What's the best way to build MOCs?

[opn2]

Edited September 27, 2014 by opn2

[jodawill]

I almost always start with physical bricks. I tear things apart and rebuild sections as I think of ways to improve my design.

As for the issue of having too many distinct colors, the best solution I've found is to order parts off Bricklink. For example, I have a ton of dark red slopes and brown log bricks because I order big shipments of them from the stores that sell them for the cheapest. Those aren't common pieces in sets, but there are plenty to go around due to things like pick-a-brick, LUGbulk, and resellers parting out sets.

[rodiziorobs]

Personally, I would avoid LDD at first, and here's why:

Like you, when I began to build again as an adult, I was bewildered by the new pieces and how suddenly SNOT building was commonplace. It took a lot of time to get used to building with the new pieces and techniques, so I tried LDD to use pieces I had never owned. I never really got a feel for them, though, because I didn't have them at hand to experiment with. Actually holding the new parts and seeing how they worked with others had to be hands-on for me. Now if that doesn't sound like you, then maybe LDD is a good place to start.

I would recommend some of the Creator sets--they have a good price per part ratio, they give you a chance to use new colors and parts, and you get to see a variety of ways to use those parts in different contexts. That way, you can display a model if you want to, but it is designed as a model from which other models (MOCs) can be built.

Good luck, and have fun!

[jimmynick]

I agree with the sentiment about purchasing Creator sets - but I disagree about LDD. As a student, I am away from my "main" collection of bricks most of the year. LDD is perfect as a replacement for physical bricks and allows you to create a bill of materials that you can assemble from PaB or Bricklink.

One word of warning about LDD, though: before you start to build something, have a plan. If you know what you want to design and know what scale you're going to build it in (draw some sketches if that helps, and dimension them in studs or plates or whatever's convenient), then everything falls into place when you actually get to building. If you try to use LDD as a sandbox, you will find yourself bewildered and overwhelmed - it is in this respect that building with physical bricks is helpful and useful.

Oh, and welcome to Eurobricks, opn2, by the way!

[MAB]

Free building for me too. Buy a load of cheap parts in cheap colours to start with too. Who cares about colour for practice. I will often build something without caring about the colour, then order the parts I want to build the MOC second time around. Chances are you will rip it down and start again many times anyway until you are happy, so having a range of parts rather than the correct colours really helps.

The way I build, I also disagree with the "have a plan" route (although it is essential for LDD). Don't have too much of a plan. Just build and see what happens.

Edited July 25, 2014 by MAB

[ShaydDeGrai]

I'm not a fan of LDD, but that's not a reflection on the tool itself, rather a matter of personal preference and the role I want LEGO to fill in my hobby spectrum. I work with computers on a daily basis and when I want to chill out and relax, the absolute last thing I want to do is spent that time in front of another computer.

That said, I've been MOC'ing for a very long time and have yet to find one absolute formula for success that works just for me, let alone anyone else. Sometimes I want a very concrete plan, sometimes that's the very last thing I want, Usually I'll build and rebuild a prototype a dozen times before I'm happy with it, other times it's one and done. I've lost track of the number of times I've "finalized" a design (in the wrong colors) ordered the bricks to build the finished thing in the colors I want only to redesign the thing to the point where it's using entirely different bricks by the time the original order of parts arrive (bad for the budget, good for building up a collection…)

My general "best" (though occasionally contradictory) practices tend to include:

* Shop for inspiration before shopping for parts: I find I do my best work when I have a passion for the desired outcome. I'm also inherently cheap and I find I stress out a lot less about the expense of my hobby if I have clear sense of what that money is going toward (even if I overbuy or change a design later) rather than just amassing random parts for some project to be named later.

* Allow inspiration to find you from time to time: I like to keep a small bucket of random parts on my desk for absent minded free building, you never know what you'll get. I was fooling around with some plates one afternoon and thought to myself "hey, that looks like it belongs on a some sort of cool ancient warship" and eventually it became part of my Corsair from Umbar build.

* You may not need a plan, but you must have a vision: If I'm building something that exists, I track down as many reference photos as I can. If no photos exist, I make sketches of my own to figure out scale and proportion. These aren't schematics to tell me which brick goes where at every step of the process, but they are guidelines to keep large builds on track while obsessing over details.

* Don't over-think things that should be organic: Nothing looks more artificial than a carefully planned tree. The human mind likes to make patterns and the human eye does a fantastic job of spotting them. Things like rocks, plants and weathering need an element of randomness to seen real and it's hard to fake "random"; our minds just aren't programmed that way. When I was building my Pillars of the Kings MOC I deliberately co-mingled my new gray with my old and randomly drew from the bins to achieve an uneven surface tone that was striking enough to add depth to the work but random and subtle enough that, unless one looks closely, you don't realize multiple colors are in play. When doing the extensive rock work on Barad Dur, I did a similar thing with shape, lumping all my dark bley slopes together and randomly picking "the next piece to be added" from the bag - my sketches and references helped guide where the piece went, but the part in hand and available connection points kept me from over-thinking the process.

* Keep a neutral palette of various bricks handy: I do a lot of prototyping when I'm working on a design and I value form over color at that stage of the game. By far the bulk of my (unassembled) collection are either some shade of gray (thus the user name) or (increasingly) tan. Working from this neutral palette lets me experiment with form without being distracted by garish color contrasts like classic red on bright yellow. Now often (for me) the finished model is also pretty close to these colors but even when the end product is going to be more colorful, I still find it useful to get the basic shapes fleshed out in gray or tan first.

* Be a smart consumer: When it comes time to render the finished design (and even before for the sake of building up a palette of shape and color), spend your money wisely. learn to love the Creator line - even if you don't care for the models they offer, they have a great price ratio, offer insights as to clever ways to use new pieces and (in most cases) the parts inventory is readily available either on the side of the box or on-line. Establish relationships with Bricklink stores - not only is bricklink a great source for parts at a reasonable price, by consistently returning to favored vendors I routinely get customer loyalty coupons for 10-20% off my final order and/or free shipping. If you have access to a PAB wall at a Lego Store milk it for all it's worth and take the time to learn how to pack a cup well (in the US PAB parts are sold by volume and a well packed cup can carry two to three times the weight/mass of a loosely packed one). If you know you REALLY need a lot of a particular part in a particular color, investigate K-Boxes (you need to speak to a store manager about these). The on-line Pick-A-Brick and Lego Education Parts websites usually don't have the best prices, but they do have the advantage of bulk ordering - if peicing together a large order via bricklink is going to kill you on postage with lots of small lots coming from dozens of vendors, take the time to see if the official parts source prices become more reasonable; it's rare but it does happen.

* Remember it's LEGO, you're supposed to play with it: the English word "play" traces back to the Middle Dutch word "pleien" meaning "to leap for joy". If you're not having fun, you're doing it wrong.

[cold_fuzion]

I'm a little farther along this process than you in that I've been accumulating for a couple years now, but only recently really getting into it. I don't think there is a right or wrong way to go about it. I'm finding I prefer to go into LDD with an idea what I want to make and then build and rebuild it there until I'm happy and then order whatever I need. The problem I've found with that approach is the LDD does not tell you which parts are next to impossible to get and which are not. I built a TARDIS and it came out exactly as I hoped it would, but the panels I chose to build the doors are extremely scarce to come by (in fact I could not find a single US-based vendor on BrickLink that sells them).

[Modelmaker]

Im just out of my dark ages and i went through my local classified add sites looking for lego bulk lots, we have one site where you can make an offer on what the person is selling and i go on there and offer less than half price on lots of different adds. most sellers politely decline my offers but a few accept and i end up with a cheap lot of bricks. The last lot i bought was 20kg for €150. the box was full of old batteries and diecast cars and other non lego junk but i managed to resell some of the junk on ebay and made back around €60 and still had lots of parts to play around with. it took about a week to sort all the bricks and wash all the sticky ones (eww) and moon sand is a real pain to get out off the bricks but then i had the fun of trying to work out what sets i had mixed in the new lot. I love how the stickers on some sets have the set number on them. I ended up with 26 nearly complete sets and 6 non complete sets from that lot. about 7 where big sets like the city garage, fire and police stations and so on. It's a totally random way to buy your bricks but it's cheap and fun trying to figure all the sets out. I also ended up with a lot of big lego parts that i don't need like ship hulls and plane cockpits so i'll probably but them on ebay in a while and use the cash for parts i know i will want.

Edited July 25, 2014 by Modelmaker

[Peppermint_M]

I advise you try building a set or two, or at least look at the instruction books. There are a few techniques that have reached official set design and the step by step guide is a great way to learn.

[VintageLegoEra]

Also, but best 2 or 3 set and check the manual for neat and professional results

[AFOLguy1970]

I use LDD first, simply because I do not have a wide variety of parts lying around for experimentation. Yet, I must agree that having a lot of bricks would be the best case scenario, because you can use trial and error.

LDD does have a couple of challenges. First, as already mentioned, it could offer you a brick which may not exist or is fairly expensive and hard to find. Second, it could allow you to make "illegal" connections. It is also hard to judge structural integrity until you actually build your model.