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LennyRhys

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  1. LennyRhys
    This is an interesting read. Despite my most recent MOC I'm usually more interested in building functional MOCs that would fit more into the advanced Technic category. I agree with the statement that Lego will always have crippling restrictions; it is a plastic kids' toy after all, and there's only so far you can take it. Speaking as somebody who enjoys model building not just with Lego, I'd say that if you start to look at Lego's failings and misgivings, you will eventually lose your love for it. It is a toy (a very advanced and exciting toy, indeed), and you need to embrace that if you are to enjoy the building and playing experience.
  2. LennyRhys
    I've got Lego from as far back as the 1970s, so I'm sure some of it is very rare indeed. Haven't bought a new style Technic set (yet!) so don't really have any of the aforementioned pieces in this thread.
  3. LennyRhys
    Such a sweet model!
  4. LennyRhys
    Hahaha Thanks for the compliment! I've almost finished building the model in MLCad - just a few pieces to add here and there, and of course the engine too. I spent some time today experimenting with lighting in POVray and this is what I managed to accomplish: four lights total, each at a different intensity and position. I have one light for each wheel to show off that nice texture! Some settings: 2560x1600 (16:10 custom resolution) Antialias_Threshold=0.3 Radiosity_2Bounce max_trace_level 15 area lights generally 500, 500, 10, 10 This took a while to render, maybe 20 minutes, and that's with 12 CPU cores @ 4GHz.
  5. LennyRhys
    Fantastic review. There seem to be a lot of new parts with this model which have very specific applications. The suspension is really nice, as is the steering. I would definitely consider buying this model!
  6. LennyRhys
    Thanks LegoWarBoys. :) I'm not sure how many hours this has taken, but it's been a lot of hard work for sure! I'm almost finished now... just need to build the engine, patch up the side, and then model the chain for the back. I thought about putting in the flex hose at the articulation points but I want to be able to re-position the model for renders so I'm leaving it out for now. This render was done with different lighting settings from before - instead of using area lighting, I used the radiosity macro. With some tweaking this could look extremely realistic.
  7. LennyRhys
    And I'll leave it here for now - updated LDraw and POVray and the difference is astonishing. Can't wait to see the completed model in this light, and it'll be so easy to change part colours!
  8. LennyRhys
    A small update - I've started the laborious process of building the Monster Miner in MLcad and I'm about 1/4 of the way there. At this stage I'm doing some very simple refining and simplifying of the build, trying to reduce the number of elements where possible, and I've done a quick render in POVray to see how it will look when finished. If I have the time (and the determination) I might go all-out and put the model into Maya and make a small animation.
  9. LennyRhys
    This is impressive. LOVE the animation and the transitions you have used. Very professional looking.
  10. LennyRhys
    I think it's a bit of a stretch to say that Model team sets lacked functionality (and indeed to imply that they were "Technic" sets). I think Model Team sets were some of the best sets Lego produced because they came with the biggest variety of elements and the models also had good functionality borrowed from Technic sets, predominantly the steering. I got Model Team set 5510 for Christmas around 1990 and I absolutely loved it - the parts combinations were very clever and the model had great functionality, great playability, was fun to build and looked quite advanced for a Lego set. I reckon that with careful planning and consideration, Lego could successfully re-lauch (or revamp) Model Team.
  11. LennyRhys
    I agree with the above - using Technic elements to build a model without functions would be silly. Even the Technic Star Wars sets had functionality, but nothing advanced or particularly interesting. On the off chance that Lego would do something so ridiculous as to release a Technic set with no functionality, I wouldn't buy it.
  12. LennyRhys
    Thanks for the continued support and the feedback - keep it coming! The white version is getting a lot of approval and I'm having some thoughts about ordering the parts I'd need to make the loader in white. In fact, I already have a few of the more specialized parts I'd need (e.g. the 4x4 round plates). I wonder how a machine like this would look in Octan livery? I smell a plan...
  13. LennyRhys
    I'm still waiting on my 50mm lens to arrive (probably won't get it till Monday/Tuesday) but I did get another flash to use alongside my Yongnuo 460. The new flash is a Yongnuo 560 II and it's virtually identical in power to a Canon 580 EX. Bargain for £30! As I'll be using the 460 as a secondary and for fill, I decided to make a small softbox for it. Here are the results: And this is a quick test using the 460 as a key light with the softbox high camera left, flash at full power, f/8, ISO 200. Not bad in my book. Will be perfect for fill at f/13. :)
  14. LennyRhys
    I always buy for the kit. If I need parts, I buy parts from bricklink, which I have been doing for 10+ years now. When I think about it, I haven't bought a new Technic kit for a long time. I usually buy preowned from ebay, and more often than not it's kits that I wanted in the late 90s but didn't get!
  15. LennyRhys
    ^ Metering is not really the problem when photographing white subjects; espeically in a product-photography-type environment, the lighting needs to be absolutely spot-on because white is notoriously difficult to expose correctly. If the lighting isn't appropriate, the image will leave a lot to be desired. One rule of this type of photography is that a single light source can't illuminate your entire subject; only part of it. Reflectors help, but only to an extent. A typical studio lighting set-up will have three lights minimum (for portraits you have your main light - key light - and then a lesser light for fill, and a third light to highlight detail, usually the hair)... for product photography, it can get even more complicated than that, depending of course what the product is. Small items like Lego models might go into a light box, but this can often give a very bland look to the image because the lighting is so diffuse and undirectional. I plan to take some photos of my other models over the next week or so and when I do I'll post the results and also my setup & process.
  16. LennyRhys
    Thanks everyone - I'm glad you all like the building techniques. I'll post some new photos soon, and I'm also working on an inventory for the set so that I can find out how many parts there are. I'm hoping not more than 1,000... preferably a lot less! Here's a photo of the Monster Miner compared with the Lego Technic Pneumatic Front-End Loader (#8459) which was the very first set to feature the large 18x10 bucket. :)
  17. LennyRhys
    The best way to photograph Lego is to have at least one speedlight (flashgun) and, preferably, a radio trigger & receiver system so that the flash can be used off-camera. I used to work as a photographer and I used Canon 580EX-II flashguns remotely...however they are powerfull enough to be bounced and can produce satisfactory results on-camera. The benefit of using remote flashes is that you can be very particular about directing light to specific parts of the subject that you are photographing, and the intensity of each light source (key light, fill light etc.) can be manipulated to achieve different results. Bounced light can't be controlled so easily. Long exposures on cheaper cameras can result in noisey and grainy images, which is why the speedlight approach is preferable - you can use a relatively high shutter speed of 1/200th of a second and the exposure will be fine. I did the photography for my Lego MOC with one flashgun fired into a softbox, a silver reflector (well, a roll of silver foil!), and some white paper for the background. With some editing in Photoshop it's good enough to pass as a reasonably decent product shot. D3200 handheld, F/9, 1/200, ISO 200, off-camera flash & silver reflector, edited in PSCC:
  18. LennyRhys
    Thanks LEGO Guy Bri! :) I have created a quick mock-up in Photoshop of what a white version might look like... I think I actually prefer it to the yellow, possibly because mining machines are often white in real life.
  19. LennyRhys
    Hi everybody! :) I'm new to the forum and wanted to share my latest MOC, and in doing so I hope to start a discussion on the set that I've designed and I'm sure that there will be some really interesting dialogue as a result of this. To get something out of the way (and quickly), this set is my very first Lego Idea and as of today it is live - please support it if you think it has merit as a potential Lego set! Monster Miner / Wheel Loader And now, some reflection on the process that led to this model and some thoughts about Lego in general! I'm almost 33 years old and have been mad about Lego for as long as I remember. I love to create things with Lego, and for about 25 years now it's always been Technic-style diggers and cranes, sometimes other construction vehicles, all with functioning gear trains and realistic movements. I'd say that this set I'm sharing here today is the culmination of between 25 and 30 years of Lego experimentation and prototyping. and I just feel that every aspect of this set has "clicked" (pardon the pun) and I'm so happy finally to be able to include a little bit of everything in one big, imposing set. My thinking on Lego today is that there are many sets which don't look very Lego-like (certainly in the MOC realm), and I'm confused by that. Why conceal the medium that makes Lego what it is? With this model I decided to embrace Lego as an educational childs toy (which is what it is, first and foremost), so instead of concealing all the studs and making this more of a replica and less of a toy, I have tried to retain the inherent Lego-ness and sturdy playability of the exterior whilst presenting an equally impressive and more grown-up sort of "model" that would appeal to teenagers and even adults. Basically, it's Lego city, Lego Technic, Lego Model Team etc. rolled into one. Whether that works or not... is up to everybody else! So what do you folks think? Must Lego sets be "niche" products if they are to succeed as merchandise, or is it possible to stretch things a little and cater for more than one market with just one set? To put it another way, I reckon this is the set that I wanted to find in the pages of the 1990s Lego catalogues, especially at the back, in the Model Team section. That's why I built it. Is it just me, or is there intrinsic appeal in this sort of set that straddles the fence delineating different Lego lines? Here are some more pics which may or may not influence your input!
  20. LennyRhys
    This is a wonderful model and it has my full support on the Lego Ideas page. Best of luck! :)
  21. LennyRhys
    Hi everyone! My name is Dave and I'm a proud AFOL with decades of Lego building and playing behind me, and hopefully ahead of me too. I've left it far too long to join the online Lego community so I'm now making up for lost time. I have a few pics of older MOCs to share and I have also recently submitted a Lego Idea (pending approval) and would really appreciate opinion on that too. I am a huge fan of 1990s Technic sets, which is what I have on my shelf at the moment, and I also have a lot of "loose" Lego which was purchased from ebay and Bricklink for the numerous MOC projects I've had over the years. I still have all these Technic crawler track links sitting in a box... hundreds of them. :) Without further adieu, here are some of my older creations. Hyster Forklift, a large-scale motorized MOC, circa 2012, unfinished & dismantled Demag CC-2800, also large-scale and motorized, completed in summer 2005. And this was produced as a "mock-up" box design for a MOC I made in 2008. As you can see I'm fascinated with construction machines and love to build them from Lego. I actually started to produce instructions for this set but unfortunately I lost quite a lot of them because my HDD died. I think all I have left are the images for the truck that I made in LDraw. :(
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