paupadros
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Everything posted by paupadros
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Project completed! Thanks for taking a look at my builds and leaving feedback! The link to all of the free instructions on the first post!
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The eighth (and last!) model is out! Herengracht 152! The Model: Much like Singel 2, this model originated from a scout on Google Maps. This time, I was looking for a final model that ticked the following boxes: it had to be a corner (I wanted two of the eight models to be corners), it had to be two buildings (I wanted to try my hand at two buildings in a single baseplate) and it had to be colourful (I was tired of building in brown and tan! ). This building ticked all the boxes. Real building: If I had used the same format that I had used for Prinsengracht 2 (the other corner model), there was just no way I could fit the whole thing. So, I went two studs larger on the side with the two façades. This makes it asymetrical, but it causes no real trouble besides that. As for the building itself. It's a SNOT fest again. Because of the narrow 4-wide façades, I had to attach them via the exterior walls and with a bracket core in the inside of each floor of each house. In order for it to fit with the other models in the series, I had to enlarge the black building a smidge. This meant adding the extra floor of windows on the first floor. The consequence of this is that the black building is half-a-plate (1/6 of a brick) off grid vertically . This means that from that point upwards, the two buildings are pretty much independent and can't interact with one another. Oh well. As for technqiues, there are fun ones all the way around. The funkiest technique is around the gables. They are upside-down in some areas, attached with nipple bricks, daleks facing forwards... Anyway, a fun mess. With the previous buildings: Hope you like it! You can check out the model in the Mecabricks 3D Viewer. I think it's very interesting to see how things are built and with the 3D viewer you can zoom, hide pieces to see the insides... =================================================== Instructions: Herengracht 152 ===================================================
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The seventh model is out! Singel 2! The Model: This building originated from a scout I did on Google Maps to find some cool buildings to recreate. This one sits at the north entrance of Singel, probably the most famous canal in Amsterdam and just has a presence that none of other buildings that I found had. It has a large step gable and a very beautiful combination of brick, white painted wood with details in black. The original is a café called Café Kobalt. I instantly knew I had to recreate it. Real building: One of the first things I realised is that there was no way I could fit that building in the 6-wide format I was doing. I went for 8-wide. Maybe 10-wide would have kept the proportions even better, but the piece count would have tripled the others easily. Because of the extra width, one of the next decisions I made was to make it a straight model instead of the corner unit that it is. I didn't want it to be even wider. The build itself was the toughest in this series and one of the hardest I have ever done. To achieve the details, I had to used SNOT for everything. The ground level (whilst a complete SNOT fest ), is roomy enough a allow for a fairly simple build. The first point of contention were the black windows on the central column of the building. Originally, the brackets were not going to be the windows. They were just temporary as I built the windows and would later on be concealed. The thing is that I tried everything that came to mind, but the space is just too crammed for anything to fit (plus, 5/6 of a brick tall). The only decent solution was the temporary one! So I went with that one! The second point of contention was the gable. As the bell gable gets smaller, there is less and less room to fit to connections to make it all work. Up on the gable, the connections get very finnicky and borderline unacceptable for my standards. Still, I reckon it's challenging but sturdy enough for me to accept it. Honestly, it's as good as I was going to be able to make it. With the previous buildings: Hope you like it! You can check out the model in the Mecabricks 3D Viewer. I think it's very interesting to see how things are built and with the 3D viewer you can zoom, hide pieces to see the insides... =================================================== Instructions: Singel 2 ===================================================
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The sixth model is out! Prinsengracht 211! The Model: After having successfully recreated Prinsengracht 2, I thought that I might have a go at another famous house from the city (funnily enough from the same canal). Building this house was attractive for a couple of reasons. First, the architecture is quite different from any of the previous that I had done as the original was designed as a wearhouse originally (despite it currently being housing). Secondly, it has more floors than any of the others, while it had to fit in a similar height to the previous. Fianlly, and probably, the top reason why I chose it: that triangular gable. I was sure that if I put my mind to it, I could make it work. Real building: The first challenge was the gable. It is triangular and has a white trim. To me, there was only one option in that scale, the 2x2 triangular tile. That's why it dictated the whole design. The colour scheme, for instance. The original quite obviously would translate better to Dark Tan, but that piece is only available in regular Tan, so I had to build to whole thing in Tan. The toughest part was figuring out a way to add that white trim. Nothing really worked in such a crammed space. After many attempts, I came up with a novel use of quite a surprising piece to achieve that. Can you guess what? This one! If you want to take a full look at how it all connects, go check the instructions or the 3D view. The rest of the building was basically using the same technique from Delft Blue Shop to achieve the windows (I think I only changed a 1x1 plate for a 1x2 jumper in red to simulate the shutters), and making a very low ground floor to fit all the windows. If you search the original, you'll see how it's a row of a few of these houses side by side. By building a couple of this model, you could definitely achieve that look. With the previous buildings: Hope you like it! You can check out the model in the Mecabricks 3D Viewer. I think it's very interesting to see how things are built and with the 3D viewer you can zoom, hide pieces to see the insides... =================================================== Instructions: Prinsengracht 211 ===================================================
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The fifth model is out! Spuistraat 334! The Model: This model has a bit of a funny background. I started building a ground floor without anything in particular as reference. I basically took the already finished Flower Shop as using the same format, I built the black ground floor you can see here. I liked it quite a bit, so I went on a bit of a scout to find a building to put on top of it. I looked around all the places I had visited in Amsterdam. The tram that went from out hotel to the Central Station stopped at a square called 'Spui'. It always sounded funny to me (don't know why). Looking around, one of the buildings just for some reason screamed 'Amsterdam' to my foreign eye. So I chose that one. Real Building: The original was a corner, but since I had just done one, I chose to omit the side façade entirely. Since I was already modifying quite heavily the reference, I bent it a bit more. Instead of the 3x3 grid of windows, mine has a 2x2. Sure, building the 3x3 grid is definitely possible, but it might end up a bit cluttered. My solution is a lot simpler and more readable. I did recreate the gable with a fun use of these Technic pieces for the side bit and a 1x2 Technic brick with a connector hole for the center. Technic really is a good ally for us System builders . I am not a fan of using the same colour scheme from Prinsengracht 2 for this one, but there are only a handful of colours that are realistic for Amsterdam and Medium Nougat + White just happen to be a very common one in the city. With the previous buildings: Hope you like it! You can check out the model in the Mecabricks 3D Viewer. I think it's very interesting to see how things are built and with the 3D viewer you can zoom, hide pieces to see the insides... =================================================== Instructions: Spuistraat 334 ===================================================
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Thank you! I would love to see your version of Prinsengracht 2! I'm guessing it's in minifig scale? I wouldn't go as far as to say that I overspent time looking for buildings, but I also did spend my little while looking around and picking what to build.
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The fourth model is out! Prinsengracht 2! The Model: When tackling the fourth model, I wanted to build another sculpture that I owned. There was a bit of an issue though. They either were Tan/Dark Tan which I had already used as main colours for buildings or I just couldn't get to work (admittedly, there were two models that I pitifully failed to recreate in Lego bricks ). So I turned my attention to real houses. These had two major issues comapred to models. Firstly, you can get a sense of space with physical models that you just simply can't get with images online. And secondly, models are already an interpretation of a house (i.e. the superfluous details simply aren't there, so you can just pretty much recreate everything). Since I was going for a real house, I wanted to go for a house I had seen in dozens of Amsterdam postcards as well as travel guides. A quick seach revealed that it was the townhouse on the corner of Prinsengracht and Brouwersgracht. In real life, this house is a café. Real building: The first thing I had to figure out was how to adapt the format I was using to a corner unit. This proved to be quite easy and soon enough I was building the house itself. In order to get the windows how I wanted them, I had to get a 1x1 brick with a stud on one of the sides to do the corner, which meant losing a brick of façade space. While I could get around that, there are a few details I had to omit, such as the variable window size on the middle floors. My favourite part of the build is the gable/roof area. Of course, this area is the one that gives the building its flair, so I had to get it right. I took the gable from the Amsterdam Internet Café and adapted it to this building. Tying the roof on the back to finish the building was quite fun and surprisingly tough. The window on the gable is attached with an Erling brick which means that it has a small (1/6 of a brick, I believe) ledge on the back. To make the roof "jump" over that I had to use the slipper and the upside-down slipper which is kind of funky. With the previous buildings: Hope you like it! You can check out the model in the Mecabricks 3D Viewer. I think it's very interesting to see how things are built and with the 3D viewer you can zoom, hide pieces to see the insides... =================================================== Instructions: Prinsengracht 2 ===================================================
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The third model is out! The Flower Shop! The Model: After the first two models were based on sculptures we brought back from Amsterdam, I wanted to build another. Most of the sculptures we took home with use, though, were tan in colour. I had already built one in Dark Tan and another in regular Tan, so I didn't want to repeat myself. I turned my attention to a magnet that had a colour close to Olive Green as the main façade colour. Inspiration behind it: The toughest part to get right in this one, similarly to the Amsterdam Internet Café, was choosing the details to represent and the ones to cut. Because I had already set the scale, I had to build this to fit with the previous builds. In order for it to work, I had to cut some of the detials. One that I was particularly struggling with was the row of red flowers on the top of the building. I just couldn't get them to look decent in the space I had available. So, I chose to not feature them. Having made this decision, I basically enlarged the white section on top, altering the proportions of the original. This gave me the opportinity to add the yellow flowers to represent the Flower Shop, which was a nice touch. With the previous buildings: You can check out the model in the Mecabricks 3D Viewer. I think it's very interesting to see how things are built and with the 3D viewer you can zoom, hide pieces to see the insides... =================================================== Instructions: Flower Shop ===================================================
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Looks nice! Certainly feels more akin to the older batch of modulars but that's still a "feel" that someone today might go for intentionally. I like it!
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The second model is out! The Amsterdam Internet Café! The Model: Once having finished the first model, I turned my attention to another model that we had brought from Amsterdam. The second one I attempted first was one that was kind of funny to me. It just looked like two buildings on top of each other. There is the white section which uses the ground and the first floor (probably made from wood) and then it suddenly turns into a tan building with a step gable. Inspiration behind it: Unlike the Delft Blue Shop, this one was not as challenging from a technique point of view. After all, the ground level technique is almost identical than the one I used in the Delft Blue Shop and the step gable is just made from jumper plates (although very effective should I say! ). It's only a bit more technical in the lowermost tan sections. The underside-facing jumper plates look more impressive than it actually is. They're just lying on a plate that is attached to the model with Erling/headlight bricks. The windows on top also use the Erling brick and two plate/brick pillars on their sides attached to the Erling. With the Delft Blue Shop: You can check out the model in the Mecabricks 3D Viewer. I think it's very interesting to see how things are built and with the 3D viewer you can zoom, hide pieces to see the insides... =================================================== Instructions: Amsterdam Internet Café ===================================================
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The first model is out! The Delft Blue Shop! The Model: At the start of this project I was very keen on recreating the models we had brought back from a trip to Amsterdam years ago. We brought 7 houses and 3 magnets, which made me believe that I chould choose a couple of them and call it a day. The one I attempted first was my favourite out of all of them: the Delft Blue Shop. It has a beautiful dark tan façade, speckled with all sorts differently shaped windows, and crowned by a gorgeous bell gable. Inspiration behind it: In Lego bricks, that proved a little trickier. The number of small windows meant I had to build entire floors on their sides and deal with the geometric issues that that causes. But without a doubt the hardest part was designing the sides of the gable. Using the swirly brick seemed like an obvious choice for this detail. But in microscale, even a compact piece such as this one suddenly is too bulky. On top of that, the only way I could make it work was by placing it upside-down. Placing it upside-down is not the issue, I’ve built entire rooflines upside down before (uhmm). The problem here was that I had no place to anchor the upside-down subassembly. I had to either compromise the façade or the roof. Trust me. I was about to give up, no. Honestly. Literally at the last moment before calling it a day up and settling with a sub-par solution, I thought of the one thing that could save me. The flag piece! It had just the right size to cover the anchor of the subassembly and serve as a roof at the same time. And some miracle it had been moulded in Dark Tan. You cannot believe the relief. You can check out the model in the Mecabricks 3D Viewer. I think it's very interesting to see how things are built and with the 3D viewer you can zoom, hide pieces to see the insides... =================================================== Instructions: Delft Blue Shop ===================================================
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The LEGO Houses of Amsterdam I'm doing something a bit different this time! =================================================================================== Instructions: Delft Blue Shop Amsterdam Internet Café Flower Shop Prinsengracht 2 Spuistraat 334 Prinsengracht 211 Singel 2 Herengracht 152 =================================================================================== 1. Delft Blue Shop 2. Amsterdam Internet Café 3. Flower Shop 4. Prinsengracht 2 5. Spuistraat 334 6. Prinsengracht 211 7. Singel 2 8. Herengracht 152 -
Very nice @Giacinto Consiglio! The composition on this one is stunning and the pastel colour palette gives it a very airy and light atmosphere. The simpleness of the townhouse over to the left also contributes to that atmosphere. I think that with this one you really have mastered the art of having the right amount of detail. It feels complete but without it feeling cluttered. My favourite part would be all the different cornices distribuited around the building. Whether that is the support for the balconies on the light nougat townhouse (using minfig legs?) or the horns on the topmost cornice or the very smart transition from the neck of the tower to the top of the tower. That said, while I think that the composition on the two structures on the left is impeccable and the red building over to the right looks a bit out of place (although that is not necessarily bad), I must admit I love the little details on the red building the most. The smart use fot he bonnets as awnings, the transition using microphones (I think?), the gorgous windows and the whole upper section. I also really like the paving on the back and under the tower. Btw, do you have any reference of where the inspiration for the build came? I'd love to take a look at the originals! Oh and that "Vendesi" sign is just like the ones I remember from when I visited Florence Overall, a top-tier model which might just be my favourite from you.
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Gotta love that transition to the tower! I think you pulled off the colour scheme really nicely.and it suits the Lego version probably better than the black/white colour scheme of the original. This kind of building is usually one that I tend to avoid for all the bulbous shapes and odd transitions throughout but I'm really impressed with how you've made it look so effortless. I also think most of the creative liberties work in its favour . Superb job Eero!
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Looks really neat I really like the stained glass windows and the whole tower composition.
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Modular Building Sets - Rumours and Discussion
paupadros replied to The Jersey Brick Guy's topic in LEGO Town
Thank you! It definitely has had a major impact. Once you have a good grasp of what has already been done, innovating is much easier. On that second paragraph, I 100% agree. A lot of modulars have great techniques or great colour schemes or great composition, but knitting a great all-round modular is actually pretty hard. Sometimes, your best bet is just to have a couple of buildings in mind as inspiration that have a similar flair and try to knit their feature together. Obviously, there's a "Legoification" that happens along the way, sometimes a direct translation of the actual architecture and sometimes inspired by the pieces themselves. Articles such as these take a lot of time to put together (it's writing, correcting, all the graphic work and for the HispaBrick article, even translating...) but I intend to to articles on specific parts of a modular (i.e. ground levels, cornices...) and maybe another about colour schemes. It's always a bit of a challenge as I'm aware that most of my design choices are not well received by many (especially the bold colour combinations) so I still need to figure out how to put it best so that it doesn't feel so "this is my way and this is the only way" because it's definitely not. I might also do one where I invite other fellow modular designers for some questions. Thanks! -
This an excellent post! I'm commenting so others can see it
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Modular Building Sets - Rumours and Discussion
paupadros replied to The Jersey Brick Guy's topic in LEGO Town
If anyone is interested, I wrote an article for Brickset on how Lego achieves good compositions on their modulars and examples of how I use composition for my own models: https://brickset.com/article/57168/the-composition-of-modular-buildings Btw, (late) happy new year everyone! -
Sexy Saide for sure!
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Having the foot tapping was kind of just a coincidence. I was getting the strumming to work and just realised I could get the foot to tap along without many more major contraptions. As for Revolution 1, I was just getting bored doing the photoshoot (I did the pictures for Gone Fishing and this model at the same day, which took about three hours in total) and played some music. When shooting the video for this model, Revolution 1 was on and I unconsciously started turning the crank at the same tempo. So, a funny coincidence . As for sound in the video, you know how pesky YouTube and copyrighted music tend to be. The White Album is really good. Favourite song? Thank you! Honestly, as this one is an enclosed box, I bet you could fit it inside somehow.
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Jamming is the sister model of Gone Fishing and were meant to be published one day apart but work got in the way . This model has a similar mechanism to Gone Fishing, but also to my Tintin Moon Rocket I built earlier this year: it's basically a camshaft that activates two sliders, one for the hand movement and another for the foot tapping. In the video, you can see how it works exactly. Fun fact, while making the video I was listening to Revolution 1 by The Beatles (despite there being no sound in the final video), and he's playing at the same tempo! You can try to sync them up if you're remarkably bored. Gone Fishing and this model were built simultaneously and out of the two, the former was my favourite in the design stage. From a technical standpoint, Gone Fishing is the more risky design composition-wise and the one with the more daring techniques. That said, once I started building both models, Jamming became my favourite. It's way less dull than it seemed in the computer drawings. Because this is set in a domestic environment, it was much more fun to populate with details. The crystal ball is borrowed from the 2015 Big Bang Theory set, but the plant is an original design I'm really proud of. Same with the guitar, the new 1x1 brackets allow for a really cool guitar design. Hope you like it! Sister model:
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Thanks Robert! I'm also very tempted to get Pursuit of Flight if it gets made through the Bricklink programme Definitely! It would detract from the sleek appearance but it could surely work.
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Grandfather and grandson on a mission! After seeing my previous kinetic sculptures, I was asked to build a new sculpture for one of my cousins. He and his grandfather are avid fishermen, so I thought I would try to recreate one of their adventures in Lego bricks. For the mechanism of this model, I took one of JK Brickworks' MOCs as inspiration (https://rebrickable.com/mocs/MOC-16540/JKBrickworks/fisherman-kinetic-sculpture/#details). I found their original design a bit chunky, so I took the (rather simple) mechanism and built this model around it. Here's a little video of the model in motion: The colour scheme of this model is something I'm really proud of; especially how the Earth Blue sea and the Red boat come together. The composition was a bit tricky as well. Originally, I was going to have both figures sitting, but, not only was it not feasible without extending the boat to canoe lengths, but the composition felt a bit flat. Having the elder figure standing allowed for the shorter boat and for the white of his trousers to spice up the composition a bit more. The seagull was added to balance out the standing figure and as a counterpoint of the engine on the back. Adding the water plants further accented an otherwise rather dull part of the build. To make the water not seem heavy, I left the bottom of the build uncovered, although that led to other major issues in making the whole thing stable (I had to add the front support as it kept falling! ). All in all, this is a very well-rounded build that I'm very proud of! Looking forward to seeing your comments! Have a nice day!
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Narrow buildings are a great way to make modulars different. That said, the green one here is pretty bad. I think that windows are the best way of opening up small spaces. Bilbao has a ton of narrow buildings solved with windows https://www.flickr.com/photos/arnimschulz/albums/72157603275637378. I took them as inspiration for a six-wide, the same width as Lego's, but in my humble opinion, made it work a lot better: With that I mean: 1. It's definitely not unrealistic. 2. I think that the green building is the weakest part of the whole model and could've been done better.