Details: If you liked last week's look at LEGOLAND California at Halloween, I have a real treat for you - another large photo gallery of highlights from LEGOLAND California in October in 2010. There are plenty more exciting scenes here, including many that weren't in the photoset featured last week. There are (of course) more trick or treaters (note the clever use of the large spider's web in the window), as well as a haunted house (seen above), an homage to Michael Jackson's Thriller, and a giant pumpkin sculpture. I had mentioned the funeral procession last week, but the view shown this week gives us an interesting look at hearse, people and musical instruments. I'm thrilled any time we get a good look at useful techniques at the LEGOLAND parks, but it only gets better when we see the extra seasonal goodies added in. Have a Happy Halloween, everybody!
Details: The LEGOLAND parks frequently enhance their displays with seasonal displays and in-jokes, adding an extra reason to come back. Around Halloween in 2010, the California park got in on the fun. Check out the trick-or-treaters seen in this photoset. Just in the one photo shown here, we've got some great dragon costumes, some great ghosts, a wizard, a pair of ballerinas, a knight, and several interesting figures without costumes. Elsewhere in the park, we can spot a coven of witches, a haunted cemetery, a pumpkin patch and hayride, a giant spider attack, and a funeral procession driving up to a zombie-infested graveyard.
Details: LEGO set designer Mark Stafford was kind enough to create a public portfolio of some of his work. The links above are for his contributions to the 2010 line, although he's also created similar pages for his contributions to the 2009 and 2008 lines. Although LEGO occasionally selects new designers from the LEGO fan community, they generally focus primarily on people with professional design or engineering backgrounds. Mark Stafford is one set designer who did come from the community. He has helped push LEGO towards ideas that are more attractive to adult fans as well as the kids who end up with most of the new sets. Many of his designs feature unusual parts and techniques that can expand the possibilities of what we can build. In a few cases, you can actually see trends from the fan community sneak into some of the kits he has designed.
Details: If you've really waded through all of the thousands of photos from this past year's Brickfair, you've seen this beauty before. Had any part of this model been registered on its own instead of as part of the PennLUG town/train layout, it would have won one of the convention's awards. There's too much here to do an in-depth look at the details fairly, and it's connected to the rest of the layout in a way that makes it difficult to tell where various people's contributions start and end. A few striking things should not be missed: the large amounts of shipping containers, the enormous dark blue boat, the trans-green water (built with tiles in something of a mosaic style), the docks, the cranes. This was so much of a show-stopper that you could be forgiven for not knowing that the PennLUG is generally more well known for trains!
Details: It's hard to believe that 2010 is coming to an end. We've shared one model here for each of these past 365 days, and it looks like we're good to go for another year. I'm sure that most of my readers are familiar with the popular New Year's ritual of watching a large object dropped near a crowd in a large city - you may also be aware of the annual TV special that features the "ball" dropping in New York City's Times Square. Here we see the best part of that captured in LEGO form (sorry, Justin Bieber fans - most of us only tune in for the countdown). The "ball" here looks great, thanks to the mix of clear plates and translucent 1x1 round plates - apparently it's a variation on the design that Legohaulic provided instructions for. This model will be on display in the Rockefeller Center LEGO store for the month of January, 2011.
Details: A LEGO store opened recently in Copenhagen, Denmark. I'm not entirely sure how to explain this one - it's not like any of the other stores. It's not an "outlet", a "flagship store", a "discovery centre", or and "imagination center" either. This place has some phenomenal things, though - a giant Pick-A-Brick wall, enormous mosaics, large sculptures, and even a miniland-scale layout. It's also the first Denmark location where LEGO has a non-LEGOLAND park retail presence. The place is as exciting as it is hard to classify. Here's a round-up of the photos I've found so far: schioldannvoneyben's's flickr photos legosamlet's Brickshelf gallery eiker86's Brickshelf gallery
Details: It's early December, and you know what that means - the FIRST LEGO League teams are having their regional competitions. Here, we have a peek into the competitions held in Davenport, Iowa, USA. This year's challenge is called "Body Forward", which is health-themed. As always, we wish the best of luck to all of the teams.
Details: This one apparently slipped under our radar while we were LEGO'd out at BrickFair earlier this year. It caught some attention there, though, bringing home the Best Large Space Craft trophy. Most obviously, there's a great balancing act here - most of the weight is on the small part that is supported, and it stays up because the center of gravity is in the right spot. As if that were too simple, most of the visible rocky section is actually built upside down - those are BURPs (big ugly rock pieces) almost the whole way around! That's before we get into the vehicles, the landscaping, and the building itself - while we've seen all the techniques before, they're masterfully applied here. Make sure to check out all the close-up shots.
For the sake of our sanity, I've skipped sharing links that have fewer than 20 photos. If you know of event coverage that I've missed, you can send it in to legomodeloftheday@gmail.com
Details: Walt Disney World's annual Festival of the Masters event is usually LEGO-heavy, with GFLUG well-represented and a build event at their LEGO Imagination Center. This year's event this past weekend was no exception.
Details:
This may be the most unique mosaic we've seen in quite some time. Coming in at around 3 studs thick, this is full of details and unusual techniques. Red clip plates hold flex-tube casings (which have been used as thin rigid hoses in a variety of sets more recently) which form the letter K as connected by minifig hands here. Using a variety of small parts, more hoses, and a generous amount of hinge plates makes the body look particularly impressive. I particularly like the way arch pieces are attached on an angle to make the blade of the King's weapons. This piece has since been sold to LEGO's Community Operations Manager, Jan Beyer, who decided he wanted it for his office after he saw it at Kockice Expo 2010.
We're going to go ahead and call this Saturday AND Sunday's model of the day. It's about time we stopped falling behind, and the Kockice 2010 photos are certainly worth counting as a second day (even though there are "only" a few hundred of them)
Details: Apparently the most popular Technic creation at BrickCon this year (it also won a trophy at that event), this seaplane with a wingspan of nearly 5 feet (just over 1.5 meters) is modeled after a DeHavilland Twin Otter.
I'm going to try to keep this short - although this hasn't been singled out post-documentation on any blogs, much has been said about it already. Here's the list of features from the flickr set above:
Specifications:
Wingspan 59.5 inch (151 cm)
Length 43 inch (110 cm)
Height 28 inch (71 cm)
Weight 26.5 lbs (12 kg)
Passengers 9 (incl. 2 Crew)
Motors 5
Cylinders 6 Large, 3 Small
Compressor 6 Cylinders Total
Switches 3
Sensors 1 Touch, 2 Rotation
Power 1 RCX, 2 Battery Packs
Pieces 20 000 (estimated)
Working Features:
Elevators
Rudder
Ailerons
Flaps
Landing Gear (With Main Gear Suspension & Casting Nose Gear)
Independently Variable Throttle
Independently Variable Propeller Pitch
Regulated Compressors in Engines
Regulated Auxiliary Compressor
Navigation Lights
Beacon Light
Passenger Entry Door
Sliding Pilot Seats (allowing entry)
Folding Wings
The information above is for the flickr set, but there's actually more documentation for this model spread out across a few sites. For the long write up (by a Technic expert who didn't build this personally - I've briefly mentioned his Technicopedia a few times), you'll need to look at this post on the Eurobricks forum (of all places - we actually try to avoid linking to Eurobricks because of their set-news-leaking habits). There are also photos (again, by Blakbird instead of the builder) on Brickshelf in a BrickCon 2010 directory, not to mention two YouTubevideos that were made by the builder. That's the extended reading when you're done with the 59 flickr photos linked above. For extra credit, write a report on that, create an LDRAW set of instructions for the plane, or build your own that's even larger, more detailed, or more functional.
Details: In this video, this giant rover base is being run by remote control. At LEGOWORLD in Zwolle right now, it's operating autonomously, controlled by 9 NXT programmable bricks. Although the video and links above don't show the full version, they're impressive enough already and give you a sense of the sheer size of this 'bot. There's a close-up of the treads that shows that they're actually made out of hundreds (or more likely, thousands) of 3-stud long Technic beams. Another video from the event shows the completed robot driving around taking pictures from inside the crowd.
I'm guessing that we'll be seeing many more photos of this (and taken by this) model after the event is over...which I'll be rounding up here as I see them.
Details: Another event that snuck under our radar is Bricking Bavaria 2010, a LEGO show in Neumarkt, Germany. I'm not sure why it has such a small online presence this time out, but here's what I've been able to track down:
Since this particular post is a bit lean, don't forget - you can always send your photos, event information, and other links in to legomodeloftheday@gmail.com
Details:
It was Brickcon time again this weekend. As I'm writing this, the festivities aren't over yet, so expect this page to be updated with more links over the next few days (or weeks - sometimes people take a while to upload photos, but we keep compiling them). We've previously covered the new set unveiled over the weekend.
On to the photo links (again, we're still adding these - if you know of photos or other coverage that we don't, send in your tips to legomodeloftheday@gmail.com):
Expand your very own wizarding world of Harry Potter™!
No need to pass through the Leaky Cauldron. Now even Muggles can shop in Diagon Alley by building this fantastically magical set that includes 3 extensively detailed buildings and 11 minifigures! Join Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger as they shop for their Hogwarts school supplies. Visit Ollivanders, Borgin and Burkes, and Gringotts Bank. Each Diagon Alley building is realistically detailed. Ollivanders offers an extensive selection of wands, storage shelves and a step ladder that allows Ollivander to gather wands from the top floor. The front desk has an “exploding” function for those inconvenient times when a spell goes awry. Borgin and Burkes includes a scary skeleton, “glow-in-the-dark” elements, a fireplace attached to the Floo Network and a Vanishing Cabinet that Dark wizards might use to sneak into Hogwarts. Gringotts Bank is an impressive two-story building with large double doors, and can be opened completely into one large building or closed to create one smaller building. The bank’s interior features a removable vault, along with the Philosopher’s Stone, a clerk’s desk, a chandelier and ‘wonky’ support pillars. Includes 11 minifigures: Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, each with magic wand; Rubeus Hagrid, equipped with his pink umbrella; Fred and George Weasley; 2 Gringotts goblins; Mr. Ollivander; Lucius Malfoy (with Death Eater disguise); Fenrir Greyback; and 4 new, decorated owls.
Includes 11 minifigures: Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, each with magic wand; Rubeus Hagrid, equipped with his pink umbrella; Fred and George Weasley; 2 Gringotts goblins; Mr. Ollivander; Lucius Malfoy (with Death Eater disguise); Fenrir Greyback; and 4 new, decorated owls!
Diagon Alley is made up of 3 extensively detailed buildings: Ollivanders, Borgin and Burkes and Gringotts Bank!
Ollivanders features lots of wands, storage shelves and a step ladder that leads to the top floor!
Front desk at Ollivanders has an “exploding” function!
Borgin and Burkes includes a skeleton, “glow-in-the-dark” elements, fireplace attached to the Floo Network and even a Vanishing Cabinet!
Gringotts Bank is a two-story building featuring large double doors!
Open Gringotts Bank completely into one large building and explore inside or close it to create a smaller building!
Gringotts Bank features a detailed interior with a removable vault, the Philosopher’s Stone, clerk’s desk, chandelier and ‘wonky’ support pillars!
Includes 11 minifigures: Harry Potter, Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, each with magic wand; Rubeus Hagrid, equipped with his pink umbrella; Fred and George Weasley; 2 Gringotts goblins; Mr. Ollivander; Lucius Malfoy (with Death Eater disguise); Fenrir Greyback; and 4 new, decorated owls!
Additionally, there's an official set of photos that was released to a few of the larger fan sites - this set seems to include a few (including minifig close-ups) that are not on the official page for this set.
While the NXT may be the reigning champion of the LEGO robotics world, there's actually another hobby platform that's caught in on the broader maker/robotics/hacker community. That's the arduino board. Although the arduino is completely open (and open source), different "shields" can be added to quickly add new features to the base microcontroller. In this case, a wave shield was used to allow this TARDIS to play the Doctor Who theme at regular intervals. The TARDIS (which stands for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space) is the Doctor's famous vehicle that is bigger on the inside (and has a few other interesting features - the Wikipedia article on the topic is terrifyingly large). This was a huge hit at this year's BrickFair, where Jon also led a seminar to fill us in on the possibilities of using the arduino platform in LEGO models.
Details: Remember the Containment layout that was unveiled at this year's BrickWorld? It's been re-done at a smaller scale. This was necessary in order to make that giant two-person layout fit comfortably on one person's shelf. Sadly, this meant removing some of the features - no lights, sound, or movement in this microscale version (yes - we seem to have found an application that would require a still smaller iPod). In spite of that, though, a surprising amount of detail was able to be squeezed back in, and the layout is fairly recognizable.
Details:
I'm sorry about the sporadic posts lately - we've done as much filling in as we're going to and will be daily again starting now. As mentioned earlier this week by Matthew (Brickapolis), the LMOTD team was at BrickFair last weekend, and we're still recovering from that whirlwind of LEGO action. I personally took nearly a thousand photos in an attempt to exhaustively cover every creation on display and as much of the action as possible. It was exhaustive, alright - I'm still tired from a few late-night photo runs. In addition to photo-taking and running performances of the NXT Robot Band, I also hosted a "Blogger's Roundtable" event, nominated two trophy categories, and got involved with several of the games. A word to the wise: getting truly involved with a LEGO convention can be work that may require a second vacation afterwards.
In addition to my own photos and the links below, we're also expecting more coverage to appear in the coming weeks - my "NXT Robot Band" (prepped for this year's music theme) was videotaped a few times by someone from CBS, and I'd expect their report to show up sometime in September. I'll try to update this page with additional links when I can. As always, you can send in your tips to legomodeloftheday@gmail.com - I'm sure we'll be seeing plenty more come in, thanks to the ~1,000 registrants and nearly 20,000 public visitors.
In the meantime, check out my photos and the photos/videos of these people who didn't win the competition to take the most photos:
Some amateur-ish video from goobers who can't handle using terminology correctly, but think you should watch ads for the privilege of seeing their goofy clips (and yes, that's the least snide I can be while describing these): Fox 5 DC clips CNN clip
This past weekend hundreds of LEGO fans of all ages gathered in the Dulles Expo Center in Chantilly, VA. This was no small gathering either! With over 700 attendees and just under 20,000 public visitors, BrickFair is America's largest LEGO convention. LEGO conventions like this one are a great way to meet fellow builders, talk shop (and smack), buy some LEGO, and for the first time this year; sell LEGO during a sanctioned "yard sale" time.
If you liked last week's look at LEGOLAND California at Halloween, I have a real treat for you - another large photo gallery of highlights from LEGOLAND California in October in 2010. There are plenty more exciting scenes here, including many that weren't in the photoset featured last week. There are (of course) more trick or treaters (note the clever use of the large spider's web in the window), as well as a haunted house (seen above), an homage to Michael Jackson's Thriller, and a giant pumpkin sculpture. I had mentioned the funeral procession last week, but the view shown this week gives us an interesting look at hearse, people and musical instruments. I'm thrilled any time we get a good look at useful techniques at the LEGOLAND parks, but it only gets better when we see the extra seasonal goodies added in. Have a Happy Halloween, everybody!
fans - most of us only tune in for the countdown). The "ball" here looks great, thanks to the mix of clear plates and translucent 1x1 round plates - apparently it's a variation on the design that 
theme at regular intervals. The
(which stands for Time And Relative Dimensions In Space) is the Doctor's famous vehicle that is bigger on the inside (and has a few other interesting features - the 
). In spite of that, though, a surprising amount of detail was able to be squeezed back in, and the layout is fairly recognizable. 
