Details: This clever little animation is a fun way to get a feel for the various challenges in this year's FIRST LEGO LEAGUE competition. Although LEGO® Robotics kits (either the original Mindstorms kit with the RCX or the LEGO® MINDSTORMS NXT), this animation shows minifigs solving the challenge with vehicles you might find in any LEGO® town. The theme of this year's contest is "Power Puzzle", so most of the tasks for the robot to do have a power-saving or power-generating theme. FIRST and LEGO have been teaming up for these tournaments for several years now with the goal of getting kids (of roughly junior-high age) into robotics. While most of the kids choose to navigate the challenges using dead reckoning, they do get hands-on experience with programming and learn a few things about constructing a sturdy robot chassis. In any given year, there are a few teams that rise above the pack, trying out more complex robotics ideas out and solving all of the challenges in that year's contest. You should be able to find out if there is an open tournament in your area at http://www.firstlegoleague.org/Calendar.aspx?pid=210 , but most of the local level tournaments have already passed.
Details: Oh sure, it's just a minifig-scale Castle model. Look again, though. There are brilliant details, more brilliant details, and yet more brilliant details. This tower is actually quite large, and it features more details than some entire town layouts do. The photography here is top-notch too - and you could get lost in the sheer amount of clear photos of this one. I'm still not done browsing through all the nooks and crannies of this tower. Since I'm not linking any highlights (I'd feel really silly if it turned out I missed something awesome), feel free to post about your favorite parts of this one in the comments.
Details: When you get to a certain size of wall made out of 1x2 bricks, you get to have a bit of flexibility that doesn't seem like it should really be there. You can kind of cheat the regular geometry of LEGO® bricks and make things curve a bit. Naturally, making that wall longer will eventually make it possible to make a wall in the shape of a circle. If you're really skilled with this sort of thing, apparently it's possible to brace a large circle well enough to make a sturdy and impressive large spaceship. This exceptional model also uses some more studs-not-on-top parts to make all of the edges of the longer part smooth.
Details: All of the comic book buffs out there should recognize this model as the original batmobile from the 1930's. This early version of Batman's famous batmobile did not have any bat-features, and is actually red and not black. There are still plenty of curves to capture, though, and Watson K13 did a great job of capturing them with arc-pieces and slope-pieces. The grey stripes here show the details of the original picture well too (yes, a reference photo is provided for us batman-neophytes). The best photo might just be the one with the official Batman character standing by it's side.
Details: Normally I try to save big layouts and other models with a hefty deal of photos to look at for the Sunday edition (like a newspaper, get it? I crack me up), but this layout is currently on display and will only be up through January 6th - so I thought I'd post it ASAP so you could make plans to see it if you wish. This display is primarily town-oriented and was assembled by the Bay Area LEGO Users Group.
Details: This gorgeous snowman was made by one of the lesser-known LEGO® Certified Professionals. Oh sure, Sawaya and Kenney are all over the American media outlets, but Singapore's Nicholas Foo is just as talented (even if more of his creations don't rely on sheer scale to catch people's attention). The Snowman is notable for the great details and the studs-not-on-top snowballs, but was also commissioned as the centerpiece for a charity event.
Details: It took me a while to find the perfect model for Christmas day. I found this gem on Brickshelf - it's a fully exterior/interior decorated Christmas present factory. The outside is decked out in snowdrifts - including one cleverly applied to the roof. Inside, we can see Santa in his office getting ready to make his trip around the world. A lower level of the inside shows many "elves" (actually just an army of matching minifigures) assembling toys. The details are worth watching here - there's a kiln for pottery and porcelain, and right in front of that you can see a Star Wars R2 unit helping assemble toys. Perhaps the most festive feature, though, is the lit vines made with green castle leaves and various small translucent parts.
Details: This model is a modified version of a robot from the LEGO® MINDSTORMS NXT kit - it has been fitted with jingle bells and programmed to play percussion to accompany the builder as he plays Christmas carols on the organ. The overall thing is quite festive. There's also a second video at http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=Er2vLWMQZIg&feature=related - featuring "Jingle Bells".
Details: This advent calendar has been posted to Brickshelf one day at a time, with each day having a new microscale building. Since the advent season is almost over now, most of the buildings are now available for you to have a look at. (Feel free to let me know if you think I should have mentioned this sooner so you could've followed along). There's a good variety of locations rendered in the small scale - most of the feature some rather innovative uses of parts (and there's even a good variety of parts from different themes used). I think a few of these might be straightforward enough to try making, but they all look great. The thumbnail to the left is just the cover image for the series - the actual models are at the link above. EDIT 12/24/2007: Now that this is complete, a group photo has been provided - we are now using that thumbnail instead of the other shot.
Details: Yeah, it's too late to try to order this for Christmas if you wanted to, but it's also too late for the whole 9-volt train line anyway. For those of you who don't follow LEGO® news, the 9-volt train line is being discontinued entirely. They're planning on releasing a new train line next year. I'm not really clear on what the exact details are, but apparently the days of being able to hook up a Mindstorms kit to a train set to automate it are behind us. The reason why they're suddenly discontinuing this line that has been so popular with children and hobbyists alike is that they would need to buy completely new machine now to continue manufacturing many of the pieces, and they're worried about being able to offset that cost by selling new sets.
So the holiday train, which they make both with and without the 9-volt motor, is really the last train set in what many of us will always see as the glory days of LEGO® trains. It also happens to be a nice set, with plenty of green parts, a flatbed car full of gifts, another flatbed car full of trees, a passenger car, a nice caboose, and a well-detailed engine and tender. The holiday color scheme is done really well - you'd think more red than just trim would be better, but this is just right.
Details: This series of LEGO® Christmas ornaments was designed by NCLUG for a holiday tree they decorated recently. Complete building instructions for these four ornaments are available at the link above. If you're interested in seeing the rest of NCLUG's Christmas tree, it is on display at Tinsel Town in Cary, North Carolina's Booth Amphitheatre through December 31st.
Details: This ode to sneakers is brilliant. This is made entirely out of LEGO® parts - those specialized bits are really put to great use here. The starfishes used on the sides are probably my favorite, but the whole thing is really surprising. Some pictures of the original sneakers are provided for reference too. Personally, I think the sculpture looks better, but I don't think we'd be able to make anything like that wearable.
This is Thursday's model of the day (Apologies for the delay, but we should be catching up and good ahead fairly quickly now.)
Details: This absolutely incredible vignette tells a complete story and acts as a virtual tutorial of interesting building techniques. There's only one photo for this one, but take a good look at the non-thumbnail version so you can have a good look at what's going on. Some things worth noting:
The woman's purse is made with a clip-plate and a flower.
The fence is built upside-down at the bottom, and a bunch of tops from 1x2 hinges are used to make a unique design that includes some studs-not-on-top effects. Plates that show the older paint color and the new paint color can then be placed on top of that fence design (I'd have to try this myself to see if it connects sturdily, but it sure looks great).
Note the use of a "two-face" torso on the minifig who was accidentally painted! Also, the loose bit of dripping paint on the ground is a feather (I believe from a Pirates set).
The dog (trying to steal the woman's purse) is made with two clip-plates, a modern click-hinge (I'm afraid that you won't recognize that unless you've followed LEGO® in the past few years...), and two round 1x1 plates.
The woman in this scene has one foot under a "dress", which is made with a special piece instead of the standard minifig legs. Her "crutch" is a wrench accessory upside-down!
The painter's pallette is two 1x2 tiles (one plain, one with a grooved top) on top of the top of a 2x2 turntable.
I'm having a hard time seeing the paint brush, but does that look like another standard minifig tool with a 1x1 round black brick attached to it to you?
Details: The famous comic book hero Iron Man has been done at a fairly sizeable scale by the Arvo Brothers. You may recall that we've featured their incredible models cars before, but this is really the first major fictional character they've done (they have done some smaller characters that I haven't featured yet, though - you can check those out in their Brickshelf gallery.) So far there are only those three photos of this one online, and they're all in the same pose (so we don't know yet if this Iron Man is moveable or not yet.)
So much for making a go at this again. I think I'll try to start again next Tuesday (and with any luck, I'll be back for real at that point).
Also, regarding my last post about Amazon, I have just been informed that the free "Super Saver" shipping that's free if you spend over $25 is only guaranteed for Christmas delivery through next Monday (December 17th, 2007). So you'll be spared hearing me shill for some of the cool current sets to be under your Christmas tree this year (of course, there's nothing stopping you from picking up something anyway ;) ...)
Details: When you have enough white-colored leaves, you can build snowflakes. Sadly, as far as I know, there isn't actually a set where you can get a bunch of these for snowflake making, but maybe we'll see that next year. The builder claims that these are sturdy enough to hang. They look amazing - I'm really wishing I had enough large white leaf pieces to try this out.
Details: This impressive ice cream truck has no studs showing on the outside. The inside is also completely detailed. The stickers are a bit of cheating, but it's worth it for the effect here. Other things to catch: the inside floor has long tiles all going one direction to give the impression of a painted wood floor, slopes of blue and yellow are alternated to get the patter on the outside, wall fans were made for the inside with turntable bottoms and grooved 1x2 tiles, curves are used to round every edge (presumably with studs-not-on-top techniques underneath), and a variety of specialized parts have been repurposed to provide detailing on the outer edges of the truck. Finally, one of the pictures shows that the truck has working independent suspension behind each of the wheels.
Details: Here's an interesting new way of building that has become quite popular among older LEGO® fans. The basic idea is to put the standard minifigs into an apocalyptic mess - often with zombies and such. This particular model also forgoes baseplates entirely in favor of building a mount out of smaller LEGO® plates. Have a close look at the phone pole, too - a mix of barrels from Pirates sets and 2x2 round bricks give it a real wooden look. The string and well-placed 2x2 grey radar dishes give it a very realistic look, which makes the otherwise fairly dystopian landscape much more convincing.
Details: Kids, don't try this at home! This project was started as a way to motorize a crank-powered cord-making machine, but TheDude decided to build a full LEGO® MINDSTORMS NXT robot around it to fully automate the process. Although there isn't a picture of just what was done to make a beam fit into the place that the crank came out of (the website says something about "fil[ing] a lego sleeve", which qualifies as dangerous cheating if you ask me), there are plenty of other photos at the link above. There's also some documentation of the challenges involved (such as the rotating output of the original machine that the robot was built around).
Amazon.com is having a great LEGO sale through the end of the day. It's buy 2 get 1 free on select sets. I recommend the mosiackits and the Eiffel Tower, but I don't know how long they'll have those still in stock. There's a decent selection of Mindstorms NXT sensors and Technic sets included in the selection too. They're still running free shipping if you spend over $25 - and that applies to this offer too.
Of course, any purchases you make on Amazon after clicking on a link from this site helps support this site and keeps me posting about LEGO® models.
I'll try to post proper models for Monday and Tuesday tonight.
Details: This record-breaking image is the largest LEGO® mosaic ever made. I believe that Guinness is still investigating this but it may appear in their next record book. They have video of the big build on YouTube:
Details: This large spaceship took over a year build. The inspiration for this model was a challenge to include interiors in a spaceship. You can lift all of the roof panels to look inside and see the minifig crew. Great pictures and some more details on the scale are provided at the link above.
Details: Happy Halloween! I know we've had quite a few problems on this blog the past few weeks, but I wanted to make sure that I got these three Halloween themed models in for this year. The ghost and witch appear to be original designs (both are quite good ad feature some clever uses for slopes in more sculpted models), but the pumpkin model is the alternate model you can find instructions for in the "Pumpkin Pack" LEGO set (which I think is available at the official LEGO Shop at Home site) - remember though, you need two of those packs to get enough orange bricks to build the 3D pumpkin. The ghost, at least, looks like a project you could probably try out this year without having to hunt down special parts. Feel free to send in any holiday-themed models you have - we'll be saving them up for next year too, and with any luck, I'll actually manage to spread them out a bit more from here on out.
I'm guessing that the lack of posts recently gave it away, but I figure I ought to make it official - this blog is more-or-less on hiatus through December first. I just don't have the time to keep working on it. I will return to blogging here as soon as I can.
After getting a few blue-screens-of-death the past few days, I'm thinking I need to stop worrying about whether or not there's truly a post here everyday and start making sure I'm completely backed up so I can send in my laptop soon. I'll try to get in as many models as I can this week, but if things seem a bit behind, that's why.
A number of bloggers have been attending NW BrickCon2007 or otherwise blogging about it. Here are their reports (all have either pictures or links to pages with pictures):
Details: This sculpture of an oversized LEGO® minifig pirate captain was created by a pair of enthusiasts to go with an official pirate sculpture that they purchased recently. Unlike the other sculpture that they wanted this one to match, this one is made entirely out of LEGO® bricks. Their design perfectly captures all of the details of the original minifig (note the details on that torso, and don't ask me how they got enough brown parts for that peg leg - which seems to have no problem supporting the weight!)
They are also looking for more info on the "Pirate Lady" sculpture that this Captain was made to go with - if you have any information or photographs to share, please pass them along to them.
Details: After deciding that he did not like the design of the model featured in the Exoforce Shadow CrawlerLEGO® set, this young builder decided to build his own alternate model with the same parts. The spaceship he built is a really clever design - it's reversable and looks just as great studs-up as it does studs-down. I'm not sure just how this was built (which direction he built out from) but the effect is great. The use of those leg/blade things from the original model as wings is a good idea too.
Details: This gorgeous minifig-scale car was built almost entirely with studs-not-on-top effects. You have to see it to believe it - and to be honest, I'm still not sure just how some of the parts are attached. The details here are amazing - it's not often that you see a car this size with side-view mirrors. I'm pretty sure that those are held on with black minifig wrenches. An alternate version of the car in the same gallery features a different way of doing car lights and mirrors.
Details: Today's model (a reader submission) is a clever sculpture of a stargate from the Stargate sci-fi franchise. For those unfamiliar with the franchise, the basic idea is that various people, aliens, etc can walk through an activated "stargate" and end up in another time and place defined by the settings on the first stargate. It's a sort of intergalactic travel device. This rendition of a stargate in LEGO® parts uses a bit of cheating to get the lighting just right, but otherwise is completely made of LEGO® parts. An RCX is used to even turn the inner circle here the same way that the ones in the franchise work. The details here are great, too - make sure to have a look at how those large circles were constructed.
Details: Here's a fun microscale cityscape. Some newer sloped pieces were used for the water here (and they look great). The use of lighter green parts for trees (and brown round plates for the bottoms of the trees) is a great touch too. Studs-not-on-top parts are used facing backwards for the windows - they have plates (those LEGO® parts one-third the thickness of a LEGO® brick) on the other side - which means that this doesn't look good from the back, but it looks great from the front.
Details: Among LEGO® robotics enthusiasts, "cheating" isn't frowned upon when it involved using third-party sensors to add additional actuator or sensor capabilities to the standard LEGO® capabilities. The builder of this rover also designed the custom RFID reader for LEGO Mindstorms NXT that was used for this model. A Hitechnic compass sensor was used here as well (For those wondering, Hitechnic is a great company that you can safely buy sensors from for your kids if they want additional sensor options). All of the sensors are being controlled with a standard LEGO® MINDSTORMS NXTkit to make it more-or-less autonomous. To go even a step further, though, this guy set up an online interface with PHP that allows RFID-defined destinations to be added or removed to the robot's itinerary remotely.
Details: Some less-than-upstanding blog that doesn't cite anything has posted a compare-and-contrast picture post on the "Seven Wonders of the World" and equivalent LEGO® models. You can see it at http://www.anieto2k.com/2007/10/01/las-siete-maravillas-del-mundo-en-lego/ Normally I wouldn't link to a site like that, but they did do a good job of finding photos and lining them up. I have a feeling I'll be featuring some of these again when I have proper background on these models (and more photos, of course), but hey, this works as a LEGO® fix for the day.
Details: Microscale building is always a great way to find new uses for unusual pieces. Check out the translucent bricks as windows and the domes used as awnings on this building. A large smooth tile is used as a sidewalk too. Personally, I think this looks like something I'd build shortly after getting just a few pieces in a new color - those tan elements aren't that easy to find (at least, not in my day...) and something small like this is a good way to unite a handful of those pieces for a consistent color scheme.
Details: I'm not really sure of all the details behind the theme of this one (the title says something about space ninjas?) - but this is clearly an awesome creation. The details are great, and I am very jealous of that supply of orange bricks for the lava below. Look closely at those rocks, too - those aren't the large single-piece hills that LEGO® makes, they are actually built with a large amount of individual bricks.
Details: There's nothing quite as fun as a LEGO® sculpture that is designed to look as if it were made of giant LEGO® bricks. Look closely at this dinosaur and I think you'll see that it's one of those. I believe this one is still on display at Disney's LEGO Imagination Center.
Details: Here's a clever one using small frogs, some unusual parts, and some unusual colors. It's a good example of how a few unusual parts can have a very clever ironic meaning.
This is Thursday's model of the day. (Somehow I got my times messed up this week...)
Details: I suspect most of you who follow other LEGO® fansites have already heard the bad news: The LEGO Group is no longer manufacturing 9V trains. This marks the end of an era - while most Adult Fans of LEGO (or AFOLs) were around before the 9V line started in 1991, this is really the only format of LEGO® trains that today's kids know. Additionally, the 9V trains were designed as part of a larger catalog of 9V electronics used in LEGO sets - light packs for spaceships, sound effect boxes for police sirens, the Cybermaster, Mindstorms Robotics Invention System, the motorized Technic sets, etc all used the same connectors and voltages. This meant that it was easy for anyone with a varied collection of LEGO parts to build trains that lit up or were controlled by computer. From what I can gather, the new "Power Functions" sets work similarly to the LEGO® MINDSTORMS NXT kit, and the new train line that will be unveiled by 2010 will be compatible with those components. Of course, if that's the case, then there will always be adapter bricks out there...
So naturally, I wanted to spotlight a train today. This beautifully detailed train was made with the 9V parts as a base, but then this hobbyist carefully added other LEGO® parts to get the exact effect he/she was going for. I'm not enough of a train buff to recognize whether or not this one was based on a life-size train or not, but I love the LEGO® detailing here - the curves, the studs-not-on-top effects, the lettering, the way the front lifts up...
Details: This Rube Goldberg Machine makes use of six LEGO® MINDSTORMS NXT kits! It's a hoot but I can't help but wonder if a less computer-heavy version of this one would be doable. You have to watch the video to appreciate this one, though.
Details: For those of you who don't remember the 50s, Town Plan was the first theme ever developed by the LEGO company. Bright colors and vintage window elements were the norm, as were some types of trees that would cost you a bit of money today. This series of models is very much in the vein of the original line, but makes use of some newer parts for good effect. I love the way fences are used in this shot. I tend to keep my "vintage" LEGO® parts aside as collectibles, but if you do mix those early bricks with newer elements, this is a great way to do it.
Details: What do you do with specialized printed tiles when you are a sculptures-only LEGO® builder? Find a way to make a mosaic, of course! The write-up featured at the link above gives some details that explain how this sort of thing can be done.
Details: Moko has been surprising me with his series of models made with chrome LEGO® pieces. I have no idea how he managed to get such a stockpile of these. I do know, though, that this is one awesome bike. I'm not sure quite what type of wheels are being used here, but I love the way they're attached. The windshield and lights look great too - the lights look like those small newer slopes in transparent colors to me. I'm a bit jealous - I don't have any of those. If you want to try making something like this, make sure to check out the shot that explains the studs-not-on-top part placement.
Details: Longtime readers of the blog won't be surprised to hear that many professionals use LEGO® as a modeling medium. This one is unusual, though, because of the way that both the landscaping and the towers themselves are designed in a boxy fashion. Further, most of the towers themselves are clear, and the whole things lights up! Of course, the scale of this thing is what allows it to spread so quickly on the blog-o-tubes - everybody loves enormous minifig-scale models. Rather than direct you to the obnoxious flash thing on the firm's official site, I'm linking you to another LEGO® themed blog that has a bit more patience when it comes to wading through models that go all over "teh intarwebs" - they have some fairly thorough coverage of the model, and links to a few other places where this one's being discussed.
Details: Generally I try to avoid posting models that could be deemed offensive, but this one is timely and I bet that most people already know what's being depicted in this model. Things to note in this model are the use of scale, the way that the smoke was created using a mottled design of various dark colos, and the great use of half-stud spaces in the facade of the buildings. That fountain looks great too.
Details: You may have seen some of these oversized bricks in some of the LEGO company's official displays and parks. They've also become fairly popular for amateur builders to attempt. At one point the LEGO company actually offered a generic scaled-up minifig for sale, but most of the builders who have tried similar things have gone with different scales for their scaled-up bricks and minifigs. This particular set is ten times regular size. The chef in particular features some great details and appears to be jointed! The use of slopes to help get some of the finer details might be a bit odd for a sculpture, but it works perfectly here.
Details: Last time we featured JP Brown's work, we saw his Rubik's Cube Solver, which was conveniently hosted on his own site. This time though, LEGO® MINDSTORMS NXT-themed blog TheNXTStep brings us his new aquatic robot. This robot has some non-LEGO parts that float (I don't know what they are, exactly, but I am pretty sure it's technically "cheating" some astute commenters filled me in - these are zeppelin parts from the Adventures line (which was out about 8 years ago)), but and the programming and the moving parts are all done with MINDSTORMS parts. You can even see it steer itself with different rowing patterns in the YouTube video:
This is controlled remotely via bluetooth with a .NET program - which means that this isn't completely autonomous, but I suspect that the programming has simplified it to the point where not much is done manually either.
Oh, and DON'T TRY THIS AT HOME KIDS, it's NOT SAFE to risk your NXT by putting it too close to the water. If you are going to try to create something like this yourself, make sure that you can test the non-electronic parts first in a smaller body of water (maybe a full sink or tub) so that you can make sure that the expensive electronic parts will be safe and dry.
), this animation shows minifigs solving the challenge with vehicles you might find in any LEGO® town.
