sparkart

Mobile Suit Gundam Thunderbolt is the first Gundam series, the first anime series, in a long-time, that I really like. I don't hate anime. I only hate 95% of it, but that other 5%, I absolutely adore. Here's a LEGO model depicting the MS-06R High-Mobility Type Zaku II (Psycho Zaku) from Gundam Thunderbolt. Isn't that a mouthful? I'm about 80% sure 80% of this will work in real-life, and am Bricklinking like mad to compile the bricks and elements for it (almost two-dozen Bricklink orders already). For me, LEGO Digital Designer makes it easier to go through the iterative, refining design process, so I start nearly all my models with it. Here's a progression of a few iterations: I came back to LEGO after a 27-year-long Dark Age, so I don't have a life-time supply to brick with which to play and experiment. I absolutely rely on LDD to help me build, since I don't have a lot of inventory. I usually try to make bookshelf-sized models, hand-sized models. That's the sweet spot for me, a size that allows for nice scale detail and proportions, but not so large that it stresses the LEGO building elements and costs an arm and a leg to make. This one's going to bigger than usual, maybe a foot-and-a-half tall (45 cm). In most of my builds, I can identify an "enabling" piece, that crucial part, from which everything else is scaled or built upon. For example, for these S.P.E.E.D.E.R. bikes, it's the mini-fig helmets. For this Zaku model, it's the pearl gold fez used for the small rocket thrusters. There's almost 50 of those rocket thrusters on this Psycho Zaku! Is it just be me, or do you also read "Psycho Zaku" aloud with a dramatically lowered voice? Try it, "PSYCHO ZAKU!" I plan to make stickers for this model, too. I'm not going to try to replicate all the markings, just the big ones like the "96" on the right shoulder and right toe, and the Zeon insignias on the chest and right shoulder armor. I think the model would look better in dark red, rather than bright red, but not all the requisite pieces are available in dark red, particularly the new 2x2 wedge plates used in sides of the feet that suggest a boot heel.

Breaking Bad meth lab would make for an interesting B model. But then, LEGO does do subversive things like The Blue Brothers with the Jazz Man collectible figure, and Terminator Endoskeletons with The LEGO Movie.

Lookin' good! I like the Thunderbolt more than the Starfury. I even have a resin kit of the Thunderbolt, but I don't want to build it, until I can figure out a way to make the resin wings sag resistant. I really like your LEGO model, it looks great, inspires me to try one of my own. I'm probably not going to do it in mini-fig scale, though, why did you scale yours for mini-figs? To fit in with the rest of the collection?

Yes, and some generous folks have recreated a lot of sets in LDD. So, you could just paste all their work into a big My_LEGO_Collection.lxf file and you are well on your way to your goal.

Any plastic polish will work, but since Brasso is a metal polish, it works a little faster. There are many success stories using Brasso on plastics, but as The Sarge suggested, work carefully gaining your experience. Clear acrylic floor polish (like Future Floor Polish) can help restore clarity to plastic, if you damage the part. Good luck.

Cool, I like that you've suggested open sights with the grille tiles in the back, and some kind of targeting system with the megaphone, because the absence of sights on sci-fi weapons is my pet-peeve. When you make something that's potentially lethal, you better make sure you're hitting it with some kind of aiming device on the weapon, even if it's just open sights. It annoys me when prop-makers make a gun, with no way to aim it properly. All those peace-loving Star Trek Federation people probably started wars accidentally because their guns didn't have sights on them so they could aim properly. I noticed in Star Wars: The Force Awakens, when Han gives Rey a handgun, she immediately tries to one-eye aim it, but there's no sights on the blaster. I know, I know, it's all just make-believe, but it's as if those ignorant Hollywood-types have never shot a gun before. Oh, nevermind. :)

I've revisited my entry with updated builds and renders. I tried to make Tom Servo and Crow more in scale with each other. Gypsy is sized more to the telephone handset used as the handle on the flashlight on her head, than to the other robots.

Ironically, "clutch power" just relies on friction, but I understand your point that it's not a "legal" connection, and relies on the geometry and tight tolerances of surrounding pieces to keep it together. Ironically, I have a similar issue with my MOC of Rey's Speeder around the same area. You can see in this photo a black 1x2 plate is practically falling out of the front grill section. It's not connected to anything, tenuously held in by the surrounding geometry. But back on topic, that's a lovely vignette, LEGOlas0232. While I don't think JJ made a perfect movie, I agree that casting Daisy Ridley was the perfect choice.

Trucks of the World looks great! The fidelity to scale proportions is nice, can we get larger pics to appreciate the detail in them?

Thanks for producing this. I learned something useful!

Entry #4: Mystery Science Theater 3000 Late in 2015, the revival of Mystery Science Theater 3000 became the most successful crowd-funded video project ever! Tens of thousands of fans contributed to raise millions of dollars to start production of a full season of MST3K. I'd like to thank and pay tribute to the MST3K crew for all the laughs through the years with these pieces of fan art. Let's celebrate the new season with... Mystery Science Theater 3000 Brick Built Bots Busts Robot Roll Call... Cambot! Gypsy! Tom Servo! (featuring sport/buzz haircut) Crooooooooooow! Altogether now! I did check that these bricks and elements are available in these colors. That's why Gypsy is dark blue, rather than purple. (Let's just say she fell asleep on the tanning table, eh?) The currently unavailable-in-real-life parts used: 1) The dragon egg used for Tom Servo's head is a new element, and isn't available in transparent-clear. The real brick model will sport the buzz-cut version of Tom Servo's head. 2) The eighth-of-a-donut pieces used in the bases is a tricky color to render accurately (flat silver), so I just made them dark bley for the render; The real build will use flat silver. 3) For Cambot, I will use 50747pb01 for the real build. It's listed as trans-black in Bricklink, but is mostly covered with an opaque light-bley print, that's why I set it to render light-bley. Otherwise, the real-brick builds should look just like these digital renders. I do plan to make all of these in real brick, hopefully sooner, rather than later. I used LDD and BlueRender to make these images (on a low powered Atom processor tablet, no less!). Thank you, LEGO and msx80 for the digital tools; thank you Superkalle, Legolijntje & Eurobricks for a wonderful contest; and thank you reader/viewer for the visit.

rjg173, there is a quaint appeal to the LDD screenshots, but with a little doctoring, I think the image presentation could be made even more appealing. I've gotten some interesting effects using LDD screenshots and the free program paint.net (available for download at getpaint.net). Simplest thing I've done with paint.net is take my LDD screenshot and apply the photographic blur effect to it to soften it. That effect also applies an antique brown tint to the image. Might work nicely with your theme? Another vote here for BlueRender. I can't believe how fast BlueRender is working on my Atom-powered tablet, and the results are very good.

Looks great! Would love to see it work in real life. 99% of what I build starts in LDD, but when I get around to building it for real, 99% of them change. Sometimes, it's just something that doesn't look proportionally right-on in 3D stereo-vision, sometimes it's non-existent parts, or just a physically impossible build. This looks like a solid design that'll work from LDD-to-real-brick with no problems. Good job!

Love the compact size of this; It's so deftly done with an economy of parts - it doesn't look like another one of those super-dense, overbuilt AFOL builds that must have a detailing greeblie in every nook and cranny. Good job!

Superkalle, THANK YOU for making that LXF bill-of-materials. I read 318, but did not appreciate it until I saw them on my screen for the first time; I couldn't help but audibly say, "Wow!" And a BIG thank you to the LEGO group for pushing this out, too! I know there are champions and backers of LDD in the LEGO Group, but it must be difficult for them to get funding for LDD when LDD seems so far away from direct sales. But, I mean, LEGO model builders that work for Merlin and the Legoland parks use LDD, LDD (Hollywood version) was an essential too in the production of The LEGO Movie, and while I don't know for sure, there's got to be some other internal engineering build for LDD reserved for the official set designers. All of my builds start with LDD, and nearly all of them I build in real-life, eventually. So, my use of LDD definitely results in the consumption of real LEGO brick. For me, LDD does drive sales, it's just way down the food-chain, perhaps where LEGO doesn't care? :(

Yes, the legs and arms are a bit spindly. As presented above, in the step-by-step assembly instructions, the SAMoSA arms, in particular, are generally too long for most applications. But it's LEGO, and easy to change the size to suit the build. It's a eye-trick or optical illusion to make them look more naturally proportioned. Sometimes, LEGO is a bit of an impressionistic art, like comic-books or black-and-white line art. You just give the audience a suggestion of a shape, and their eyes and brains fill in the rest of the detail. I'm working on a Star Wars Episode VII Rey speeder using this formula for the riding figure. I've made her arms one stud shorter...kinda. The hands and wrist area for Rey are mostly hidden behind speeder structure. I'm relying on the viewer's imagination to accept that the Rey figure is holding onto some kind of handlebar.

S.P.E.E.D.E.R. (Straddling Pilot Echoing Equine Disposition Ergo Rider) Here's a sample recipe to make a more realistically proportioned human rider figure that can straddle a sci-fi/fantasy speeder bike or motorcycle: S.P.E.E.D.E.R. (Straddling Pilot Echoing Equine Disposition Ergo Rider) by SPARKART!, on Flickr. Some of the connections are tenuous single-stud assemblies, so this isn't really aimed toward playability, but more for giving a sense of scale to a model. LEGO Bat-pod by SPARKART!, on Flickr. CHIPS - Central Headquarters Imperial Pursuit Squad by SPARKART!, on Flickr. LEGO Rey's Speeder on Jakku by SPARKART!, on Flickr. I hope the assembly instructions are useful and spark some creative applications. Thanks for checking it out.

Looks a million times better. GREAT JOB! It's more a faithful scale model than a child's toy. Really would love to see more of this magic, thank you for sharing it!

I like what Andrew Lee says, "To an AFOL, no LEGO piece is useless." I loved the planet pieces, New Style Astromech in LEGO by SPARKART!, on Flickr. Star Wars R2-D2 Ralph McQuarrie Concept by SPARKART!, on Flickr. One of my back-burner projects is a Marvel Comics Micronauts Homeworld LEGO model.

I'm not a Porsche fan, not a Technic fan, but if this car came with those stickers, it would be a must buy for me. In that camouflage, the LEGO Technic looks more like an art piece than a toy to me. If the camouflage stickers definitely are not included, I hope the car is released in black. A label maker like a Brother P-touch could be used to make some interesting sticker designs. Pics of this real car are from here.

LDD is my favorite LEGO editing tool. I don't make anything in LEGO without sketching it out first in LDD. And LDD had such potential! These animations are just LDD screenshots: The rezzing in was just taking pieces from hidden to transparent to solid colors. The whole panning around was just by clicking on the rotation arrows for a frame. I can imagine someone making whole movie sets from LEGO and telling dynamic, entertaining, animated stories just using LDD screenshots. Just not with any more new pieces, now...

What makes me think the Y-Wings had the main mission? Because the main mission was to destroy the Death Star. The Death Star was coming to crush the Rebellion once and for all. The star-fighters were given the mission to prevent that, by destroying the Death Star before it could get into firing position (presumably the planet was a bit too big for the Death Star to blast through). When you have a mission that important, you send in your best, most effective team to do it. I joke about Red Squad, because they make an easy target. With tongue firmly planted in cheek, Red Leader was over-aged, Porkins was out-of-shape, Biggs lacked conviction (deserted from the Imperial Academy), Luke was an inexperienced bush-pilot, and Wedge was a naysayer (Colin Higgins) and coward (Denis Lawson).

Neato, this looks nice. I like Luke still sticks out, being just a back-country bush pilot. Ever thought about how Luke gets put into an X-Wing? If you think about it, the Y-Wings are the fighters that had the most important mission, destroy the Death Star. That was the main mission. The others were just there to provide cover and distraction. I imagine the conversation... Rebel Tactician: "General Dodonna, we've analyzed the plans provided by Princess Leia, and have formulated an attack plan. It will require a diversionary attack force" General Dodonna: "Use the overweight, overage pilots in Red Group for the diversion." Rebel Tactician: "We've been able to piece together a few more X-wings from recovered and rejected spare parts, we could give those to Red Group, but they're a little under-manned right now." General Dodonna: "Then fill those ships with with whatever cannon fodder you can find! I heard we have a few Academy rejects, that Darklighter, for instance. And didn't a few stray dogs follow the Princess home? See if any of them can fly." Later, the Rebel Tactician finds our hero... Rebel Tactician: "Hey, hey, there! Nice job with the Princess saving, getting the droid and plans, uh....Nuke is it?" Skywalker: "Luke..." Rebel Tactician: "Well, Duke, how'd you like to help out some more? We've got a big meeting in about 20 minutes, we'd love for you to swing by. There will be coffee and donuts, too!"

Looks good! It looks like he's smiling under that helmet. I would be.

"acceptable"? Wrong a-word, you must mean, "awesome". The realization of the sketch is on-the-money, looks terrific! The only thing I'd request to see is some small ships or cargo or activity in the docking bay to give it some life. The scale of the conning tower/overlook assembly makes the ship feel BIG, but a hangar with something in it would suggest busy activity, which suggest the support infrastructure, housing, repair workshops, diagnostic labs, etc. which would mean the ship is really BIG.