Month: May 2016

Lego Classic: Retro Values with a Modern Aesthetic

ramblingbrick elements, Lego, reviews, techniques , , , , , , , , ,

When LEGO rebooted their ‘generic brick’ sets last year as ‘Classic’ I was pretty excited.  Whilst I enjoy the creator and mini figure containing sets, the building often feels a little bit constrained. It’s like we aren’t being encouraged to experiment too much with building any more.  Now, my early experiences with lego were before the release of the mini figure, and in those early days, box art would often demonstrate alternative builds without instructions.  So the classic sets are available in a variety of sizes and price points, from $AU25 (224 bricks) through to the $90, 1500 piece, creatively named ‘Large Creative Box’.  In between are a variety of building sets and also ‘supplement sets’ these $AU30 sets come without wheels or plates, but a variety of bricks, as well as some ‘eye tiles’.  There is even a ‘bright’ supplement set: featuring much of the Friends color palette. I would love a ‘landscape supplement’ full of greys, greens and browns, but leaving out the purples and trans red and so forth…

Today I am looking at 10702 – Lego Creative Building Set.  Whoa… lets look at that word again: Creative.  That’s like ‘building without a net.’ It was purchased on special, $29.99, rather than the standard $39.99: 25% off.  It contains over 570 pieces in 41 colours. That was around 7 cents per piece; 73 cents per colour, 13.9 pieces per colour. Forty one colours? you’d think they were ice cream flavours.

The box is shaped like an old school toy box, made of corrugated cardboard and  contains several transparent poly bags, filled according to color family.

These images show us all the colour, and representative of the parts selection. I ran out of space in my light box so…

Continue reading →

Minifigure Storage Dilemmas

ramblingbrick AFOL life, Collectible Minifigures, elements, Lego, reviews

As the weather become less pleasant, and the great outdoors becomes slightly less appealing, peoples attention turns to sorting things out in the Legoratory.  Over the last few days I have seem some impressive displays that people use to store their collection of Collectable Minifigure Collections, Batmen, Iron Men, sundry Super Heroes and Big Figs.

I admire the effort that people go to, constructing spectacular reconstructions of the BatCave, or Tony Stark’s Armour Lab as a backdrop for their collections.  The Daiso boxes (nifty little display boxes you can buy from Daiso stores…), Customised Ikea frames and Lego Minifig Storage containers (Why, oh why did they have to release 18 Disney Collectable Minifigs?? Why does my computer keep trying to autocorrect minifigs to minifies? And what does ‘minifies’ even mean??)

I have to admit, I lack the discipline to sort my figures out and display them in any ordered fashion.  This was driven home to me as I set about trying to locate a certain minifig, as part of an image I have been looking to create [shameless cross promotion: Keep your eyes on the Ramblingbrick Instagram feed to see it soon ].  Many of my mini figures are kept in the one area of my lego build room…

I was unable to find him for a couple of days.  He has subsequently revealed himself to me. Perhaps my mini figure storage and organisational system needs a little refinement.

What do you think?

IMG_9577

 

Play well.

 

 

Scaling up to 4×4 Part 2: 31037: Adventure Vehicles

ramblingbrick Lego

So, last time we had a look at the sub mini figure scale 31040: Desert Racers.  Today I’d like to look at Adventure vehicles.  Another Creator 3 in 1 set, this one has instructions for an off road vehicle, a hovercraft and a helicopter.  The color schemes are predominantly green and white, with red and dark bluish grey elements completing the mix.

The Action Starts

The Action starts with the box: the 4 wheel drive is shown traversing a treacherous landscape.  The other two models  – a helicopter and hovercraft- are displayed in the call out.  All three vehicles are seen having an adventure together on the back of the box – with some suggestions on how to make riding in the four wheel drive even more adventurous: why not remove the roof and doors?

How treacherous is the landscape on the front of the box? So much so that in order to traverse, the recovery winch has been attached to the edge of the box itself…  I laughed. Perhaps I should get out mere?

adventure box Continue reading →

Scaling it Up 4×4 Part 1: 31040 Desert Racers

ramblingbrick creator, Lego, photography, reviews, techniques , , ,

One of the great things about LEGO is the way in which the same model can be built in different scales: some times, equivalent models in different scales are available simultaneously.  This is the case with the sub-minifig scale 31040:Desert Racers and Jack Stone Scale (I’m not afraid to go there…) 31037:Adventure Vehicles.  Each of these is a 3-in-1 Creator Set.

While travelling along this path, I thought we might have a look at forced perspective, as a way to give images the impression of greater depth.

 

Let’s Start Small

Lets start today by looking at 31040 Desert Racers: this set has 65 parts, costs $AU 9.95 and is a 3 in 1 creator set.  The presented models include a 4 x 4;  a dune buggy  and what appears to be a quad bike.

The thing I love about building at sub minifig scale is that pieces take on brand new roles: here the short ladder becomes a roof rack; the motorbike handlebar becomes a bullbar and the round tile with a hole in the middle becomes a spare type, strapped on the back of the vehicle.  The build takes around 5-10 minutes and measures 4 studs wide, around 4.5 bricks high and  6-7 studs long.

triptic vehicle1

Continue reading →

Play On: Ninjago Skybound

ramblingbrick Lego, ninjago, reviews, video games , , , , , , ,

IMG_9442

So… having never invested in Ninjago as a theme, it seems to have taken up a little more of my time than originally planned this year.  So, having looked at a couple of sets, I thought I would (once again) succumb to the message on the side of the box… Free App: Available on iTunes or Google Play.  So, while Mighty Micros is an arcade racer, and Adventures in Elvendale is a colour matching casual game, Ninjago: Skybound is a platform game.  The opening screens reveal that the Ninjas’s souls, except for Kai, have been captured within the djinn blade of the evil  Nadakhan.  Kai must pass through a number of quests to rescue his friends. Continue reading →

Disney Collectable Minifigures: In order of Appearance

ramblingbrick AFOL life, Collectable Minifigures, Lego, reviews , , , ,

 

Blink and You Will Miss ThemIMG_9422

The latest range of LEGO Collectable Minifigures (CMFs) hit the shelves last weekend around the world. People have been honing their packet feeling skills and doing their best to get a full set before the box runs out of Mickey Mouse and Buzz Lightyear. And they are vanishing fast.

Unlike previous sets of CMFs, there are 18 rather than 16 different figures to collect. Each box of 60 contains 3 full sets with 6 ‘extras’.  There is a good mix of classic and modern characters, Pixar and Disney, hero(ine) and villain.  But there are plainly of gaps in the collection. Enough to say ‘here are my favorites for series 2’… So we can only hope that this may be an actual thing, rather than just a fantastical imagining…

Plenty of sites are offering reviews of all the CMFs – I have decided to present them in chronological order of their first appearance: Continue reading →