smoothbit

I'm new to Flickr so I don't know why but they seem to have changed the URLs for all the pictures I've uploaded to them! Maybe they don't like hotlinking, even though I used their Share functionality? So I'll go back and edit my posts that had Flickr images, but if they break again you can see the pictures here: https://www.flickr.com/photos/smoothbit/

I needed to make a Flickr account in order to upload the pictures but you should be able to see them here in the thread without one, are there no images showing up for you? I just changed them to being viewable by everybody so maybe that makes a difference?

[uPDATE 25th July 2015 - I finally compiled a , have updated the video below with the correct timecode.]Dang, that took way longer than I expected. Usually such a model as this would take me ~8 hours to build, I'd do so in an evening while listening to some podcasts or an audiobook. But this time, taking a photo for every piece, it took me five days o_O That's 14-hour days no less, nothing but waking and photographing with a bit of eating thrown in. I had a whole week with my wife away, thought I'd get all kinds of things done around the house, so now I squeeze those things into today. But so anyway, here's a quick video of the rest of the build: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdoiBlpADkA&t=3m34s It's the same form as the previous two but when I've cropped and cleaned up the 4548 photos as best I can then I'll upload a higher resolution one of the whole build. I won't have much time to write more about this for the next week, but I'll try and post little tidbits each day. And, of course, having built the digital model for real, there are a few final tweaks to make ;)

Sadly I underestimated how much light I needed to light the scene and overestimated the quality of my iPhone 4's camera, so even the original 2592x1936 photos are all fuzzy and grainy. I'll do some mass cropping and color correction with Photoshop once I'm done with the upper floors but unfortunately there's just not much more detail to see. As for the idea of leaving the final builds on screen for longer, that's a good idea, I'll make that change too. Thanks, that worked well, though not with HTTPS YouTube URLs for some reason.

Thanks again for your feedback, I've posted the videos I've made so far in the thread about my MOC. 2969 bricks down, only 1475 left to go!

[uPDATE 25th July 2015 - I finally compiled a , have updated the videos below with the correct timecodes.]I've been working non-stop these last few days, placing and photographing each and every brick, one by one, and it's taking far longer than I expected :O I've completed all the sub-builds and also the ground floor and garden, they total 2969 bricks. Tomorrow I'll photograph the final 1475 bricks, that will be the first and second floors, the attic and the roof. But so let's not wait! Here are all the sub-builds: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdoiBlpADkA And here are the garden and ground floor: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zdoiBlpADkA&t=1m50s These are both at 15 frames per second but is that too slow? Should the LEGO move faster? EDIT1 - Does anyone know how to embed YouTube videos rather than just link to them? EDIT2 - Thanks to Artanis I for explaining the MEDIA tag, I also needed to use HTTP rather than HTTPS YouTube URLs.

Only when you see MOCs like these? ;) There's much more to come in that vein! Now that I'm building it for real it's even better than when I was designing it, I just stare slack-jawed at how cool it is. The garden looks like a mini version of where I used to play! I tried searching for other people who've done such things but phrases such as "childhood home in lego" just return people reminiscing about playing with LEGO as a child. So you should definitely build your own!

Thank you very much. I originally intended to only build the house itself, with no furniture or garden, but then once that was finished it looked too plain. I considered adding the garden as a permanent attachment to the ground floor of the house, of using three 16x32 baseplates, but then I thought it would be too long to be structurally sound. So then I added it using technic pins instead: That's exactly what they are :) As you can see in the original sketch above, the house originally had a flat roof and where those trapdoors are there used to be skylights above the bathroom and stairwell: Then, in the early '90s, all the houses got sloped rooves added and the skylights got turned into trapdoors. The staircase from my sister's room up to the attic was one my dad built, that it would be easier to get up there.

Thank you very much. I'll detail the compromises I made in converting from the real world into a LEGO model but I too am happy with the likeness. I live in Germany now but I grew up in England, Milton Keynes. When they were designing the town, and Fishermead in particular, I think they were very idealistic: Hey, I just noticed, that guy on the right looks like my dad did back in the '80s!

Yep, I made an account and it seems to be working fine. I'll add more over the coming days but that's a good idea about the Street View, here's what it looks like now: A bit more run down since I left but at least Google took the photo on a sunny day :)

Man, that was too much stress! My own fault for leaving it last-second, of course, I spent an agonising minute hunting on Flickr for where to Upload the image for my micro build :/ So though I entered the text and the LDraw file at 23:59, I understand if the image itself is disqualified as it was edited in to the post at 24:01 ;)

It's a miniature version of my entry to the free-build contest :) micro.zip

As the subject says, here's my childhood home in the form of a LEGO model! I started work on it quite a while ago and was prompted to finally finish it by "LDD/LDraw Contest 2014: Build your dream home". I entered it into the "Free-Build" and "Micro" portions of said contest. I wanted it to fit in with LEGO's official Modular buildings but 16x32 was not deep enough, so I made the house 16x48 and then added a garden of the same dimensions too. From left to right: The garage that my dad added to the house that he used as his workshop (he fixed washing machines, dishwashers etc.) Downstairs toilet Hallway and stairs Kitchen Patio Garden Stepping stones Cherry tree Birdhouse Shed Bench In addition to my own memory and some old home videos, I found a post on Iqbal Aalam's architecture blog very helpful as it contained photos and original floorplans. Here you can see the first and second floors: Clockwise from bottom right: Balcony Living room Stairs and hallway wardrobe Parent's bedroom Sister's bedroom (with stairs to attic) Hallway with wardrobe and airing cupboard My bedroom with computer Bathroom (with shower curtain rail) Here's the attic (with pool table) and roof itself: The roof includes some extra-rare 1x12 tan bricks, necessary for the stepped pattern! The houses were modular in pairs, each one being a mirror image of its neighbour. So though my model is just the one house, here's what it looks like with the mirrored gardens: And so then also, I made a 222 piece Micro version to complement the 4,444 piece Modular one! I'll be updating this thread over the next few days with more pictures, information and a stop-motion animation of the actual build. Until then, feel free to peruse the LDraw files and ask me any questions you might have. house.zip micro.zip

NOTE: Sorry about this, I just found out I can only attach 100KB files in total, where I had assumed that was 100KB per file. So the next 5 images and the LDraw file will appear as soon as I find somewhere to host them :/ NOTE2: It's still 23:15 GMT right now, yeah? The deadline is GMT not BST? ~~~~~ Here's the house I often dream of, most likely because I spent the first fifteen years of my life living in it :) I wanted it to fit in with LEGO's official Modular buildings but 16x32 was not deep enough, so I made the house 16x48 and then added a garden of the same dimensions too. From left to right: The garage that my dad added to the house that he used as his workshop (he fixed washing machines, dishwashers etc.) Downstairs toilet Hallway and stairs Kitchen Patio Garden Stepping stones Cherry tree Birdhouse Shed Bench In addition to my own memory and some old home videos, I found a post on Iqbal Aalam's architecture blog very helpful as it contained photos and original floorplans. Here you can see the first and second floors: Clockwise from bottom right: Balcony Living room Stairs and hallway wardrobe Parent's bedroom Sister's bedroom (with stairs to attic) Hallway with wardrobe and airing cupboard My bedroom with computer Bathroom (with shower curtain rail) Here's the attic (with pool table) and roof itself: The roof includes some extra-rare 1x12 tan bricks, necessary for the stepped pattern! Finally, the houses were modular in pairs, each one being a mirror image of its neighbour. So though my model is just the one house, here's what it looks like with the mirrored gardens: And here's my LDraw file: house.zip Please step through and see all the details I couldn't explain in just six images. For example, it is made of exactly 4,444 pieces! Also, the four copper pieces are stand-ins for pieces that don't exist in as official LDraw pieces and the radar screen should be a computer one. Finally, here's the topic where I will be posting more information: [http://www.eurobricks.com/forum/index.php?showtopic=94542]

Since "April 15th at 23.59 GMT" would be in ~24 hours from now, I'm hoping I still have time to write up my models and enter the free build and micro contests. I'll check in the morning!

Does this competition end in a few minutes or in one day and a few minutes?

Stop Motion (meaning no-hands-magic-building-itself) is my preferred form, but I'm not sure of the best way to do it. I definitely don't want to have to stand up and manually press the shutter button for every piece but I don't have a camera that has a remote shutter. I tried looking for a Mac+iPhone app combination that would let me take the photos using my iPhone's camera via a single keypress on my Mac but I couldn't find anything that looked like it would work. Does anyone know of such software? Since I have a video camera I may as well leave that recording anyway, I'll balance it on some books as my tripod will be busy holding the camera. It's an interesting idea. If I do time-lapse instead of stop-motion then I think I will do this for the sub-models and then slot those into the appropriate places.

Hi, I have two questions for the "Free-Build" category: Can one of the six images be an animated GIF of the house building itself, brick by brick? Can that animated GIF be made of photos of the model being built for real? Or should it be screenshots/renderings? I should be building my house for real this coming weekend, is why #2 is even possible :)

Next week I'm going to be building a 4000+ brick MOC that I've spent the last two years designing in LDraw. I'd like to record the building process so that I can post it on my website and I have four ideas of how to do so: Use a still camera to take a photo each time I add a single piece, then stitch them together at 30 frames per second into a 2.5 minute video, no hands or arms visible Use a still camera to take photos at regular intervals, then stitch them together, my hands and arms sometimes in view Use a video camera to record my hands building the model, then speed up by many factors Use a video camera to record my whole self building the model, then upload in all its real time glory What do people think? What are your preferences for watching builds? Do you even like to do that kind of thing? Also, can anyone recommend any builders who've posted particularly good videos?