On October 30, BayLUG had its October 2010 meeting at the Museum of American Heritage.
Bill Ward
R.I.P. Daniel Jezek, Bricklink founder/owner
The LEGO community has lost one of its most valuable members. Daniel Jezek created and ran BrickLink, the online marketplace for secondhand LEGO parts and sets, which is a cornerstone of the LEGO hobbyist community. He will be sorely missed.
Big Yellow Taxi
I’ve built an iconic New York City yellow Checker taxi cab.
Throughout building this, the Joni Mitchell song has been running through my head…
Glacier National Park Bus
Glacier National Park is famous for its iconic old-fashioned tour buses with ten doors and an open roof. I’ve never been to the park, but I built the bus for BayLUG’s "National Parks" theme building contest at the September 2010 meeting, and displayed it at BrickCon 2010 in Seattle. I’ve made a few minor adjustments since then, but the original build was done in only two hours.
Review: New LEGO Technic Idea Books
There’s something new for LEGO Technic fans from No Starch Press.
Why Does LEGO Ignore Girls?
Blogger and podcaster CC Chapman has set up a great video series where his daughter Emily pontificates on the issues that matter to her. The latest one is “Why Does LEGO Ignore Girls?” where she makes the case for LEGO to make more products that are accessible to girls.
Let Your Android Control Your Robot
Today, LEGO has announce a new Android App for LEGO MINDSTORMS NXT.
BayLUG September 2010 Meeting
BayLUG had its September 2010 meeting on Saturday, September 18 at Johannes’s church in San Leandro, CA.
Greetings from BrickCon
I’m here in Seattle for BrickCon. I’ll post more about it soon, but for now, here’s my pictures:
Vintage Vehicles and Family Festival 2010
The 2010 Vintage Vehicles & Family Festival was held in Palo Alto on July 25.
Brick Show now open
This was the opening weekend for the the Brick Show in San Leandro, CA at the Bay Area Family Church, organized by Johannes van Galen and featuring BayLUG/BayLTC. The show is ongoing through July 25 so come on out and check it out!
Seven-way radial symmetry technique
I just stumbled across a way to build a 7-way radial symmetry in LEGO.
A technique for building 7-way radial symmetry in LEGO. The blue 2×2 plates are connected to each other using plate hinges in a ring, and when I built that I noticed the ring looked like the right diameter to go around a 4×4 round piece. The hinges actually protrude a little into the center, but by sandwiching the two 4×4 rounds together and filling the space inside with a round 2×2 plate and seven (leaving one stud open) 1×1 round plates, you can make it all fit nicely. And since the 4×4 rounds and 2×2 round plate have axle holes, it can easily be connected to any Technic mechanism.
If you stick an axle in the middle it twirls like a top – it’s very well balanced.
LDraw code after the break:
Maker Faire 2010
Here are the pictures from the Bay Area LEGO Users Group & Train Club‘s exhibit at Maker Faire 2010 Bay Area in San Mateo, CA.
We had a 40′ by 50′ space just like last year, but this time we set aside about half of it as a play area for the little ones. We dumped out loose LEGO parts on the floor (including a DUPLO area for the really little ones) and spread them out on some tables as well, so that fairegoers could build whatever they wanted. We then had some tables set aside to display these MOCs (My Own Creations), and had volunteers who would take pictures of the models and put them up on a computer. I brought my video projector and we had a continuous slideshow running all weekend with pictures of these MOCs.
Bricks by the Bay Photos
My Bricks by the Bay Pictures are available on Flickr if you want to take a look at some of the great models on display and the crowds on the public day.
BBTB: Some good, some bad, some ugly… but mostly great
So, that was what it’s like to run a LEGO convention.
I LEGO N.Y.
I LEGO N.Y. by Christoph Niemann is a book that was released on March 1, 2010. It’s a series of photographs featuring mini NYC vignettes, created entirely out of LEGO pieces! It originated as a blog post on NYTIMES.com. As far as I know, Niemann isn’t known as an AFOL (Adult Fan of LEGO, the term used by the adult LEGO hobbyist community).
BayLTC at TCA 2010
Last weekend I, along with other members of the Bay Area LEGO Train Club, had a display at the Northern California Train Collectors Association Cal-Stewart Spring Meet in Santa Clara, CA.
How best to share building instructions for my creations?
Every once in a while I get a request to share building instructions for my models. I am willing to do so, but haven’t quite figured out the best way. I was wondering if people might want to comment and make some suggestions?
BayLUG January 2010 Meeting at Dave Porter’s house
On January 24, Bay Area LEGO Users’ Group (BayLUG) had our annual meeting at Dave Porter’s house in Woodside, CA.
Dave always sets up a very impressive layout in his loft featuring a huge collection of LEGO sets and his own custom creations, with running trains. He has been inviting the club up to his house every January for the past few years to share his layout and give us a chance to show off what we’ve been up to. Marcello de Cicco brought his Japanese Navy ships to show off, and Brian Thiemer and his wife brought their newest MOC, a baby, to the meeting!
Reasonably Lazy
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.