The use of black pieces

[Carsten Svendsen]

I have been wondering about this for a while.

TLG seems to be going away from using black parts in their sets and using dark/light bluish gray instead or even red pieces in their chassis of models. I can understand this from a childs point of view as to ease the building process.

However, I also see a lot of MOC's with barely any black parts in them and to some extent I understand why (highlighting details that would be hard to photograph) but when I see the bottom of a car or whatever made with no black pieces I just wonder why.

To me, black pieces represent the real thing better as other colors (example, the chassis of the new 42070 6x6 All Terrain Tow Truck set is pretty much all red) which I feel gives off a better look. I honesly don't care for the looks of that particular set.

But maybe I'm just having trouble finding a balance between black and dark bluish gray pieces. When to use what and why. What are your thoughts on this?

[doug72]

Over the years I have amassed a lot of black technic parts from sets - now broken down.
I decided to use them for my latest MOC for as many parts as possible as running low on other colours.
Same with Red left over from a super car set.

edit. Black connectors also seem less prone to cracking.

Edited January 14, 2018 by Doug72

[mocbuild101]

In terms of chassis, I think they should only be made out of back or grey - mainly for the sake of realism, but also because it provides a better contrast with the colors used in the body. And really, now that TLG has moved to red and yellow axles, it would make more sense to use monochrome colors, because a red axle going through a red beam isn't the best thing for easy building...

46 minutes ago, Carsten Svendsen said:

However, I also see a lot of MOC's with barely any black parts in them

Sometimes it's just because the builder doesn't have as much black as other colors...

[Jurss]

But they made 5x7 frame in black recently

[TheMindGarage]

42 minutes ago, Jurss said:

But they made 5x7 frame in black recently

Indeed - in the 42077 Rally Car. But the chassis on that seems to be a mixture of black, white and grey. Would help if they also made the "H" version of those frames in black.

[syclone]

At least for me the problem is actually the non-presence of black parts in modern sets - which leads me to use LBG in chassis (which combines well with frames and old-colored gears (light gray) ) making the chassis uniformly-colored as in a real vehicle. I'd still prefer having a black chassis, since I don't understand the point of remarking with various colors the driveshafts and mechanisms, and LBG-colored chassis stands out too much. I really miss old TLG selling strategy 

56 minutes ago, Jurss said:

But they made 5x7 frame in black recently

Probably because people children of recommended age on box were getting them confused with 5x11 H-frames 

Edited January 14, 2018 by Xewyz2001
grammar errors

[1gor]

57 minutes ago, TheMindGarage said:

Indeed - in the 42077 Rally Car. But the chassis on that seems to be a mixture of black, white and grey. Would help if they also made the "H" version of those frames in black.

H frame is what we defenetly need to (finaly) make all black chassis that is realistic representation in our mocs. With different combi of lbg or dbg with black it looks just to colorfull (sometimes like clown for circuss), so I agree that there is good choice that we have whole palette of black parts

46 minutes ago, Xewyz2001 said:

Probably because people children of recommended age on box were getting them confused with 5x11 H-frames 

That is possible reason because from some angles, or hidden by other parts less experienced people can mistaken one frame for another...

Edited January 14, 2018 by I_Igor

[Erik Leppen]

I like black because it's the color that hides itself best if behind a "hole" in a bodywork. I mean, a grey chassis shines through holes much clearer, which I personaly find looking worse. So I usually prefer black for inner workings. My most recent model, the Jaguar XJR19, I went for all-black because that makes the other color (metallic green) stand out the most. Black takes the least "visual space" and makes the other colors shine more.

Also, I have the most parts in black.

However, I also like to distinguish several parts of the inner workings. For example, what I have done once is use gray for structure (because frames are gray), black for functional modules that hang in the structure, and dark-gray for moving parts (because some suspension arms are dark-gray). That way, color gets a meaning.

But if a model's body is black, I tend to pick another color for the insides. My TC7 Enforcer was black (and white) so the chassis was all light-gray. Another example: set 8285 uses a red chassis, and in that same vein, my recent tow truck was black with a yellow chassis.

 

[Leonardo da Bricki]

I tend to use black in the body of my MOCs, mostly because it is the most common color I have. Thus, I usually make the chassis light bley, and color code the functions with the various colors of axles, because it helps to show what does what.

However, I have used black for the chassis before, and I will be doing that again on my current project, an Ariel Nomad, mostly because a lot (nearly all) of the chassis is visible. The only parts that will not be black are those that cannot be, or those of the bodywork, what little there is.

[JonathanM]

I've just built @steph77's helicopter which mostly uses DBG (and white). I didn't have enough panels in white so used red, and then also switched the DBG to black, mostly due to part availability (the DBG was tied up in sets not parted out). To be honest, I felt the black is a bit boring after building more recent sets that use DBG/LBG or even red for chassis - somehow they have more interest during the build for me? It tends to be easier to photograph as well for cheap cameras, whereas black parts aren't as distinguishable (this is good in some cases, ofcourse!) Sure, not realistic, but it's plastic so I don't mind :)

I wonder also if it helps make instructions more legible on print/PDF?

[Kelkschiz]

Blue may be the warmest color but black is definitely the coolest color!

Edited January 16, 2018 by Kelkschiz

[Carsten Svendsen]

Interesting. I can understand that people that haven't got as many LEGO sets when they were kids are lacking in black parts where as I am overflowing in them. I pretty much never use LBG or DBG parts unless the model is specifically in that color (Like my motion simulator) or the part simply doesn't exist in black. 

I also agree that black can be hard to photograph, and also that it hides the "holes" in a MOC quite well. It's truly a balance thing, that takes a lot of trial and error to learn.

[Rudivdk]

I usually try to colorcode things a little, but keep the overall appearance as smooth (colorwise) as possible. Because I almost always use the LBG frames in car chassis, chassis automatically becomes LBG or DBG for me (might change now though with black frames appearing...). Since core parts for gearboxes are red, drivetrain becomes red (axles, axle connectors etc.). And I mostly use the yellow shocks, so suspension (including steering) is yellow (apart from the actual suspension arms), together with other manual controls. Then I use black for connecting bodywork parts to the chassis (also to visually fill up possible gaps), and mostly also for interior itself. Haven't tried black for bodywork yet, but it should fit in above colorcoding scheme.

It's just a personal preference, partly also based on available parts in certain colors. 

But I have A LOT of black parts (from older sets) in my collection, so I could also do black chassis without issues. Just doesn't feel right having LBG frames on black chassis, it loses coherency IMHO.

[1gor]

On 1/15/2018 at 4:10 AM, Kelkschiz said:

Blue may be the warmest color but black is definitely the coolest color!

Agree 

[mocbuild101]

3 hours ago, Rudivdk said:

I usually try to colorcode things...LBG frames in car chassis...drivetrain becomes red...suspension is yellow

Interesting... I tend to stick as close to black as I can - I would choose black parts over LBG and DBG, and LBG/DBG over other colors - unless I'm using a major accent color, which in that case it would have priority. This also applies to Bricklink orders - which is partly why I have so much black...  

I might even say that I have too much black, but I do like building with it - for many of the same reasons mentioned above - so I guess it's okay...

[Trawler Man]

While I genuinely love black parts, I do feel the lack of perceived detail in sets and MOCs with a lot of black can be disappointing.

That said, I do think vehicle chassis look much nicer in all black or all DBG. I understand TLG's desire to give people a mix of colors with their sets, but I would greatly prefer the bigger / more AFOL oriented sets to follow a somewhat realistic color scheme.

Edited January 17, 2018 by Trawler Man