ProvenceTristram

A close loved on died tonight, so I decided to try to distract myself by significantly lengthening the hull. Ultimately, I feel like this had to be done - while I was happy with the length of the original, the width had bothered me. This new version is far, far close to the proportions of the real deal.

I went ahead and designed a pelican figurehead. Not *super* happy with it, but I am honestly not sure how it could have been done more effectively at this scale.

Ripped off the top layer to add some sheer (just two plate's worth at the bow and stern). Not exactly sure if I like the result or not. Early 18th century Ketches did not have a great deal of curvature in their hulls... but it was there. I just don't know if it is justified in breaking up the more uniform overall look. Any thoughts?

One more update - I tore it all down a second time and tried to halfway it. Even though this sacrifices a bit of interior space, I like that it's shaped just a bit closer to the real thing, with the stern narrowing just slightly.

I decided to try a different stern. I'm not one hundred percent sure which one I prefer. Opinions are very welcome.

Prototype (sort of; I feel like there's a lot of leeway when it comes to age of sail ships and what we produce in Lego. This is the basic idea, but I wasn't trying to clone it 100%): MOC: Also, one non-Bluerender shot of the cabin interior (the roof is removable) and its organ (what pirate ship is complete without one?). There's also a bunk and writing desk for the captain (neither pictured):

Nothing too exciting, but I did want to share it. My focus was to design something affordable that fit in well with the other ships Lego has produced in the theme (which generally meant a low part count, a very colorful paint scheme, and a vessel that utilized the old pre-formed hulls). The roof of the main cabin can be lifted out, while the hatch grants access to the cannons. There's no great "mystery" to it beyond that... but, then again, neither was there really with older boats like the Black Seas Barracuda and Caribbean Clipper.

Yes, I do hope to bricklink it at some point in the next couple of months. It's only a bit north of 800 pieces, which is really pretty tame for a standard gauge steam locomotive and tender.

Forgive me, but I am going to add a few more photos. I find that Bluerender does a very disappointing job (at least on my PC) with majority-black models. Also, here are some great videos of the real thing(s):

For those of you who would like to read the specifics, they can be found here. Suffice it to say, this was a class of lightly-built American 2-8-0s intended for overseas service during WW2. However, a fair number of them found their way back across the Atlantic to see service in the United States (featuring heavily in Alaska, but also elsewhere). My version is semi-North American-ized, envisioned as potentially a Canadian incarnation of the class, but a few small modification would render it French, British, Polish, or U.S. in a heartbeat. Proto: Model: I didn't bother doing running gear, because if built, it would use custom rods. I also didn't feel like putting the effort into squeezing a motor into the tender, but I am sure it could be done.

The problem is that I try (most of the time) to design things that can be built without spending $1000 USD, or.more. When using preformed Lego hulls, one obviously surrenders creativity for frugality - the longboat hull was a concession to numbers. The funny thing is, I can't even see it anymore. I mean, sure, if I squint, I can tell what it is... but I don't view it necessarily as something Viking. My dad upon looking at it, however, immediately said "oh, Vikings!" so clearly this is a product of me having stared at it for too long :P Basically, I wanted to achieve something that looked sharp and trim (a counter to so many of the pirate-themed Airships you see), but could actually be assembled one day, taking inspiration from some Spanish-American War gunboats. It's by no means perfect (I usually prefer bigger vehicles to have interiors, but no matter what I did to cram in a captain's cabin, it degraded the overall look), but I think for a ship intended to be a close-in patrol craft (rather than, say, a much larger destroyer, light cruiser, battlecruiser, battleship, etc.), it probably works. I am definitely open to criticism, though - I actually tore it apart a few minutes ago to see if lengthening the hull could give me a little more space to play with (it wouldn't; because of how much space the balloons eat up, in order to achieve this same neat fit, I would have to have blown it up by 4 hull sections, and at that point you're probably going from like 1,200 pieces to something closer to 2,000).

Spent all night and morning, starting about 13 hours ago, working on it. I wound up settling on an open flying bridge with doghouses on the ends because nothing else really looked as good, in the end. It's a *little* funky to my eyes, but hell - it's steampunk. Haven't decided on a name yet. Surprisingly, this doesn't have that many pieces, relative to its pretty enormous size.

Better know by her crews as "Thomas the Pain Engine." If you aren't singing that stupid song by this point, I have failed. This is the last one for a while, I promise.

It can move up and down, and it slides 2 studs inwards to replicate recoil.

The model features a recoiling turret, fully accessible interior via liftouts (though I just tore off the parts willy-nilly to show the insides), a rail and car system plus shell hoist, rotating sponson guns (which the minifigures can actually get to), a boiler and engineering area (not pictured, but it's in the rear), bunk beds (again, not pictured, but they are located in the nose). I only did one set of tracks out of the four because it just seemed like too much work.

Thanks! I went ahead and lowered the tracks by one plate level, thus lifting the tank slightly - I feel like this helps the proportions immensely, and also allows for some prototype-accurate strut detailing on the underframe. I plan to build the model - question is: tan or white? The Chaffee wasn't introduced into the European theater until 1944, and it saw its most extensive combat at the Battle of the Bulge (and later in the Korean War), so white might actually be more accurate, even if it probably doesn't look quite as good. Anyone have any opinions? Oddly enough, another possibility is dark green, which I had originally ruled out because I just figured those parts wouldn't exist. Aside from the black gun, it apparently is possible. Sigh. I can never make up my mind on things like this:

Completely rebuilt the front end, moved the turret forward one stud. Now I feel like this is as good as is possible (for me) at this scale.

I know very few people are paying attention to this, but I did want to post a small update regardless. I was very unhappy with the original turret - it was too big, very complex, fragile, and lacked the ability to mount an opening hatch (or minifigure). The supports for it also gobbled up all the interior space... and I like to have usable inside areas because I'm a big kid, and feel like models are incomplete without play features. All of that is remedied with the 2.0 version, which has a lift-out under the turret, a functioning hatch, and happens to be both smaller and - IMO - far more closely aligned to the shape of the real thing.

My only regret with this one was there was no way to do an interior. Prototype: Lego Model:

Nothing too exciting - an M3 Stuart light tank. I tried to keep it close to minifig scale (although I have seen some very nice MOCs of these vehicles which are a bit larger). The turret turns, there's a mount for a Browning machine gun, and the tracks should roll once installed, though I always find those things are better in theory than in practice. Also, it is missing a 6 x 1 hinge plate on each side, which exist (but not in LDD anymore :/). There's room for a figure inside, although he'd have to lean back a bit. Prototype: Model:

I went back and forth on whether or not to post photos of this. It's my first traditional ship ever and... I'm not super happy with the results. And, generally speaking, if I don't like something, I don't put up pictures. On the other hand, I completed the whole thing in about 12 hours last night, so I figured what the hell - it's likely never to be built, so I might as well throw up some renders. Prototype: Model:

But how do people get to the to-- oh, wait, no, I got it: catapult.

So, I built like 4 castles before I settled on one I was really happy with (Blackwail Castle), but considering the time invested, I did want to at least share a few of them over the next few days, as they are never likely to be built. This one - which I never named, so it is simply called 'New Castle' - was based in passing on Berwartstein Castle in Germany (at least the upper portion). In the end, I decided it was too square and way too big - 5,700 pieces without a base. On the upside, it featured a lot of interior details - a full chapel (with Christ in effigy on the cross), a physicians room, wizard's room, kitchen, King's room, servant's room, and council chambers (at the top of the tower). If I ever win the lottery, it would make a nice opposing castle for Blackwail, but otherwise, it's a dead project. The other castle I wanted to share was intended to be the corner piece of a 4-part fortified manor house (in order to keep the price down, I hoped to break a full castle into pieces - what a larf :P). However, it was a bit too derivative of another MOC I had seen (it's different, just not different enough)... though I felt like the exterior scenery was some of the best I have done. These are the Pacific Northwest trees I referenced in the Blackwail thread.

Well, that's another total bust. It's a shame when they release waves that have very low cross-theme potential. One of the nice things about regular waves is that a torso here, or an accessory there can at least be useful elsewhere. But here, unless you are actually planning to host a Lego in-universe costume party, there's very little good that can be gotten out of the figures. In fact, I've never purchased one of the previous "suited" characters for precisely this reason: what good are they? So my reaction to an entire series of them is: GO AWAY.

Situated on the fringes of the Great Flenshly Marsh, a saltwater tidal basin on Pembermile Sound famous for its thick fogs, looms the seat of the Duchy of Tiverton: Blackwail Castle. The fortress can attribute its somewhat grim name to the calls of a local seabird, whose mournful notes are often mistaken by unfamiliar travelers for the wail of a banshee (or so people tell themselves. It is Lego - you never know :P). Lacking a curtain wall, the enlarged keep nevertheless boasts fairly strong natural water defenses, and - probably owing more to its remote location than any other factor - has never been taken in a siege. The castle alone is approximately 3,800 pieces, while the base adds up another 1,300 or so - an exchange I'm not *fully* convinced it worth it (though I do like the marshy part). Exterior shots. The single tower contains a bell and functions (on the top level only) as the access point for the roof. If constructed, I would also add a 4-pole-supported cloth sun-screen to cover a portion of the roof area, but as the 4 beams would just look naked in LDD, I left them out. There's a small fishing/high tide-usable pier to give the marsh some context. As an aside, I have much grander Pacific-Northwest style pine trees that I had built intending to use with this structure, but they wound up looming over the castle (accurately; most of it is only 3 stories tall, after all), and I felt like it reduced the overall impact, so I swapped them out for dinkier specimens: As usual, even though the whole facing-left side of structure swings out dollhouse-style, I had an immense amount of trouble making bluerender cooperate with lighting. Therefore, after a single gloomy photo, I just took screenshots directly from LDD. The result is less dramatic, but at least shows off details. The first (and second) floor features a checkerboard tile base, two suits of armor, three candelabras, a raised walkway, fireplace, kitchen (not pictured, but it's below the white 'house' wing), tapestries hanging from the ceiling, grandfather clock, a spiral staircase reaching the third floor, a feasting table, and a requisite throne. The Tudor-style second-floor wing is home to the castle's resident wizard. The roof here is designed to lift out with very minor parts removal. I tried to make the space look somewhat cluttered, but the effect is lost in this screenshot, since you can hardly see the bed or the book shelf. The front of the top floor isn't really intended to be accessible, but would only require removal of a portion of the roof to get at, so I went ahead and did a (very basic) interior. This is the servants'/guards' quarters, with two bunk beds, a book shelf, and some storage. 'Fun'-unfun (for me) fact - I am so colorblind that LDD's reddish brown looks green to me the entire time I am building a model. Finally, we have the King's (or, in this case, Duchess') chamber/solar (with walk-in closet!). The room features a fireplace, English settee, canopy bed, larger bookcase, and desk (which you can't really see, but is located in the swing out). A kitten has bitten off more than it can chew by cornering a large, black rat in the closet space. I don't much like cats, but I hate rodents. Kill 'em good, Mr. Mittens. And that's pretty much it. As is typical, it is probably too grand a design for me to ever build, but I am at least finally satisfied with the end-product (I've built like 3 other castles since I last posted here that I didn't bother putting up).