Opinions: The LEGO brand

LEGO, it is fair to say, plays the part of a hobby in our lives. For some, it is more; it is a career. But it is a career that, for the most part, would be enjoyable, and one would have chosen it having had a happy childhood association with the Danish toys. So, the decision of a nicorette company to feature LEGO in its adverts is one I find read more...

Lego commercial: "Build Together"

I love this new commercial from Lego. It's not just for a specific theme - it's for Lego in general. Some great stop-motion animation in there as well.

~John

Mid-2010 sets: World Racers

Loved that bit of old-school Lego design in the last post? Well, here's something to whet your appetite for the new year further. World Racers, a new theme for 2010, just screams Lego: two different 'factions', racing in different parts of the world, on different vehicles. They race in the ice...

In the desert...

There's the obligatory speedboat chase...

Hovercrafts in the jungle...

And of course the street race. Just take a closer look at that globe graphic on the box art: does anyone remember the Drome in the old Racers sets? Ah, memories.

Finally, we've got our first peek at the Bionicle replacements. I'm not too sure whether the top and bottom rows are the last line of Bionicles (Bionicle Stars) or the replacements, but they look very Bionicle-ish. Luckily the replacements are not Ben 10, which is a relief. If you're getting stressed in the days leading up to Christmas (three days left to go!) then you can calm down knowing that Lego didn't leave Lego fans including everyone at BZPower Ben 10 sets [which cost more than $1 per piece] as the Bionicle replacement.

Oh, and there's some of the larger Space Police III sets:

~John

Newly leaked images: Mid-2010 Castle sets

Dano, along with some other people, has just released images from a Dutch Lego catalogue of mid-2010 sets. Without further ado, let's take a look at what will be available in June and July next year...

The new Castle theme is called 'Lego Kingdoms' and features the usual two factions fighting each other, kind of like those bull-crest soldiers fighting the guys with the eyepatches in an old Castle theme. I think you can tell I'm not a Castle fan...

There's all the usual stuff - catapults (quite old school, if I remember correctly), knights on horses... and what looks like a great new helmet! The 'baddies' have a dark green, brown and gold colour scheme (that should provide some good dark green parts), whilst the 'goodies' have a white, red and silver colour scheme.

The big castle looks, as many have commented, very old school, and I have no problem with this! It's fantastic to see Lego going back to their roots, especially with Castle themes. "More of this!" Is all I can say.

Even this £7er looks like a great set for parts - there's even a new horse face guard and what may be a new horn piece. I'm getting serious déjà vu from this set!

This new Castle theme looks like the best in a long time... Lego have shrugged off the façade of blatant popularism, and ditched doll-like knights and giant trolls. They've gone back to the basics with Kingdoms, and boy am I glad to see it. I may just buy my first Castle set in 9 years.

~John

Flying Lizards?

 I'm a sucker for VTOL attack craft and these little gunships from Don Quixote 2x4 (where do people get these names from?) make me swoon with desire. Well, maybe not quite swoon, but they are lovely little things, especially the one using the scaled brick as nose art. I'm also somewhat in awe of that incredible ground/floor - an apaprently endless series of slopes!

Dr. S.

Tanks for the Memories...

Yes!  I'm still here!  Sorry for the lack of posts from yours-truly lately but a large LEGO project has had me busy.

But back to the blogging...

This M1A3 Abrams Main Battle Tank by ChandlerParker is the business - the angles on the turret are beautiful and the entire creation has a well-honed look to it - this is clearly a labour of love, and something to be loved, especially by an old warmonger like me.

Dr. S.

Not in the festive mood yet?

Well, then you need some urgent Christmas cheering up! And what's better than some great fan-made lego advent calenders? I'm sure most of us have been following one of these for the past 21 days, and if you haven't it's time to start catching up!

Certainly the best of the bunch this year is Powerpig's brilliant shots using the contents of the Lego City advent calendar. You may enjoy the shots, but think more about the pictures: you open the little window of the calendar not knowing what you're going to get, but by the end of the day you need to have built it (not so hard, I admit), worked out what it was, created a set-up and photographed it. Tough work even for Powerpig.

Similar to Powerpig yet sadly not as popular, Fanboy 30 is following the Lego Pirates advent calendar, which wasn't available in the US for some reason. As I live in the UK, I managed to get one so it was fun to see what Fanboy 30 does with the little models I found in the window that morning.

Finally, MisaQa has been quietly making her own advent calendar, where she makes microscale Lego models of buildings in her town. Though they may not be as exciting as some of Powerpig's or Fanboy30's stuff, it still deserves some recognition. And besides, we're a Lego blog, not a photography blog.

~John

"Welcome to the team, Legsly Von Sharkerton!"

Well, here's the third episode of the increasingly hilarious New Beginnings series. I must say the l;evel of detail in the building and backdrops of these Brickfilms is superb - and though the animation could do with some smoothening, it's still a cut above most of the rest. Anyways, here's the plot so far: Malifioso is on the brink of destroying New Block city, so NNN's best reporter Steve Deepsea gets the inside info on the public's opinion of Malifioso's "threat". Well hey there Steve!

~John

"Did I miscalculate the Calamari coefficient?"

Remember Out of Bonds, the first episode of the New Beginnings series? Well here's the second brilliant episode, SVELT Interview. Here's an added bonus: all episodes are in HD, so you can sit back and enjoy them in full quality. Yay? Yay!

~John

"New Beginnings" - Out of Bonds

I've just recently discovered this hilarious and very well animated Brickfilm series from NNN on YouTube, called New Beginnings. There are currently 3 episodes released, with an advert in between (the shows are in a TV news programme format, with ad breaks between each episode). It's certainly something refreshing after so many Dane Cook movies and whatnot, so I strongly recommend you check it out. Here's the first episode:

~John

Clutch Powers Trailer

We've known about the full-length Lego film 'Clutch Powers' for a while now - but we've finally managed to see a trailer, and here it is.

~John

MUJI + LEGO, LEGO Wallets

It's not everyday that, when checking the blog Design Milk, I come across two Lego-themed designs. In fact, I've never seen Lego featured on Design Milk before now. Maybe this is the start of some big marketing campaign - we'll find out in the coming months.

First up, popular Japanese design company MUJI is offering what the folks at Design Milk called an "awesome stocking stuffer". It appears to be Lego creatures and other models with card parts that slot in to create a more 3D effect - a very interesting idea.

All of the sets come with several models you could build. This set includes little mushrooms with card tops that fit into the studs on the bricks. There is an included instruction manual for other models.

In these pictures you can see, in more detail, how the models work. A pretty cool idea if you ask me. According to Design Milk, these sets will be released in the US at some point - but for now they're only available in Japan.

Next up are some Lego wallets made by design company ColorByNumbers. Though they may not be as well presented as MUJI's sets, they can have baseplates on the sides so you personalise them with tiles of whatever bricks you want.

ColorByNumbers' wallets are handmade and always personalised to your needs, so their stock is limited. If you want one, I suggest you get one soon!

~John

The Letter

Hi guys,
Sorry I have been out for a while. Anyway, here is a film I found on YouTube.

This film is actually very good! The animation is flowing and the camera does not shake too much. The sound is a bit wierd but not in a bad way. I think this film is very good and would recommend it to anyone, it is very funny.

Chris

Novvember '09: The round-up

This year's Novvember has been well and truly fantastic! As expected, there was a sharp influx of 'Vipers on the last day as everyone thought "Damn, I need to finish mine by tonight", but before we look at those let's pick the best out from where I last left off - the 7th November.

First up, we've got two great microscale 'Vipers by Zeessi. I really love the one on the right - the left one is a bit blocky (excuse the pun) but there are some great parts usages anyway. The dark colour highlights are nice, too.

Of course I couldn't do this round up whilst ignoring some of Fredoichi's stuff. Firstly (top) is the 'Hime', with some pretty pink highlights, the underside of those under-curves and a nice simple shape. Then we go from pink to purple, with the Ikari. Take a closer look and you'll see the purple cab roof fit perfectly into that from shape.

Talking of brilliant 'Vipers, here's some rather abstract shapes in Cole Blaq's "Jaune" (yellow). He says he doesn't like it that much, but I do. Sure, there are some parts which aren't perfect as we'd expect from Cole (the Technic bars under the cockpit), but the wings look really great.

I really like _Nash's stuff, so it is no surprise to me that I love his sleek Vic Viper. The combination of smooth slopes and flat side-bricks is lovely (dang I can't think of a better adjective), despite the exposed slopes.

When you have rules about what a spaceship should look like (Nnenn's Three Laws of Vic Vipers) is that you can get some really crazy stuff as a result of bending said rules. Take legosamauri's fantastically shaped Viper. I simply love the use of those slopes with sand green squares (from the original Slave I IIRC). I should get down to using mine sometime...

We wouldn't have a totally wide range of Vic Vipers without some Classic Space. Whilst Pete Reid astounded us with Space Police Vipers, Wizz Bang! provided us with his own unique style of Neo-Classic Space. Beautiful.

Finally, here's Pyrƒyre's unique contribution to the group: the 'Vick Vapor', based off Vick's Vapor Rub. Because, after a whole month of building pretty much the same thing, it really was time for someone to break the ice with a bit of light-hearted humour. Even Kevoh from the Twee Effect blog made his own little diagram: "Vic Vipers: Beating a dead dog". Heh heh.

So that just about wraps up another successful Novvember. Sure, we've been beating a dead dog so much it's now more of a mushy dog-smelling mess, but we've had a heck of a lotta fun doing it. And besides, it got Nnenn back into building after moving house, so it's generally win-win, right?

Well, that's for you to decide. I hope you enjoyed Novvember as much as I did, so much so that I may keep the Novvember background for a while. I really love those sketches.

~John