Why is a raven like a writing desk?

Tommy Williamson (of Lego Colbert report fame) has put together these wonderful models of the Mad Hatter and Alice, as they appear in the new Tim Burton re-imagining of the classic Lewis Caroll tale (starring Lord Sir Admiral Johnny Depp, plus one actual member of the British aristocracy).


...if nothing else, it's the perfect excuse to use those wonderful dark red and medium blue colored bricks!

If you happen to find yourself in the Bay Area in April, you can even come and admire these and many other "Bricks of Character" at the Bricks by the Bay Lego convention, where Tommy and I will be exhibiting all kinds of exciting 'stuff'.

And make sure to check out this movie in its full 3D glory when it hits theaters March 5th. Tommy will thank you, since there is more blood sweat and tears behind these little models than you might think!
 

I think the 'bot' in 'fembot' isn't short for 'robot'

Alan M (aka rediv) recently created these wonderfully posable - and wonderfully posed - Lego fembots named "Idkildr" and "Nephet"...



And just to prove they're more than just a pretty frame, here they are having an informed and completely non-partisan discussion about healthcare reform...



Alan's inspiration for his fembots was the work of motormann, which includes the entirely computer-rendered (and therefore imho ultimately flawed, but nevertheless beautfully conceived) "Femme Fatalle"...



Now, to motormann's credit, he has managed to actually build a few of his fembots in actual Lego...





...although, to his discredit, the above model of videogame character FeiYen has obviously been doctored to made red bricks appear pink (...trust me, the vast majority of those bricks are not available in that color or anything like it!)
 

Happy landings

The landscapes that people create these days for their Classic Castle or Classic Pirate dioramas are always very impressive, very often featuring craggy cliff faces and splashy shorelines.

But I kinda like this one built by Chas Irish as part of the 2010 MOC Athalon contest, not only because of the beautiful sculpting around the waterfall, and the use of tan and dark tan for the rocky river banks, but also because the environment itself is the entire scene - there are no buildings or people to pollute its tranquility!


 

Totomania

Although mosaics are strictly outside this blog's original charter, I just had to make an exception for Tracy Lee's mosaic of Totoro, not simply because of my Miyazaki fandom, but also because this character has eaten up a significant chunk of my life recently, as I would guess it has been for Tracy too!

Ogre the hills and far away

While Toyota should be praised for reacting so swiftly to fix the safety issues on their current vehicles, I think this may have led to something of a "knee jerk" reaction in their safety modifications on next year's models, as evidenced by Duane Hess (aka legozilla) in this recent test-drive of the 2011 Prius.


While the new "retro future" styling of the bodywork is an unusual choice at best, and the headroom leaves something to be desired for the more 'husky' Dwarf-pounding slathering monster-about-town, these drawbacks pale into insignificance compared to the approach Toyota has taken in solving the sticky accelerator pedal problem...


By completely removing the pedal, and the entire drive train system that was attached to it, the vehicle is now unarguably much safer. However, some buyers will certainly be deterred by the new top speed of 1 mile per hour.

On the plus side though, this model does infinity miles to the gallon, which in these hard times means the car practically pays for itself, assuming you are capable of lugging around 10 ten times your own body weight. Consequently, Toyota are expecting the new model to be more popular among the Troll/Ogre demographic.

For 2011, the new Prius will be available in "Smashed skull of Elf" red and "Smashed skull of Orc" black. Retail price: 57,000 Republic credits (4000 gold pieces).
 

Mightily morphed

Moko, one of my favorite Japanese builders, has created these Chibi versions of some characters from the Kamen Rider series. He's definitely captured their overall 'tude and poses. And crazy BuG eyes! (...although as yet, sadly no motorcycles)


These are similar to a version of the main character that Moko did a while back. I kind of prefer these versions to Moko's previous minifig-plus-plus versions (which are still pretty cool anyway, since Moko made 'em).


If these guys look vaguely familiar, its probably because Kamen Rider is from that classic era of action-packed Japanese TV shows of the 70's that eventually spawned lame 90's American knock-offs such as the Power Rangers.

In fact, there was even an American knock-off of Kamen Rider itself, called Masked Rider. The American version was actually pitched as a spin-off of the Power Rangers. I'll just repeat that. It bears repeating: Power Rangers spin-off. Yes, I know, I know, I didn't realize it was possible to those words in the same sentence either!

It would kind of be like opening up your McDonalds Happy Meal and finding that the free toy was a plastic model of a McDonalds Happy Meal.
 

Explosive situation

RMingTW's creations are quiet varied, but always lively and original. And this one, despite its size, is no exception. (...although I wouldn't mind if the focal point of the scene were more, well, in focus! But you get the idea...)



I don't think I've ever seen an explosion modeled this way before, with the billowing fireball and the flaming debris going out in all directions. The smoke trails are also a nice touch, as is the use of forced perspective and of course Toy Story Army Men!

Proving that you don't need to use a lot of bricks to create something new and exciting!
 

My buckles are now officially swashed

Miniland scale never had so much action! Over at Hispalug, the Spanish LUG, they've started a new building contest entitled "Governor vs Pirate Captain". The idea is to create an epic battle within a 16x16x32 brick space featuring, well, a governor and a pirate captain. And I suspect this entry by Spazski will be setting a pretty high standard!



Check out the full photo set to see all the chaotic little details, including a ship that appears to be rapdily disintegrating under these guys' feet!
 

It probably even takes pictures

Not my normal blog fayre, but I am total awe of the total awesomeness of this Olympus C730 Ultra Zoom by Sven Junga. This is a great build, especially considering it was knocked up for some contest or other over at MOCPages. And yes, the model was photographed using the camera on which it is based!


 

Because to some people, Star Wars is a religion...

Davinci's Last Supper in Lego by Pascal (aka pasukaru76)


(...which makes perfect sense because I've always maintained that Lucas is the antichrist.)
 

The eyes have it

Carlos Méndez is clearly a Matt Groening fan (who isn't?!) as evidenced by this nice very 'stary' pairing of a brain slug from Futurama and Blinky the radioactive mutant fish from The Simpsons.



I think I see love in their eyes! Hmmm, how many eyes do you think their offspring would have? Depending on who had the recessive gene, it might end up not being a whole number. Eew!

...FOR NO PARTICULAR REASON I SUGGEST WE ALL NOW GO TO THE BRAIN SLUG PLANET AND JUST WALK AROUND NOT WEARING A HELMET...
 

Dino-"phwaaaaaar!"

There are Lego dinosaurs, and then there are Lego dinosaurs, and then there's ROBO-REX by Remi (one half of Bolt of Blue, the original CCFOL).

He's several hundred thousand milli-billi-grams of fully gear-articulated Jurassic-plastic whoop-ass monster goodness!





(CCFOL = Cute Couple Fans of Lego)
 

Who's a pretty Polly then?

I considered hanging onto this until "Talk like a pirate day" but decided that would be a completely stupid thing to do. I have almost 60 browser tabs open right now and if I don't shift some of this stuff soon, I'm just gonna lose it all when the next tree hits that power line! I guess I need to be more organized, and buy a pen or something.

So here then is a very jolly little Macaw (or should that be "MOCaw", ha ha ha ha ha ha ha, oh God I'm so funny, not!) by Richard03.


 

Solid state!

To make up for taking in vain the name of Dave Shaddix, aka The Shad, aka Shaddy McDave the Shadmeister, aka Lord David Earl of Shaddington, its my honor and pleasure to present this amazingly accurate retro Teac radio, created by the aforementioned Shadizzletrix...



This thing has so many nice details I don't know where to begin (removable battery panel with actual Lego batteries, positionable antenna, authentic looking tuning readout, sw/lw band selector buttons, and you can even see the speaker lurking behind the front grill!).

This brought back many happy childhood memories of the radio playing in our kitchen. I can almost taste the spaghetti hoops now, slowly dissolving their way through the slice of very sligthly burned toast.

As Obi-wan might say, "an elegant entertainment system, for a more civilized age"!
 

"I'm sorry Dave Shaddix, I can't let you do that."

HAL 9000 by VampireBohrok
 

I was a teenage Sneetch

Would I enjoy this MOC in a box?
I would not, could not, in a box.
I could not, would not, while watching Fox.
I will not enjoy it at a Lego con.
I will not enjoy it while having nothing on.
And I do not like to write my blog,
While I am sitting on the bog.

...I could go on, but I expect it would just get increasingly lavatorial, so I will quit while I'm a head (haha, snuck another toilet reference in there!).

Dave and John Xandegar (aka BrixWerx) have done it again!

To commemorate the 50th anniversary of the publication of the phenominally popular Dr. Seuss book "Green Eggs and Ham", they have created this great sculpture of "Sam I Am" and his miscolored meaty treat.



I particularly like the accurate brick work on the food items and fork. Overall they seem to have successfully captured the surreal essence (the "Seuss-ness"?) of the original imagery. Check out Dave's backstory on the original book, to understand the full significance of the number "50" here.



Growing up I seemed to end up with all the more trippy "out there" Seuss titles. Which could apply to all of them, I suppose. I remember how creeped out I was by the story of the "pants with nobody inside them" and the girl who "thunked up a Glunk". Stories which I have since subjected my own children to...

Mwuhahah!

(I look on it more like some Lovecraft-ian induction into a mind-expanding parallel dimension, from which there can be no subsequent recovery of one's sanity)
 

Awww, they make such a cute couple!

Last summer Sachiko Akinaga was asked to create wedding figures for the wedding of one of her Lego friends. The result was - not suprisingly - completely adorable...



I love the smooth all-round countouring of the hair, veil and gown. Sachiko also provides some nice background on how she arrived at the facial expressions...

He said, “We both have droopy eyes. Please try to make the figure with those eyes in mind.” At his request, I made the figure, imagining their faces with droopy eyes when they are extremely happy.
 

Like water off a dragon's back

Just in time for the Chinese New Year, the "Avon tagger" Cole Blaq has crafted this exquisite Water Dragon. And exhausted his entire collection of blue bricks in the process, sounds like!



I love the use of trans blue elements to create the impression that the beastie has just surfaced, and water is pouring from every crevice (and nostril!).

We just got back from watching a procession of Chinese dragons cavorting through our local Asian grocery store, then hit the local Chinese buffet (where the kids were somewhat bemused to recieve "lucky money"!). So we're all New Year'd out now. Except to wish you all...

新年快樂!
 

"Eh"-lympics!

For as long as I can recall, the Winter Olympics has just been this "wierd off-season Olympics related thing going on up some godforsaken mountain and only followed by die-hard skiing fans". Now its going on in a city only a few hours drive away from me, and the youngsters love the snowboarding and all, so suddenly its now the media hype event of the year!

Anyway, teen fan of Lego and Moscovite Alexander Alekseev (aka Shurik*) used it as an opportunity to create this excellent 'in motion' model of a speed skater, that really has to be appreciated from both sides!





*No footnote, the asterisk is just part of his alias! Don't get me started...
 

Happy "Stuff Hallmark's Coffers" Day!

Oh I am such a cynic. But this is such a Hallmark holiday! Well, I guess their shareholders do need to see some kind of revenue stream for Q1.

My kids just cooked Mrs. Jelly breakfast in bed, so I duly greeted her with "Happy early Mother's Day!". So romantic fool that I'm not, I'm gonna share some images of Valentines themed Lego with you anyway!

Now, everyone this week has been building Lego hearts of all shapes and sizes. And most of them look like you could get a nasty cut off them. Fortunately, we have Carlos Méndez to show us how its done. His heart is the biggest, and leaves all others in the dust...



Then for humor, good camera work, and finding a way to include a reference Star Wars, top marks go to Marker/Mark(R)/Marcos for this little scene...



Hey kids, where the hec is MY pancake then, eh???
 

Feeling lucky, punk?

German builder Pascal, aka pasukaru76, has created this very cute little steampunk hard suit. It looks very cosy. I imagine things would have turned out much better for the French army if they'd been outfitted with these things during Napoleon's march on Moscow!



...and you will just have to let your imagination run wild with the "crotch nozzle" attachment on that suit. Well, if it takes me an hour to clamber into this bloody thing and get the boiler up to pressure, I'm not about to just hop out for a quick Jimmy Riddle because I had a bit too much Cafe Au Lait at breakfast, am I?!

---

I've also been enjoying Pascal's "365 days" Flickr project, which chronicles the unhappy lives of a bunch of Lego clone troopers, Some of this stuff is freakin' hilarious (...saving me the bother of having to be, on this occasion!).





It certainly has been fun to get such a deep insight into the German sense of humor. And to discover that there is one.
 

Technically, its related to the humble cockroach

In my bug lovin' days the praying mantis was my favorite insect, so I couldn't pass up the chance to feature this excellent Technic mantis by grohl666, from the Czech republic. Notice how I said Technic and not Bionicle! Anyway, this thing even has a rotating head, flapping wings and moving front legs. So its a ton of icky swooshable buggy fun! Just don't leave it near your gerbils.






 

Sharks with frikkin' lazer beams? No thanks!

...those are *so* twentieth century. Every self respecting evil genius or mad scientist with world domination on their minds has long since upgraded to telemetry-controlled giant rats with frikkin ray guns, as demonstrated by Felix Greco...



It appears these hairy henchmen were first utilized by the dreaded Dr Dopamine, who I like to imagine was the inspiration for Dr Horrible!


As far as i can tell, this rat army is commanded via power chords played into a guitar-based controller. Fortunately, Dr Dopamine seems to know some good licks!


I'm not sure if he wants to rule the world, or just rock it!
 

Tiny tree, you're so cute!

This adroable little Bonsai tree by Luke.Manuel (I assume that's also his domain name) begs for many possible descriptions, all with the same theme...



"Small but perfectly formed."
"The best things come in small packages."
"Quality, not quantity."
"Don't worry, its personality that counts."

I could go on. But I won't. Because "less is more"!
 

Bloody excellent, snow doubt about it

HEADLINE: "Contest trophy beats out contest entries, is awarded to itself"

...well ok, its really just a prediction, but that's what I half expect to find myself reading over at the ApocaLego group on Flickr in a few weeks, when their current "Blood in the Snow" building contest ends. Because the model you see below is actually the trophy for that contest!!



I wonder if its creator, Carter Baldwin, will have the guts to enter it? After all, many guts were spilled in its creation...

[Purist alert: The icicles are BrickForge bricks!]
 

Cotton pickin' varmints!

Continuing our brief segway into the Old West, I'm noticing a lot of really good Western-themed dioramas popping up in the Legosphere recently. Not the least of which is an ever-growing set by Australian builder Josh Morris, aka "I Scream Clone". (...hmmm, that would be another great theme for a BrickCon 2010 display, hint hint!)

This rather understated little piece (or 'pees'?!) just makes me smile...





How did we ever manage before the days of dark tan, sand green and the apparent unlimited availability of brown tiles?
 

So shoot me

This facsimile of a Remington by my pal Arkov is so much classier than the endless generic rectilinear black Lego ouzi's and gloks that we normally see out there. And 58% less likely to result in the local SWAT division repelling in through your office window, too! Its an elegant weapon, for a more civilized age. Or the less civilized parts of Colorado ;-)



This so takes me back to when I was six, and had a cap gun that looked exactly like this! Look, you can even load it...



How cool is that? There's so many clever use of bricks to create all the fine details, I hardly know where to begin! Except to wonder: Where do I order?