SlyOwl

Hehe, really nice and funny animation! It's a bit grainy; I'd recommend taking the underground animation under your normal lighting conditions and then just darkening the images on the computer, to stop the camera doing all its crazy auto-adjust functions. I'm no expert on special lighting photography, but it's what I do when I try to do dark photos. Keep it up!

I'd assume the caveman hair/beard is one piece - there's no obvious division, and beards can't rotate as far if they're put onto the neck. Hmm... disappointing to be sure (not as bad as the spade and pickaxe in a barrel, but that was kinda necessity for an all-round pirate set)... brown and tan parts are always welcome, but true, two tables is a bit on the cheap side. I must say though, the creatures thus far have been great - a monkey, crab, croc, clam! I'm also loving the figs, a great array, particularly for those with few modern pirate sets.

Sounds like you got some Tyco there, which has that irregular plate/brick width system. I got Raanu; my first Bionicle, but very welcome nonetheless! We had loads of fun at lunch playing with it. The price limit was only £3-5, so there wasn't that much scope; I'd have liked to have taken part in the £10-15 one my friends did aswell, but I missed the sign up for it. Ouch!

As I recall, reflective chrome is done by dipping elements into the stuff, instead of spraying it. It's quite expensive to do and difficult to achieve a smooth coat, from what I gather. Chromebricks sell gold and silvered custom chromed bricks (these rims look like they're from there), and also do requests. It may be worth contacting the owner if you're looking to do your own. BTW, On Flickr, click All Sizes above the pic, then copy the image location

I think this belongs better in the Pirate Forum, so I'm moving it there! Nah, I like the use of the imperials as a later army, which fits the uniforms better after all. A clean, simple design, with good attention paid to colour balance between tan, red and brown. The 3x3x1 slopes are something I really should buy at some point, probably in black. I recall Deino's quest for them in old dark grey... I always admire your photo editing, although in this case I can tell the flag is fake

Am I the only one not wanting anything this Christmas? It's not that I've got too much Lego - I've got enough to MOC in my style, but only around 15,000 bricks overall. I guess it's the lack of decently priced sets; the MMV would be ideal, but still feels excessive for the impact it would make on my MOCing - essentially just accessories and some more brown/tan. I haven't actually asked for anything - although my parents did get my the Pirate Advent Calendar, a complete and welcome surprise, and reasonable value for a set that size, so I don't have to feel bad about wasting money. I'm expecting an impulse set from our Maths class Secret Santa, but that's about it overall...

Mmm, I got 3 MISP in my stocking last year, even though they were released ages ago I opened them, as the value isn't that high (although if I'd realised Shadows was on the hunt... ) I've used the shields now and then, and have used a couple of the weapons in early stages of MOCs, before removing them due to more aesthetic alternatives; and I used a sticker from the Danju fig in this MOC. The fig itself is shockingly bad, though.

Thanks all! I never realised this one would be so popular! I bought them off Bricklink in order to brasso into plain tiles... but I kinda like them. I can understand people's dislike of them, as I have the same feelings to an extent, but I keep saying to myself I might as well use them before I brasso them... Not very strong at all; just the one rubber band. It's an old band though, so it would be stronger with a new one. Not a technique I'd like to use much without further reinforcement. Master Builder... why do you think I build all these so quickly? Yup. Now to get it off... Goat food - straw or something. I couldn't find any sand green hands off the hoof for grass... and I've got none of those rare normal green hands... yet *green army men* My history is a little hazy... I don't think the Dissolution was a violent process at all anwyay... Skimping on school work? Maybe... My damily are all behind me... and my friends look at it wryly, but they're generally impressed, or accepting at least. It was kind of random - I built them long before the inside of the building (the arches/number of pillars I could build determined that). The door and flower bed played a role in their positions, but it was largely ad-hoc. Woah, Draggy, you're on fire! I've answered some of your other questions above, but here's the rest - a) That was quite a problem - getting the butresses high and detailed enough, whilst not going into the windows! b) Whitewashed seemed to pretty common back then... and I also ran out of grey! C) It was originally only going to be based around the complete window there, so the altar was in the middle. But then there was the problem of the absence of the opposite pillars, and the whole building looked a bit small, so I bigged it up, pretending there was a whole building twice the size there. But the original interior furnishings remained... It could be a side-chapel/altar, yes.

The results are in for the Small Division Voting...

What I love about the small category is how it normally comes down to the subject matter and execution of the idea, rather than the amount of bricks people have... Pellaeon - 1 JDHinten - 2 Jansued - 2 Mariann - 2 Voting is now closed!

SMALL Division WINNERS 1. Jansued 2. Lorentzen 3. JKool Jansued, Lorentzen, please PM Bonaparte your addresses to get your prizes! You all get trophy tags too Congratulations!

Weird. No, seriously weird. But I love it Gotta get me some more octopuses!

Check out Kris Kelvin's Brick Castle now!

Wowza. That's immense, mate I love the overall blend of brick and wood, especially the towers. The trees are great too. Nice to see dark tan as a "base" colour; I would complain that the angled portion isn't that well integrated, but it could be a man-made earthwork. Similarly, the whole thing feels a bit "square" - the castle is built on a cuboid rockface, surrounded by a right-angled moat, with a right-angled path. If you'd extended the whole thing by say 16 studs in the side with the trees, you could have built a more rounded rockface and moat. Not so much a criticism as a point of view, that; the squareness gives it a Lego-ish vibe that I love. The castle itself is removable; is there anything underneath? I'm beginning to see a pattern in your raised-level MOCs

Henry VIII disbanded monasteries, friaries and nunneries in England between 1536-1541, essentially to take their money...

Ouch... that must be heartbreaking Nonetheless, building it back together again should be an "interesting" experience - perhaps you could build it into a car instead?

That looks great, Curtis! Nice timing and sound effects too. My main complaint is that when one fig is moving, the other is mostly stationary; e.g. Brickbeard slashes, and the Imperial guy just holds his sword in one place, waiting for the blow to come...

Oh yeah, and 6 of these... The Jack Stone video was just a compilation of the clips that could be found on the Lego website at the time, so nothing too special. I'd have preferred a Star Wars one along the same lines; the classic Han Solo Affair video would have been perfect

Some calendars have 25 days, but most have 24 now (I guess it's because 4x6 is more aesthetically pleasing than 5x5). You don't get a window for Christmas Day itself. Nice little cannon today

Thanks again all Hmm... not much, as I wasn't really "feeling" this MOC as much as Drahomira and Medieval Fayre - for some reason I don't like it as much as those two... Scarily much time building. I do about an hour per weekday, and a couple more on Friday/Saturday/Sunday, so it must come to 10-15 hours per week. That's at the moment though - without the CCCVII on, I'd spend much less time building. Yeah... I really should just let it float around sometime

Hehe, I had a video of that I got free at a Club event at Windsor. "When there's a problem, there's a solution!" "Can do, will do, done!" I never liked Jack Stone at the time, but he's growing on me a bit now (despite the intrinsic AFOL hate of everything Jack Stone). I might have to pick up a fig or two some time (probs the pirate ones) to do a MOC with...

Thanks for the review Tell me, does the paper get tatty about the edges; bent around the bricks? Also, from my experience, sharp Lego corners can scratch coloured/printed card easily - does/could this happen? I'm unlikely to get this set, but may just modify my own hole punch... Sou desu ne!

Thanks all I try to build sturdier these days (and it also helps my collection has grown), but when building at speed (and not doing interiors), fragility just happens... Hehe I missed the FC Contest deadline though, whilst waiting for BS to come back, as I didn't want to flood my Flickr with photos. Naturally I agree; it was difficult to find a thinner mast without making it either fragile or parts-intensive (or using the prefab masts), so I had to go with 2x2 rounds. The boat was originally going to be larger, so the mast fitted in better there. It's just a 6x14 plate with tiles not pushed down properly on it; the strongest of all the roofs in this MOC, and stable enough for most people, I think. 1. About a week. I would have spent longer (to build interiors etc) and built larger, but for contest restrictions. 2. The tiles in both of them are simply not pushed down properly onto a plate underneath. Strong and simple. 3. Just balanced in this situation. In the past, I've used some technic angle connectors to hold the boat down, between the bottom of the boat and the water. 4. Dunno - orange sludge?

Worth getting if you haven't got many of the other sets (like me). Mermaid, castaway, wench are the minifig highlights, but the rest is also worth getting, like the swordfish. It does fit - 1 fig, 2 accessories; 8 figs in all -> 24 days.

I think it's the standard now - epaulettes are now a piece that you get extras of, like gear sticks, 1x1 round plates, cheese slopes, technic pins and bushings etc. I got a spare pair in my Soldier Impulse too.