Henchmen4Hire

The TRU in Van Nuys, CA had a bunch of series 9 and 10. It was already picked over though, I kept finding the same couple of figures, half the series was missing. The Target near there had Series 9. No Galaxy Squad polybags at either store :[

What? Someone other than me or the weird guy next door made an 8-wide! Hurrah! Spiffy truck, good job snotting the proper shape for the cab. The 8-wide to 9-wide transition looks good. Things I would change: -Shorten the wheelbase a little -Reduce the gap behind the cab to 2-studs -Either pop out the tank by another stud or redo the area to make it more accurate. Also, what's up with the photoshopped mannequin in the corner? lol

Those blueprints make me think you should try incorporating more Bionicle pieces, at least to make the shell look more interesting, because all the big wedges right now just look kinda "blah" lol

Giving collectors something to crow smugly about is exactly what rare figures are for. Blame the people at the LEGO company if you don't like it, not the customers. Don't hate the players, hate the game. And we aren't talking about natural resources or oxygen here, it's just useless colored pieces of plastic. There's no real problem or cause to complain if every LEGO figure collector in the world can't get this figure, rare items are simply part of the game when it comes to collecting. "Taking candy from a baby" doesn't apply here. The people who are actively hunting for the figure and finding it are burning way more calories than the people who don't want to look as hard (and so don't have the figure). The saying here should be "Working hard to find candy that the baby won't/can't work hard to look for." I also don't think the people at LEGO HQ had kids in mind when they decided to go forward with this rare figure idea. More likely they had the rabid AFOLS and parents (with wallets) in mind. I'm not actively searching for the gold figure (I think it's ugly), but if I should happen to stumble across one I will sell it in a heartbeat to pay for some bills and classes. I'd rather go dig ditches for a few days and make $600 than spend all that time and energy feeling up packets and arguing with customer service over shady practices. That said, I think people who actively hunt for rare figures just to resell them at outrageous prices are scum, simply because they aren't collectors, they aren't a part of the friendly and mildly competitive community. They're just thorns in every collectors' side. If someone resorts to shady return tactics and feeling up 50,000 packets to get the figure, but they actually want it for their collection, then I tip my hat to them because that's unparalleled dedication lol

Really? I think the bottom-left one is the ugliest lol When I get them I'm going to push the technic pins in more so that the slots slide past the trigger on the nozzle, might help with the shape a little. The ones with the ribbed part and clips I need to make by hand because it can't be done in LDD, I just positioned them so they moreorless resemble what they should look like. I'm sure they'll look cool once made, and if not then they get reused for robot parts lol

I can usually tell a render by the trans pieces, they always look "off". Maybe too perfect or too clean, whatever it is it always stands out.

Lol thanks! Going to order a few nozzle pieces to make sidearms for my Blacktron troops, very simple ideas

What's with everyone complaining about how rare the gold figure is? That's the whole point of making a rare figure, to have it be rare LOL. The point of having a rare figure is to brag that you have a rare figure, if every third person could get it then it wouldn't be rare anymore and having one in your collection wouldn't mean anything, there'd be no point in LEGO making a big deal about it. I'd love to have a Superbird, a castle, and a life-size replica of Red Sonja, but you know what, they're rare and expensive and I can't find them in little packets at a toy store, so I just have to accept it and move on. I hope I do find a gold figure, that thing would pay for the auto mechanic courses I want to take!

It's nice to know that no matter what planet it is or how big the bug is, it'll always die with its legs up xD

That looks like the setting for either the best or worst dream ever lol

Wow, what an amazing penguin!

It has a beetle-ish shape, I think it could look good as a GS bug ship

Got the torsos! I really like the d.bley gloves, don't think I'm going to change them (also, I'm not paying 20 cents per hand to replace them). A little photoshop magic and you can see how they're going to look with black helmets (they were blue). I have more pants with pouches but I have to remove the colored stripe. I'll take more pics once I've dyed all the gear black.

Very cool, it's definitely eye-catching. I kinda want to make a helmet with that ship's design.

Aside from a few useful posts on Brickset, there's no recent topic or tutorial about VHT Vinyl Dye for LEGO on the entire internet, so I'm going to start it here to give everyone peace of mind. I'm waiting for the can to be delivered, so while it gets here I'll start the tutorial with some general info. According to random internet folk, your best bet for getting vinyl dye is online. I can back this up after calling and visiting several stores and either not finding it or having the people working there not knowing what the megabluck I'm talking about. People in Los Angeles do suck though, so maybe they were just lazy and didn't feel like talking to me. I got it for $15 total from Summit Racing. There are a few posts on Brickset in this topic where georgebjones uses VHT Vinyl Dye Gloss Black to recolor a large cylinder piece. He posted a picture but it's tiny (I can't make it larger anyway). I'm going to post large glorious pictures. There is a popular LEGO/Dye tutorial here but they use a different brand that is no longer produced. Still, it's a useful read so you understand how the spray dye works on LEGO. Ignore every review on Amazon about anything ever (except the joke ones, those are good times), especially about vinyl dye. You will learn nothing other than people don't know the difference between paint and dye and no one follows instructions. Dying your LEGO parts is a permanent way to recolor them. It's also a way to save a ton of money by recoloring your current LEGO pieces instead of having to buy new ones. Dying things black always works, if you want to make other colors it's best to start with white bricks. Dying a blue brick red will give you a purplish color. Please refer to your 2nd grade elementary school lessons about colors for more information on color mixing. I ordered some VHT Vinyl Dye Spray - Gloss Black to finish up some Blacktron figures, I'll be recoloring armor bits of various colors as well as many other random piece. How is this going to save me money? I need battle droid torsos in black but those are expensive, averaging $1.00 each. I can buy tan battle droid torsos instead for 20 cents a piece and just recolor them, for an 80 cents savings per torso. Also, there are robot legs and armor that aren't made in black, so there's dye to the rescue. That's it for now!

So what, you're not going to find Mr. Gold in the bedroom! :p

You can either discuss how important LEGO is to you and how you justify the price, or you can remind her who makes the money and proceed to buy two cases.

All I can recommend is don't tell people how much you paid to build it, no one wants to pay way more than what it cost you to make something. Then again, people gladly pay $500 for an iphone that cost $5 to make, so what do I know. Art is another exception, maybe you can work that angle.

That's the model the guy who built the 6-wide version used, I used the Colorado Rocky Mountain version, probably mixed a few details though Next time I'm by San Diego I'll try to get a look at their version though, just to gawk at it in person haha.

Lol, "not too much work", that's what I tell the mechanic when I ask him to rebuild a transmission

The lack of pictures in this topic is disturbing Anyway, it's a weird question but I'd say I made aliens before CMF came out. Just harvest the heads from other toylines like Ben 10, star wars etc. and pop them on a minifigure.

I'll do them for sure if I get paid, especially when people want crazy complicated designs, otherwise I make like one a month lol

Cuuuuute! lol I think the car should definitely be shorter to make the blimp look bigger, but it's well done anyway.

Here's progress on the brick-built version, along with a shot of the Wrecker's progress too. Saving money for another BL order and to get some vinyl dye spray.

Realized my Superbird is about 98% complete so here's a shot with the Barracuda. It's just missing a few bits to complete the interior and a tile or two so I can finally attach the sweet wing. Added a snazzy orange stripe because orange is snazzy lol