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6 hours ago, dathil said:

I Can't find the questions topic anymore, so I'll ask it here:

I am going to Legoland in Billund at the end of the month, I wanted to know if they have enough PickaBrick-walls there. I have quite some budget, but there are not really any sets that I want to have :P (OR: Could you guys recommend a set that is currently being sold, that is inevitable for a castle builder?)

Well, no NEXO-knights of course (except maybe the bad guys as Nocturnian fellows). :wink: 

Since there's nothing else really intresting, I'd go for the Creator sets. They have a very high price/piece count ratio. If you can find one with a lot of bley or reddish brown, I'd recommend buying it

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8 hours ago, dathil said:

I Can't find the questions topic anymore, so I'll ask it here:

I am going to Legoland in Billund at the end of the month, I wanted to know if they have enough PickaBrick-walls there. I have quite some budget, but there are not really any sets that I want to have :P (OR: Could you guys recommend a set that is currently being sold, that is inevitable for a castle builder?)

I've taken a look at the current range of sets, but well...

I guess 70323: Jestro's Volcano Lair is currently the closest set resembling an ordinary (Fantasy Era) Castle set, but directly from LEGO is more expensive than pretty much any other store at this moment. I personally think there is an appeal in 41180: Ragana's Magic Shadow Castle, from a Castle perspective. 71040: Disney Castle is an option, but A: it's really expensive, and B: you may not want to take it apart for the parts (same goes for other modulars). 

For pieces (alone) I could further think of 76060: Doctor Strange's Sanctum Sanctorum, 70594: The Lighthouse Siege and 76057: Spider-Man: Web Warriors Ultimate Bridge Battle

 

Of course, if you want to get yourself a nonomissible piece of Castle history, The Fortrex is the way to go! 

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av-rebeltrooper_fleshie.pngav-stormtrooper.png

Calling all builders - do you want to try your hand at a Star Wars MOC, without the commitment of signing up for another Eurobricks RPG?  Shadows of Nar Eurbrikka is looking for builders to help us out with an upcoming episode.  The episode should launch in the next week or two, and players will have 4-6 weeks to finish their builds.  The game takes place in the 'Original Trilogy' timeframe, between 'Empire Strikes Back' and 'Return of the Jedi'.  Let me know if you're interested, and we'll give you all the details in a PM.

GoH mods - if there's a better place / way to post this so that GoH players can see it, please feel free to move / change.  Thank you!

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Does anyone have some advice on what kind of DSLR camera to buy and/or avoid buying for LEGO photography? I am sick of my low resolution and badly focused pictures (especially for larger shots) and my wife has given me the authorization to buy a new camera (yay!) but I wanted to see if anyone had some feedback. There are several Canons on Amazon with what seem to be nice bundles for less than $500, like this one and this one.  I do not know enough about the nuances of it all to know just from looking that one bundle is better (the camera itself seems to be the same). Thanks for any help anyone can give!

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Personally I like the mirrorless cameras better... smaller, easier to handle and the one I have (Olympus O-MD E-M10) is just awesome.  I have never regretted the ~$500 I spent on it!  I'm pretty amateur myself, I will admit, so I'm not too up on all the technical benefits of one over the other, but I did do research into the differences when I was shopping and concluded that where the DSLR has an edge over the mirrorless is mainly in shooting moving subjects... not something as LEGO fans we're going to need too often, and I can speak from experience that my mirrorless does a very passable job for moving shots.  (Actually only downside to it that I've noticed so far is that when shooting videos there's often a "camera noise" in the background, and I have no idea what the comparison to a DSLR would be for that.  It's awesome when it comes to brightening the shadows of a picture... hardly any graininess!)

For the bundles it's probably the lenses that are different - for LEGO photography you don't need a very fancy lens - shooting subjects are up close, so you don't need to be able to zoom excessively, and they're stationary, so you don't need a lens designed for taking sport pictures.  What you do need, bundle or not, is a lens protector which I think is called a lens filter - so that if you scratch the lens you're scratching the protector, not the actual lens - and you'll need an SD card.  But usually those are not very expensive on their own.  In fact, you might want to look into buying outside a bundle - could be cheaper.  Then again, maybe not.  But I don't recommend relying on the pictures when it comes to looking at the product - go down to the specifications where it tells you exactly what's in the box.

Of the two that you linked to, the cheaper one (by Ritz Camera) looks better to me - more GB on the memory sticks, extra batteries, and slightly cheaper.  But I don't know how the quality of the extra accessories would compare.

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@Henjin_Quilones  About a year ago, I bought a Pentax K50 camera.  I am also an amateur photographer, so I had to research cameras to make a decision.  The main reason I went with this camera was the increased definition for moving objects (such as people and animals) and better instant screen view (Pentax uses a prism instead of mirrors to generate this view) for capturing landscape scenes (my additional photography interests).  These features seem unnecessary for shooting LEGO builds, though.  My Pentax K50 came with a telephoto lens that I wanted for nature photography, but you would not need this for LEGO photography.

That Canon Rebel T6 looks like a good pick.  I also might suggest considering the Nikon 3300, which seems to have a comparable cost and similar capabilities with a higher megapixel count (though C-MOS sensor size combined with megapixel count are more important than megapixel count alone, as a camera with a smaller sensor will produce a grainier image if using more megapixels, the exact case I found with my first cheap point-and-shoot digital camera that boasted 26MP but produced very grainy images).  This site seems to recommend the Nikon 3300 and 3400 slightly higher than the Canon Rebel T6, though it is hard to say.  It should still be a good read for you with your current camera considerations.

I hope someone that knows a lot more about photography (like @Gideon) might input information to help you in your decision.  I am pretty confident that you will be happy with the ones you are considering if you cannot find any information or advice that points you in a different direction.  I do know my Pentax K50 has kept me happy, both for LEGO photography and for nature photography.

...And so you know that I am not specifically recommending the Pentax K50 for LEGO photography, the other reason I chose that one was the weather resistance (which should hopefully not be a concern for your LEGO photo shoots!).  To get the equivalent "bundle" from Pentax was more expensive for me than with the Canon and Nikon bundles you are considering.

Edited by Slegengr
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Lens before body as they usually say, but 18-55 (plastic fantastic) is a good start for sure in your photography journey.

Most sure is you will get soon addicted, and gather money for your next "big" (aperture) lens :)

I am a Canon fanboy myself so I can safely say that you wont be disappointed.

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@Kai NRG, @Slegengr, @Gunman: Thanks for your advice! I ended up getting the cheaper of the two Canon options I had listed, as it seemed to have the same stuff, if not better, for less money. Hopefully there will be a significant difference in the presentation of my larger builds for Category C (it's too late for the smaller ones; they have been photographed and consumed by the larger ones for parts...). 

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@Slegengr

I am in a very similar situation (identical actually, my wife also said its time for a camera). Based on your recommendation, and because we have similar interests and I really like that the thing is weather proof, I think we're going to try the Pentax KS-2, which seems to be very similar to the K 50, but a few years newer and with a few extra features my wife didn't want to do without.  

She always likes to know how all the features work, so would you have any recommendations on that side of things?

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@MiloNelsiano I am not sure I understand what you are asking.  What extra features are you wondering about?  I have limited photography experience and have yet to discover all the uses of the features of my camera, so I might not be able to help with explaining additional features.  The larger pixel count of the KS-2 could be a nice benefit, especially if the sensor is larger than the one in the K-50 camera.  The swivel display could be useful to some (especially for video), though I would probably find it more bothersome than helpful to me.  I use the camera almost entirely for pictures rather than videos.

I have been able to take nice photographs of both LEGO builds and nature scenes with the K-50.  The weather resistance is a nice benefit for outdoor shooting.  I also like the built-in stabilizer that seems to reduce shake blur on the photos.  I generally still use a tripod and remote for the most stable pictures, but I have taken some shots with the camera in my hands, and these still have come out pretty nice.  It does seem like the prism for live view works pretty well in showing what the picture will look like, unlike my previous cheap point-and-shoot camera that always seemed to have different coloration and lighting between the live view and the captured picture.

If you have any specific questions, I will try to answer them, but I am very much an amateur photographer as well as being pretty new to Pentax cameras.

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42 minutes ago, MiloNelsiano said:

identical actually, my wife also said its time for a camera

Got to love those (at least semi-)supportive LEGO wives! (Though mine has been a LEGO widow recently as I have been working in every spare moment on builds...)

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15 hours ago, Henjin_Quilones said:

Got to love those (at least semi-)supportive LEGO wives! (Though mine has been a LEGO widow recently as I have been working in every spare moment on builds...)

Now, that's promising :wink: 

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On 2-4-2017 at 6:04 PM, TitusV said:

Well, no NEXO-knights of course (except maybe the bad guys as Nocturnian fellows). :wink: 

Since there's nothing else really intresting, I'd go for the Creator sets. They have a very high price/piece count ratio. If you can find one with a lot of bley or reddish brown, I'd recommend buying it

I brought home an Assembly Square and a lot of spare bricks. Got 50% off on the set cause of business relations of a relative :P I already love all the sand blue and sand green, expect tudor style from me!

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10 minutes ago, dathil said:

I brought home an Assembly Square and a lot of spare bricks. Got 50% off on the set cause of business relations of a relative :P I already love all the sand blue and sand green, expect tudor style from me!

Great news, always nice to see some good tudor sections! I'm looking forward to them :wink: 

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Just now, TitusV said:

Great news, always nice to see some good tudor sections! I'm looking forward to them :wink: 

and then I open the summer joust 2017, starting today, and it reads 'Homestead' :) So, enough space for me to work with :D

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Just now, dathil said:

and then I open the summer joust 2017, starting today, and it reads 'Homestead' :) So, enough space for me to work with :D

I'll try to enter as well!

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As already mentioned, the 2017 Summer Joust is now live. The Summer Joust is a castle contest with 6 different categories that is open May 1st-June 30th 2017. The contest is hosted on Flickr in a dedicated contest group. This year there are prizes for 1st and 2nd in all categories (excepting the team category), as well as 3 individual awards.

Should be lots there for any Castle fan, and its fine to use a build for GoH and the Summer Joust (assuming the build wasn't posted before May 1st 2017) :classic:

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With fanweekend in between and the amount of sorting I still need to do I don't think I'll get to enter.:look:

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4 hours ago, soccerkid6 said:

Less than a month left in the Summer Joust now, with plenty of prizes up for grabs :grin:

I have some ideas, but time will be an issue... 

 

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5 hours ago, soccerkid6 said:

Less than a month left in the Summer Joust now, with plenty of prizes up for grabs :grin:

have my best (and most detailed, which equals best) moc ever in progress since day one and almost finished for the Homestead category! Alas I will not have time to make more entries although there are so much awesome categories

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Everybody probably thinks I'm dead but I've been working on a huge build, my biggest ever, though it unfortunately does not fit with the Castle Joust categories this year. I COULD have made it work with the Immersive Scene but I just don't have enough Lego. :P

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3 hours ago, mccoyed said:

Everybody probably thinks I'm dead but I've been working on a huge build, my biggest ever, though it unfortunately does not fit with the Castle Joust categories this year. I COULD have made it work with the Immersive Scene but I just don't have enough Lego. :P

Great to see you're still alive man!

You can never hae enough LEGO :grin: 

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