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This was a project I undertook last year during lockdown. In fairness, I got carried away with it. Originally published on New Elementary's Patreon site and then shared (in a heavily edited form) on the brickset forum... so some of you Classic Space fans here might not have seen it. I thought I would share it here (in full) just in case anyone was the slightest bit interested in my silly project! Odyssey No.918 For my fifth birthday, I was given a 918 ‘one man spaceship’. The very same 918 ‘one man spaceship’ pictured below in fact, bitten, scratched and sun damaged... but still my original set from 1979. I can only assume my juvenile self was not the same fan of that little moon logo that the adult LEGO addict is. At some stage in the past, I had nearly rubbed and scratched away the whole logo. I recently took a pragmatic decision to “restore” the slope by removing the logo entirely with Brasso and replacing it with a homemade sticker. It held no nostalgia for me as it was and it really was unusable in the state it was in. My original 918 with “restored” 3939 6x3 slope. The box is an empty one I acquired circa 2007, when a 'Classic Space LEGO' habit was affordable! During lockdown I've been rebuilding many of my old Classic Space sets with my children as an “activity” for all of us to enjoy, well, for me to enjoy ;-) ...and that’s where my old 918 comes in. Often, we have no idea where the inspiration comes from for a LEGO project but this is not one of those times. This started as an attempt to reflect the classic moon logo by building an all red version of 918 and it quickly spun out of control. I ordered the parts I didn’t already own off Bricklink and the built ‘The Redbird’ above. It was really easy acquiring all the correct elements owing to the plentiful supply of red parts. I decided to go red with a few black accents - mostly because I had a lot of the missing parts in black as spares... and there aren't 3963 three-way direction jets (space rockets) in red. I’ve subsequently found that there was a brief availability of red 4x4 cones - I assume from a pre-production run that is now sadly all bought up. With the Redbird another tricky part were the red 3940 support stands and I wasn’t sure they added anything to this variant, but the two I bought eventually found a good home elsewhere :-) Since the initial foolhardiness of the ‘Redbird’, one 918 has led to another 918, as it were. I popped these pictures of the Redbird in various places on the internet and was delighted with the reaction they garnered. Casually one evening whilst washing up, I mentioned how inordinately pleased with my red 918 I was and other people's responses to it. My wife said to me "How many different colours could you build it in?". Oh come on! Loose lips sink ships, seriously, you shouldn't say something like that to an addict! Bricklink search time! You think 918 is made up of mostly commodity parts, but some are fairly rare if you stray away into "all the colours" territory. Some are simply beginning to become rare as a result of age and its associated issues. Others are just expensive because, well, Classic Space. According to Bricklink’s inventory we are looking for a meagre 81 parts. "This is doable!" I thought "...and anyway, we're down the rabbit hole now." My first considerations were wings and slopes. “Don’t Chrome crying to me that this isn’t a full ring!” The 4x8 wedge/wing with 1x1 notch/cutout otherwise known as 3933 & 3934 (the original classic space wings) are available in a total of 16 colours. Let’s immediately forget the chrome wings that came in the 10026 ‘UCS’ Naboo Starfighter from 2000. Why? Well, to be honest, the price per wing is enough reason. Additionally they're only available in limited quantities, none are on sale in the UK and postage from anywhere else would make the cost bankrupting. Furthermore Chrome has such a limited number of parts, unless you do go the custom route, it would only ever be the wings and antenna that are possible to include. I could buy very reasonably priced custom items from one of the reliable chroming boutiques, but then where would it end?! ...I see a red car slope and I want it painted black... The 3939 3x6 slope, comes in 8 solid colours and 6 translucent ones. You need a translucent one and a solid colour one in each variant 918. The solid colour either needs to be the same colour as the wings or a nice visual companion as with the original 918's colour scheme. Surprisingly, the reintroduced 6x3 slope 58181 doesn't actually help all that much. Available in only 3 solid colours and 4 translucent ones*. The exception being its appearance in dark bluish grey... which is a pretty rare piece as a ‘parted out’ component, owing, I am sure, to its singular inclusion in 75144 UCS Snowspeeder. *Trans red is also tantalisingly available too, but again, expense made me rule it out in its unprinted form. Once I had amassed all the parts I had in my parts store, I realised that some of these spaceships were going to be easier to complete than others, and at least a couple of them were going to require a few compromises! I had most of the parts for a black one but I couldn’t decide whether I wanted a regular Classic Space black or a Blacktron variant. An extra Blacktron 918 however, would mean that I would (just) need another pair of black wings and a few yellow parts. You can see where this is going can't you? 3963 direction jets (loudspeakers) are only officially available in 8 colours and they are not plentiful in yellow, or were (at least) rare enough not to appear in pairs in the UK on Bricklink. I realised a little after the initial batch of orders that the Blacktron 918 needed a yellow cone too. The yellow 3943b 4x4x2 cone was only available in four sets including the US exclusive 6954 Blacktron Renegade... which I've seen being coveted in a fair few quarters recently. There was only one used one available in the UK at the time (gone now!) but I was able to get two new ones from a good German store for not much more than the UK price plus postage. Combined, these things and minimum order costs pretty much simultaneously meant that I ordered enough parts to make a yellow version. Brackets of the 3956 variety don’t exist in yellow (not in official sets at least), but I worked out what I think is a neat enough alternative using the new 41682 2x2 bracket in yellow and 32028 1x2 modified door rail plate. Luckily the 12 colours that the original bracket comes in covered most of the variations I wanted to make. I used the bracket solution for one other ship. There is a dark bluish grey 3956, but it only came as an 'alternate' part in 8100 and more common in that set is the light bluish grey variety! Not that expensive on its own, but only two Canadian sellers had it listed on Bricklink, and although supply on ebay looks possible within the set, I would need to spend a minimum of £8 to get it! Stealth mode ON! I knew blue was going to be fairly easy, and I had everything but a spare trans blue 6x4 plate and a spare pair of wings. The model is missing just one final 3940b blue support stand, sadly this was owing to an inventory error with one Bricklink seller. Blue is definitely one for the purists, because it’s possible to do a faithful colour correct recreation (however, I did end up substituting a pair of wings for the 6104 wedge plate). Other variants that came together reasonably easily were White and Light Grey. Again, the white should be a purist pleaser. The Light grey is actually theme accurate if not 100% part accurate, sets 6901, 6861, 6891, 1968, 6952, 6940 and 1580 all use the Trans Green/Light Grey colour scheme to great effect. Dark Red has just one part that I would love to have the appropriate replacement for. My Dark Red 918 needs the 3956 bracket, but it doesn’t exist and currently at least I can’t use my 41682 “fix”. Also, I’ll make no bones about it, I would also LOVE a dark red Classic Spaceman! Dark Grey really needs the front forks/guns (otherwise known as 3839a or 3839b and please do see Inthert‘s excellent article about that part!). It could really do with the doors too, but the black ones are okay as the chances of there ever being original dark grey doors are between pretty remote and non-existant! I always order more “used” parts than I actually need. It’s a habit I’ve formed over the last fifteen years of ordering from Bricklink. Understandably, the quality of parts can be variable, even from the same seller, also, there’s never a single seller that has all the parts I want. Almost always there is some overlap of availability of the more plentiful pieces between sellers that have the rarer parts in stock too. Long story short, I usually end up having more than I need because most Bricklink sellers are excellent. During the process I found that I had enough parts to create a few extra additions to my fleet. I already had a good supply of Light Bluish Grey wings so Neo Classic versions of the original livery was a nice variation to be able to do and also there were also parts I wanted to try out with a Redbird variant. I also find that I’m easily muddled when ordering from a few places and this leads me to mistakenly order duplicate parts (particularly when I’m balancing the best deals). I doubt I’m alone but the pictures of left and right wings (and wedges too, etc. etc.) on Bricklink confuse me too. The happy consequence of that though, has been the multicoloured ship that has naturally evolved out of the spare parts. At this point, I decided that if I could, I’d like to build as many of the possible variations as I could afford to on my LEGO budget. Where 3939 is not available at all, I've allowed a configuration of 1x3 & 4x3 slopes - you need the width in the middle to have a big enough logo! Where neither 3x6 or 4x3 are available I have combined where possible with different colour wings to limit my overall number of separate ships. Brown wings are therefore partnered with a sand green 3939 slope that I thought looked like quite a nice companion... alternate parts are available but without the red crest, this ship just doesn’t earn its nickname! I'm also still working on my sand blue, dark orange, orange and dark blue versions. Collectively there are still quite a few parts to locate for the fleet, hopefully parts to plug some of the more important gaps are on the way. Not least, the Orange Spaceman that comes in DK’s ‘LEGO® Minifigure A Visual History New Edition’ will be a wonderful addition. As with many of these endeavours, you discover just how crazy prices can be, for example, the 6x3 slope 3939 in black (that I'd ideally have for both black and blacktron) was only available in one promotional set (2998 for Stena Ferries) in '98 and would have set you back a cool £16 each, minimum, on Bricklink (at time of writing). Amazingly, there are only 5 colours of the 3479 tail wing support, so decisions must be made as there's really no way to satisfactorily work around that element in modern pieces. All but the original blue slopes have homemade "moon" logo stickers, I know, I still need to add a few more! It really has been an undertaking, and one I partially regret right now, because I’m about three months’ worth of my LEGO allowance over budget. I’m happy with the results, it’s been a nice challenge. I had pulled from spares and acquired enough wings to make the full delta wing arrangements for the whole squadron but the corresponding plates to support them were more troublesome, and despite my efforts to account for all the pieces I would need... Plates are required in 4x8, 4x4, 2x10, 2x8, 2x6, 2x4, 2x3 2x2 aaaaand 2x1 & 1x1 in various quantities and believe it or not, not all the parts are available in all the colours needed to complete this job. Others meanwhile are rare and only available for just plain demented prices, I’m looking at you Sand Blue 3024! Luckily most are possible to substitute. Similarly 1x4, 1x3, 1x2 & 1x1 bricks are also needed... although, I think just about all the colours I needed are available. Trans colours for the 3032 4x6 plate you need for the canopy are limited to two, it only appears in trans yellow and trans blue! So, naturally I have had to use solid colours for the majority of the fleet. Homemaker stove switches 4x1 3010p41 also comes in only two colours (white and light grey) and I honestly didn’t see any real reason to worry too much for a part that won’t be seen and is pretty difficult to see in the original anyway. I did buy one very reasonably priced white one though. Only one real disappointment in all of this for me was the absence of any green wings. So in the interests of making this more of a rainbow in our troubled times I clad some spare yellow wings... vive la NHS. Rainbow, well sort of ;-) Finally, I was left with a "junkyard" of extra unused parts... ...and I think “Hmmm, could I use red wings to do a pink/magenta/purple in a similar way to the green?” ...I really don’t own much purple LEGO!
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Here is my take on a Minifigure Scale Ancient Greek Homeric Galley. A predecessor to the Bireme and the more widely known Trireme, the Homeric Galley was a rowed warship that sailed the Aegean Sea around the 12th century BC. This ship specifically is based off of the Epic Poem The Odyssey and its protagonist, Odysseus' ship. Homeric Galley by Nicholas Goodman, on Flickr Homeric Galley by Nicholas Goodman, on Flickr Homeric Galley by Nicholas Goodman, on Flickr
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Introducing a continuing LEGO series spanning the Trojan War of Achilles, Agamemnon, Hector and Paris to the decade long journey of Odysseus through the mythical Aegean Sea. I hope you enjoy my interpretation of Homer's Epic Poems. I also hope you learn a little bit about one of history's first incredible adventures. Homer's Iliad by Nicholas Goodman, on Flickr The Warlord Achilles and his Myrmidons. Achilles and his fearsome Myrmidon Soldiers hailed from Phthia in the Northwestern Aegean Sea. It is a disagreement between Achilles and the Mycenaean King Agamemnon that serves as the primary storyline of the Iliad. Acilles and his Myrmidons by Nicholas Goodman, on Flickr
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Happy New Year everyone! Our last build of 2018 was the iconic scene from 2001 A Space Odyssey - from bone to space station. Hope you enjoy! The flickr album, with the rest of the photos: https://www.flickr.com/photos/152265303@N06/albums/72157705266651634
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Space... vast and endless as time itself, yet filled with many lifeforms bound by Creativity. The Odyssey project was designed to protect life from the forces of Chaos and Destruction, no matter the cost. But it serves another purpose too, as a gathering place of aliens races' leaders and a meeting of the great inventive minds in the universe. From times of war to times of peace, the Odyssey space station has stood proudly as a beacon of light to the many worlds darkened by the forces of evil. Now that beacon is threatened by mysterious forces from beyond our dimension, plus old foes that have resurfaced in this time of peril. The plea has gone out for help to save Imagination... Will YOU answer the Call? Fictional info: This space station (named Odyssey II) orbits the ice world of Beta Polaris, pointed at the direction of the trans-dimensional rip in space-time that leads to Lego Universe, ready to report any threat that may emerge from the space between spaces. Odyssey II is both an advanced weapons research platform and a forum for great minds and leaders from throughout the universe.The station is the headquarters for the Neo Nexus Force, (in cooperation with the Norsta race, of course) and the home of Nexus - Polaris University. This school focuses on the meaning of time and space itself, plus performing experiments on hyper-space streamlining, artificial gravity production, theoretical physics, and sports. (Let's go Nexo-nauts!) (this picture has a description of the areas of the station. See here for a bigger look at the picture so you can read it!) Their are meeting rooms on one of the half of the two arms of the station, which provides the gravity for this section like a centrifuge. As such, this section is laid out so that the "ground" is towards the ends of the arms, with the center having lower gravity and the non-public front and back of the station have none and you can float weightless in. The other one of the arms features a large research facility, with many libraries and even a small university focused on the study of space, time and the many mysteries therein. The station also has "the wheel". This module provides living quarters for all the university staff, visitors, and station crew, and gravity is provided by the "ground" being the outer wall of the arms. The engines on this station allow it to move if need be, even through hyper-space, though this has never happened on a large scale beyond course correction and maintaining balance in it's orbit of Beta Polaris. Here we see one of the Neo-Nexus Force ships (the cruiser Bright Hope) docked on one of the four "gravity locks". These allow for the ship to sync up with the station and crew / passengers to disembark the ship. The solar panels on the station are actually detectors of chaos energy, which would mean the breach between Universes is open once more and the evil of the Maelstrom is coming through. This would mean the station would be evacuated of civilian personnel and the military forces bolstered, ready to attack the swirling mass of darkness. The Bridge Hope in miniature scale. (This was designed by my brother to be a counterpart to the Odyssey II space station. It is based off my mini-figure scale ship of the same name: Bright Hope) This vessel is included in the LDD file. (In reality the space station model was inspired by this model by DcotorSpock888: https://www.flickr.com/photos/dr_spock_888/20558633496/in/dateposted/ plus the Babylon 5 and Star Trek TV series', the Star Wars universe, and the old LEGO Universe massive multiplayer online game.) As usual, Comments, Questions, and Complaints are welcome! EDIT 3/9/17: The model has been updated, and the pictures retaken and uploaded.
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The Trojan War Let me tell you a story, my son. We don't know if it really happened or not, but that also doesn't matter... so listen carefully. It began long ago, in the palace of Menelaus, the king of Sparta. He had money, power, but most importantly, he had the most beautiful wife in the world, Helena. He had a bellyfull of his rivals, the Trojans, but he also didn't want to argue with them all the time. So he invited them to a feast to put all the disputes aside. After many days of celebrating they left... though not alone. Helen eloped with Paris, the younger prince of Troy... and so it all started This was the perfect reason to start a war against Troy and finally kill of his opponents. With his brother Agamemnon, who was king of the Greeks, Menelaos built up the largest army the world has ever seen. So they sailed to the coast of their enemies and started a siege. But althought the Greek had way more men, they couldn't overcome the huge walls of Troy. After nine years of failed attemts, they finally remarked what went wrong: They may have the most men, but they didn't have the strongest man. So they sent Odysseus to find Achilles, a demigod. His mother hid him on a farm, because she knew that if he'd go in the Trojan War, he'd die there. With his artful lingua Odysseus could convince him to come with him. Achilles may die in front of Troy's walls, but if he'd go to war, his name would outlast over thousands of years... For Odysseus it wasn't that easy. After he brought Achilles to the war, he thought that they would finally win it. But instead of fighting against Troy, Achilles argued with Agamemnon. Because of this little despute they could have lost the whole war. But Odysseus, disingenuous as he was, had an idea... They built a wooden horse out of some ships and then sailed away, only around the corner, where the Trojans couldn't see them. The next morning, the Greeks were left and the Trojans thought that they finally won the war. The wooden horse should be a gift for Poseidon, so that the sea would be still and that they'd have a fast return. To celebrate their victory, they took the horse in the city, in front of Apollo's temple, who was the patron of the city. Their gate was too small for it, so they even had to break a hole in the wall. After a nice evening and a lot of drinking, they all fell asleep and suddenly something moved in the horse. Odysseus, Achilles and some other Greek soldiers climbed out of the "present to Poseidon". From the inside of the city they could open the gate and through there and the hole in the wall, the Greeks stormed Troy... So in the end the Greeks won the war, but was it truly a victory? All their leaders, except Odysseus, died in the war and many Trojans could flee. One of them was Aeneas, who then built up a new Troy to the west of Greece, but that's another story, which is too long to tell now...
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I am glad to introduce a series of my works devoted to Odyssey's travels. #1. Odyssey and Lotus Eaters. #2. Nobody is a guest in Polyphem's cave. #3. Odyssey and Circe. #3.1 Odyssey and Circe. Pediment: Batrachomyomachia
