Bill Ward's Brickpile » Travel

My Video of BrickCon 2008 (Part 2) on LAMLtv

Bill — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 08:09:26 +0000

As promised, I made a second episode for LAMLtv about BrickCon. The main feature is an interview with Joe Meno, editor of BrickJournal.

This video stuff is a lot of fun. I’ve got a lot more ideas for video projects. For example:

BayLUG meeting and event footage
Interviews with BayLUG members
My MOCs and those of other local folks who will consent to being taped
Other LEGO conventions (I’m already planning on BrickFest PDX in 2009)

If you have any thoughts about LEGO video projects, you can share them with me here or over on the LAMLradio blog.

My Video of BrickCon 2008 (Part 1) on LAMLtv

Bill — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 23:56:45 +0000

At BrickCon 2008, I shot video of a lot of models on display and interviewed a few people. The result has just been released as an episode of LAMLtv, the new video podcast arm of LAMLradio. This episode features interviews with Simon Kent, design lead at Lego Creator in Denmark, and Jenn “The Brick Chick” Wagner, as well as footage of models on display.

I have enough footage to make at least one more episode. I hope you enjoy! Let me know if you have any feedback – comments, questions, or suggestions. And if you are interested in video, contact James Wadsworth and offer your services. It’s a lot of fun to be involved in LAMLtv and there’s always room for more.

My BrickCon Haul

Bill — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 02:30:42 +0000

When I flew home I was really worried my suitcase would be overweight. Arriving at the airport, I hauled it up on the scale at the check-in station, and my face fell when it came up at 64 pounds and change. Since most airlines have a 50 pound limit for baggage, I feared I’d have to pay a fee for overweight bags. But happy day, Virgin America’s limit is 70 pounds!

Here’s what I got:

Set # 7090: Crossbow Attack (Castle) – freebie in my event bag – MSRP: $6.00
Set # 7738: Coast Guard Helicopter and Life Raft – City Build-Off prize – MSRP: $40.00
Set # 8635: Mission 6: Mobile Command Center (Agents) – was built and disassembled, parts may be missing – Raffle prize – MSRP: $90.00
Set # 3831: Rocket Ride (Spongebob) – bought at LEGO store at 25% off – MSRP: $30.00
Set # 7724: Advent Calendar – bought at LEGO store at 25% off – MSRP: $30.00
Set # 10192: Space Skulls – bought at LEGO store at 25% off of existing sale price ($69.99) – MSRP: $100.00
Set # 10185: Green Grocer – bought at LEGO store at 40% off (scratch and dent) – MSRP: $150.00
Set # 10189: Taj Mahal – bought at LEGO store at 50% off (scratch and dent) – MSRP: $300.00
4 Pick-A-Brick large cups – bought at LEGO store at 25% off
1 Pick-A-Brick bag from the bins at the convention – $5 for a good sized ziploc bag
20 minifig parts from the bins at the convention – $10.00

When I went to BrickFair I didn’t win anything in the drawings, and I missed out on the scratch and dent because we got there too late. At BrickCon however, I was much luckier: they had a drawing of sorts to determine the order for the scratch and dent, and my number was the first one called! There was only one Taj Mahal at 50% off, and I got it! Then on the last day I won one of the more valuable sets in the door prize raffle!

The LEGO all arrived home intact, but the suitcase was a total loss. I put it out on the curb hoping a neighbor would take it, and it finally disappeared this afternoon. Both of its handles had ripped off, internal plastic bracing along the sides had crumbled, and one of the zipper pulls was lost. (It was already in pretty bad shape before the trip to Seattle, so it’s not just from that trip).

Home from BrickCon

Bill — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 21:14:08 +0000

I got home late last night after returning from BrickCon and slept in until noon.

What a weekend! I finished uploading all my pictures from the show finally. I took 446 pictures in all, which I think is a personal record. I still need to go through them and rotate the vertical ones, though. What I usually do for events like this is make a separate photoset with what I think was the best pictures from the event, but that’s probably going to take at least a week.

I also took a bunch of video footage. I did several interviews on behalf of James Wadsworth for LAML Radio, and once I send them to him hopefully he’ll find some clever use for them as well as other “B-reel” footage I got. LAML Radio, for those who aren’t familiar, is a LEGO-oriented podcast. It mostly consists of interviews and LEGO news, and is usually quite interesting and a great way to get motivated to build something if I’m otherwise not feeling creative. If you use iTunes, you can find it easily there, and/or just subscribe to it in your blog reader.

Anyway, if I didn’t see you at BrickCon this year, hopefully you’ll be able to make it next year.

BrickCon 2008 so far

Bill — Sat, 04 Oct 2008 19:41:31 +0000

BrickCon is going very well so far. There are tons of great models on display, many great deals to be had on LEGO, and some amazing news.

I took a lot of photos yesterday and they’re all up on my Flickr account. The biggest news was the unveiling of a new castle set, the 10193 Medieval Village. I made a video of it and posted it on YouTube (but had to wait until 12 noon today so that BrickJournal.com could have an exclusive 3-hour early announcement). I also created a special photoset for just those pictures so you don’t have to dig through all the images in my BrickCon set to find them.

BrickCon here I come

Bill — Thu, 04 Sep 2008 19:19:21 +0000

I just bought my plane tickets (on Virgin America, natch) and am looking forward to my second brick convention this year! I’ll be arriving at Seattle airport at 11:35am on Friday 10/3 and leaving Sunday evening. I have a room at the Hampton Inn (official hotel for the con). Question is, how do I get there from the airport? I would rather not rent a car…

Home from BrickFair, thinking about BrickCon

Bill — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:59:05 +0000

I made it home safely from BrickFair last night around midnight – another pleasant Virgin America experience. I can’t say enough good about that airline. The employees actually smile! When was the last time you saw that?

Anyway, the next LEGO convention is BrickCon in Seattle in October. Virgin America flies to Seattle too. :) I had other plans that weekend but I’m seriously thinking about changing them…

BrickFair 2008, Day 3

Bill — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 21:33:45 +0000

I’m writing this during the closing ceremonies. I have packed all of my models into a box, and have my suitcases beside me. “I’m leavin’ on a jet plane….” The final door prize raffle is going on now.

This afternoon I got a chance to take part in a fun event, a live Skypecast for LAML Radio Podcast. Six of us met in a hotel room on the 22nd floor, and gathered around a laptop and listened to James interview his guests live, and then joined in for a live discussion. There were a number of technical difficulties, as seems to always happen with Skypecasts, but I think it worked out OK. I’m looking forward to hearing how I sound on the podcast when it is published.

BrickFair 2008, Day 2

Bill — Sun, 31 Aug 2008 05:07:39 +0000

Well, the first of two public days is over, and the hotel was absolutely swarmed with people. They raised over $8000 for the SladeChild Foundation charity, which is great news.

After the public cleared out, there was a game of Bingo, a few awards were handed out, and three games were announced: a chess tournament, a speed build of the new Taj Mahal set, an Agents Turbocar Chase set build-off, and a chess tournament. Participation in the games was by raffle, and sadly I didn’t make it into any of them, so I just wandered around, taking photos and chatting with people.

I took over 200 photos today, and they’re all up on Flickr. Hopefully soon I’ll have a chance to sort through them and pick out the best ones, which I’ll put into a new set. Also, some of them probably require some editing, to rotate the images or fix color balance, exposure, etc. I have RAW images of each photo so I may be replacing some of the photos if they’re worth the effort.

Now, it’s time for bed and I have to also get my things partially packed to go home tomorrow…

BrickFair 2008, Day 1

Bill — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 07:06:19 +0000

I flew from San Francisco to Washington DC on Virgin America, and I have to say that it’s been the best air travel experience I’ve had in decades. Can’t say enough good things about that airline. Here’s hoping when I go home Sunday I have as good of an experience.

Anyway I got to Dulles airport and took a SuperShuttle to the hotel and checked in without incident. I got here just in time for the keynote speech by Tormud Askildsen, LEGO’s head of community development. After that, I set up a few of my recent models (some that have been blogged about here, and others that haven’t yet…) and found some guys who were heading out to dinner and then over to Pontiac Mills for the 50% off scratch-and-dent sale at the LEGO outlet. We got there too late for the best deals but I did score an Indiana Jones set (#7623) and four train motors, all for under $60!

Now I’m heading to bed (3am local time). Tomorrow I plan to take some pictures of exhibits etc.

Roommate wanted for Brickfair

Bill — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 06:46:09 +0000

I just bought my plane ticket to Brickfair in Washington DC.

Now, I need to find at least one roommate. The room is about $100/day so it would be nice to be able to share it. I have a room reserved for both Fri & Sat nights, Aug 29-30. Hit me up if you are interested. (If you already have a room too, that’s OK – the reservations can be canceled up to 4pm on check-in day.)

No NWBrickCon for Me

Bill — Tue, 26 Sep 2006 17:03:46 +0000

It’s official, I’m not going to Northwest BrickCon. Having just gone to BrickFest a month ago I really can’t justify another trip right now, and besides BayLUG is having a meeting that weekend.

I was really hoping to go to NWBC to meet some of the folks who weren’t able to come to BF. I met a lot of west coast LEGO folks at BricksWest 2003, but haven’t seen any of them since, except for a few who made it to BF this year. Hopefully next year, NWBC and BF won’t be so close together!

I am still hoping to make it to BrickSouth next spring in Atlanta. I met a few of the Georgia classic space guys at BF and am looking forward to that event. Hopefully I can build some kind of impressive spacecraft to show there.

Best of BrickFest 2006

Bill — Tue, 05 Sep 2006 04:40:41 +0000

I’ve finally had a chance to go over all the photos I previously posted from BrickFest, and selected what I feel are the best. Some are great photos, while others are photos of great things. Still others are just photos of things that are quintsentially BrickFest. Click the picture to the right to view the 79 pictures I selected, or go straight to a slide show.

I also added tags and titles to all the photos I had uploaded, and deleted a few that were redundant or out of focus. If you would like to see all the pictures, click these links:

Technorati Tags: lego, brickfest, brickfest2006

BrickFest 2006, Day 3 – Turn out the lights, the party’s over…

Bill — Mon, 28 Aug 2006 16:27:46 +0000

So that brings us to the final day of BrickFest 2006. My pictures are up on Flickr and just about everyone’s gone home. I started the day by attending a discussion on Capital Ships run by some of the experts from classic-space.com, including Jon Palmer, Adrian Drake, Mark Sandlin, and Chris Giddens. We met in a conference room on the first floor where we discussed some of the techniques and challenges for building and transporting very large spaceships made of LEGO, and then we went up to the exhibit hall where some of these things were demonstrated on the ships there.

After that I went to a discussion on LEGO as art vs. LEGO as toy, which was led by Roy T Cook, who in addition to being a LEGO builder is also a professor at Villanova University. I think the consensus was that while LEGO is a toy, it can be used as an art medium, but it depends on a number of factors including the context in which the model is made. I learned a lot about the philosophy of art and it gave me a lot to think about.

The afternoon was taken up with dealing with the crowds who attended the public exhibition. After they cleared out around 4 pm, we started tearing down the displays in the exhibit hall. My vignettes took about 30 seconds to tear down, but some of the guys didn’t finish until after midnight. We had closing ceremonies in the evening with a lot of door prizes being handed out. I didn’t win any, but I was pretty happy winning the small vignette contest.

Holly and I went out to dinner at a great Japanese restaurant in Fairfax called Blue Ocean (where we had also had the most amazing lunch on Friday). The food was great, but they were very busy so the service was slow.

After dinner we returned to the hotel where I hung out with the Classic Space guys and we stood around chatting until they were done tearing down, then we retired to the (closed) hotel bar where we all sat around talking until about 1 am. I drove Tom McDonald to the airport, came back to the hotel, and went to bed. I can’t wait for next year! In the meantime I hope we can attend Northwest BrickCon in Seattle and/or BrickSouth in Atlanta next spring.

Technorati Tags: lego, brickfest, brickfest2006

Brickfest 2006, Day 2 – and some good news

Bill — Sun, 27 Aug 2006 13:45:35 +0000

I’ve uploaded my pictures of Day 2 of Brickfest 2006 to Flickr.

The good news? We won!!! Our model “Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening” won the award for best small vignette out of all the vignette models at Brickfest! Holly and I are very pleased. Thanks to everyone who voted for it. Here’s a picture I took the other day of the winning model:

Technorati Tags: lego, brickfest, brickfest2006

Brickfest 2006, Day 1

Bill — Sat, 26 Aug 2006 20:42:18 +0000

Day one of Brickfest 2006 is done.

I spent a lot of time looking over the MOCs that had been brought in since the night before, and attended a facinating presentation on making brickfilms, which I recorded on my camcorder and plan to post on YouTube soon. The exhibit halls had been updated quite a lot with new models being brought in that morning so I took a lot of new pictures.

Technorati Tags: lego, brickfest, brickfest2006

Brickfest MOC Exhibit – Setup

Bill — Fri, 25 Aug 2006 14:19:55 +0000

The annual Brickfest LEGO convention has begun! It starts today (Friday) but all day yesterday folks were setting up their models in the exhibit room. I took these photos late last night.

This is the first time I’ve been able to attend Brickfest, though I have gone to a similar conference, BricksWest, twice. Brickfest is being held in the Sheraton in Tysons Corner, VA and is being put on by folks from the Washington DC area LEGO club, WAMALUG. Holly and I are staying at the hotel here and will go visit her family in Pennsylvania afterward.

The LEGO designer moonbase Contest seems to have been won by my favorite – Hungry Hippos. Or at least, I spotted it in the Moonbase layout.

If you’re at Brickfest introduce yourself to me. If not, keep watching the blog as I’ll be adding entries all weekend. But now, I gotta get downstairs and see what’s going on!

Technorati Tags: lego, brickfest, brickfest2006

Any LEGO Fans from South Carolina?

Bill — Wed, 08 Feb 2006 08:45:35 +0000

My wife and I will be traveling to South Carolina (visiting Hilton Head and Charleston) next month. If you’re in that area and would like to meet up, send me mail or comment under this entry. Related posts:Next BayLUG Meeting: April 15LEGO survey of adult fansWALL-E Related posts: