contraption made (mostly) out of LEGO that creates three-dimensional objects using chocolate!
The tricky parts are not built out of LEGO – the chocolate is melted and the temperature is carefully calibrated so that the desired amount of liquid chocolate comes out for each “pixel.” But the “print head” is moved around using LEGO mechanisms to build objects of any shape. It creates the design one layer at a time until the desired shape is completed.
This isn’t exactly news but it’s new to me. Frankly I don’t know where I came across this first. It’s been featured on LUGNET, BoingBoing, and Slashdot.
Technorati Tags: lego, chocolate, contraption
When I was a kid, Peanuts was one of my favorite cartoons. 
The (mis)adventures of Charlie Brown and his friends were always a treat. My father had several books of Peanuts cartoons from the 1950′s and 1960′s which I used to read over and over. So when I saw this LEGO creation I was taken right back to those days when I would lie on the guest bed in my mom’s sewing room, flipping through the old books of Snoopy cartoons.
Most really impressive LEGO models are impressive for their size. LEGO models of Snoopy have been done before, after all. But the impressive thing about this one is how small it is. As difficult as it is to build large LEGO sculptures, the ingenious use of speciatly parts such as flowers for his feet, the parts in the typewriter, etc. show even more creativity in my opinion.
The model was created by a Japanese LEGO fan named “MisaQa” There are more amazing small LEGO models available on stud-and-tube.com, the creator’s Web site (which is mostly in Japanese, but with some English too). Or just click the image for more photos from the creator’s Brickshelf folder.
Technorati Tags: lego, sculpture, snoopy, woodstock, typewriter, doghouse, peanuts, schulz
One of the most amazing LEGO models I’ve seen has recently been making the rounds of all the LEGO blogs. And this one is no exception. It’s just that good. It’s the USS Harry S. Truman, minifig scale – complete with a full complement of aircraft!
Wow!
I mean really, wow!
Click the image to see the rest of the pics.
The creator is a German LEGO fan named Malle Hawking, also known as “Weebleleezer.” Lacking skills in the German language that’s about all I could find on him. Look at his Brickshelf account for a few other creations which are quite good, but not nearly on the same scale.
What I want to know is, where did he get all those grey bricks? That must represent a fortune in LEGO plates and bricks. I’m not sure I could build a ship that big even without regard to color, but all in grey? Like I said before, wow.
Technorati Tags: lego, ship, aircraft carrier, harry s. truman
Today’s entry features a creation by a Czech LEGO fan named Jindrich Kubec.
It’s called the Treasure Reef and is really two models in one. I came across the announcement on LUGNET a few days ago and was very impressed. The diorama consists of two main areas, plus a story in pictures:
First, there is a beach scene with a bar, sunbathers, and volleyball court. I especially liked the sand castle and volleyball game.
But when you lift off the water (represented by blue baseplates) you can access the other part, an underwater scene, featuring a cave of treasures protected by an octopus-like monster. There’s also a whale skeleton which came from an old LEGO set.
Finally, there is also a story in pictures, as a variation of the underwater scene, where divers fight to obtain the treasure from the sea monster in the cave.
All the pics can be viewed by clicking the above links, or view the whole gallery on Brickshelf.
I was very impressed because of the sheer originality of this diorama. Although elements of the set (such as the whale skeleton) came from official LEGO models most of it – and the idea of combining the things together like this – is very original.
Technorati Tags: LEGO, beach, underwater, sea monster
My wife and I visited her family in Williamsport, PA last September. There is a very small airport there which just has one gate, served by US Airways Express turboprop planes. So imagine my surprise when I saw LEGO on display there! They had a glass display case with LEGO sculptures of Kellogg’s Tony the Tiger and Toucan Sam characters, along with some of the Kellogg’s product boxes.
I don’t know why these were there, or if any other airports were included in this program, but I was very impressed with the models and very surprised to see them in such an unexpected location. As far as I know, neither LEGO nor Kellogg’s have any particular connection to Williamsport.
