Gideon

I really like the tan/blue combo with all the details Good job adding lighting in some places too!

Thanks! And thanks for all the feedback along the way See you in 3 weeks! (Most WIP projects must be "slowly" for someone who can crank out 50+ high quality MOCs per year )

Lovely build with a lot of well-placed animals! I really like how you've managed to create so much "suspended action" in such a limited footprint. My favorites are the jumping fish (still can't really see how that is attached...??) with the water splash effect and all the sand green details around the window and door (need to get some of that unicorn "GoH" shield!). A small feedback on the presentation however is that I think the build would have "popped" better if photographed against a darker backdrop, now the seagulls and white helmets almost get lost against the background. (I usually alternate between a white and a gray Ikea blind depending on the color of the outline of the build, but for my lighthouse build I had the same problem as my biggest backdrop was white )

The figbarf is probably the best thing in this revamp, I love how both the palette of minifig parts has evolved over the past 10 years! It's of course also great to see your skills today in combining them and presenting them with super crisp photos too

Impressive build! I'm amazed at how much details you've managed to fit on such a fairly limited footprint Great detail too with a direct connection back to Book I, well done!!

More likely the guano from the birds gets harvested regularly for use as fertilizer for the rich horticulture inside the city! Good question, the lower part of the fortress is fairly hollow but the upper part and the octagonal section is quite sturdy to support its size. The plates of water are also quite hefty. I'll make sure to put it on the scales at some point

Thanks! If you come to Skaerbaek at the end of September it will most likely be displayed there, perhaps even with some more of the harbor built by then It is however way to big to ever travel over the pond as its predecessor got to do (albeit that was a one-way trip for it) I really see your point about the missing seagull droppings, realized that already when taking the photos but with not enough time to correct by then...but I should correct that for future exhibitions!

Great Lighthouse of Barqa The Arkbri River has been a major trade route through the heart of Historica since ancient times. Where the great river meets the sea, the port city of Barqa is ideally positioned to connect the inland river shipping with the sea traders, making Barqa a major hub for trade between all corners of Historica. To ensure a safe haven for the valuable shipping, fortifications have been guarding the harbor of Barqa for centuries. Over time this has grown into a strong harbor citadel. To guide seafarers into the port, it has been a long tradition to keep a fire burning on the top of the citadel and this platform has been built higher and higher over the years, becoming one of Historica’s most prominent lighthouses. This lighthouse was however heavily damaged in the elemental attacks at the culmination of the Revolword war, and it also fell further into disrepair when the trade along the Arkbri river was disrupted by the Kaliphlin civil war. As the trade resumed when the hostilities ceased the prosperity returned to the city. The city council, led by chancellor Gideon, could therefore commission a major restoration and expansion of the lighthouse. Its peak now soars higher than ever before, dominating the Barqan skyline. In daytime, the new whitewashed upper section is the first thing seafarers spot sailing into the Arkbri estuary. When darkness falls, the fire - burning bright thanks to being fueled by Kaliphlin naphta - is now visible farther out to sea than ever before. Great Lighthouse of Barqa, as seen from the Arkbri estuary. Great Lighthouse of Barqa, as seen from inside the city. (To be continued...) The upper balcony of the lighthouse is an excellent platform to keep an eye on all maritime traffic passing in or out of the Arkbri estuary. The harbor side of the lighthouse, with some roofed stalls for storage or fishmongers, next to the docks. One of the main offices for the tax collectors of the port of Barqa is in this fortress, protecting the not insignificant share of the wealth passing through Barqa which is mandated to remain in the city. Chancellor Gideon, always in a hurry, has visited the fort. Probably for a meeting with some tax inspector manager or some other bureaucratic duties, quite far from the life of a wandering warrior he lived 10 years ago… As the citadel has been expanded over time, only some small portions of the original rock it is built on is still visible. Some persistent seagulls however still try to claim their ancestral home. This is a re-interpretation of the lighthouse I built for Challenge II of Book II: I also built the orginal lighthouse to display at Brickworld Chicago 2014, but since I had to dismantle it (to keep the bricks safe from losing clutch power in a hot parked car during our 2 week roadtrip following Brickworld ), it was one of my shortest-lived builds. However, that build is also one of the most special in my AFOL journey, since Brickworld 2014 was my first convention abroad and the first time I got to meet some other GoH builders in real life. Special thanks to @Rogue Angel who helped get my build a spot at the EB tables, where I had a great time haning out with the EB people there over the weekend! One of the reasons I chose to revisit this build was that I wanted to improve on the blocky “brick” arches over the windows. I also really wanted to try my hand at more advanced water building at a large scale, which I hope is an improvement over the original build’s poured round plate technique. The water in the new build is based on a 3-layered technique, with different shades of blue in the bottom layer, trans-dark blue/trans-light blue/trans-clear in a middle layer and finally trans-light blue on top. This enables both a better sense of depth of the water and mixing “new” colors, to achieve a better gradient. I also added some waves at the end, with trans-clear plates as foaming water next to the shore and a pattern of waves out on the open water, at an angle against the “grid”. Building several layers of small pieces creates quite a lot of stress on the plate, so as only building it on a baseplate creates a quite substantial “banana effect”. This was counteracted by having a full Moduverse plate underneath the water to provide additional rigidity to keep the water flat. The corner turrets were a particularly challenging part of this build, especially the domes. I borrowed the concept of using the dinosaur tails for a dome from @adde51, but figured out myself that if I staggered their mounting points it was possible to create such a dome with only 8 studs diameter. Thanks to the tile revolution in recent years (particularly the 3x3 curved tile finally filling the gap in the rounded tile lineup!) I also managed to completely tile the interior. Not that anyone will notice when exhibiting the build, but I know that it is there Interior of one of the corner turrets. This is also intended to be the first section of a long-term project with more parts of the maritime side of Barqa being built - and hopefully also being able to be integrated with some of my older builds for future exhibitions. While the original lighthouse basically exhausted my supply of tan and medium nougat, this only scratched the top of the tan bins in 2023… Lighting by LifeLites, “candle flicker” diodes by the entrance and a eLite Advanced kit (the size of a 2x4 brick) controlling 8 individual diodes in a fire pattern at the top. Film of the fire at the top of the lighthouse. The battery box is hidden inside the city wall for ease of access:

Great entry! As usual I'm super impressed with what you manage to put together in just ~3 days

Thanks! But the credit for the large amphora should go to @Legopard, as I think I borrowed this technique with the Scala flower pots from his excellent Venice 1486 build: https://www.newelementary.com/2016/11/the-new-black-jonas-kramm-brick-vader-venice-1486.html (Itself a treasure trove of more build techniques well suited for an Age of Sail city too!)

Midjourney, AI service accessed through a Discord bot. Free to try but unfortunately I’ve run out of my free computational time (and no longer have a subscription either, but might restart after the challenge is finished)

Thank you sir for keeping in line with this excellent tradition! But I suppose it also means no excuse for not making an effort in at least 2 categories

I’ll remember it if/when I renew my Midjourney subscription! (Won’t happen before the end of the GoH challenge however, got a lot of building to do…!) But it is free for anyone to try a few prompts as well.

@Umbra-Manis Thanks for the input Starting of course with some enchanted pumpkin pies! Ruins of lost greatness Purple Fantasy city can have many interpretations, but here are a couple: A young white-haired mage: (Midjourney still has some problems drawing human hands, but for someone who dabbles in...powers that maybe should not have been stirred...maybe it's not that out of place ) Some other results: The orcs riding frogs were tricky to achieve, but here is one decent result: ...mostly ended up being merged by the AI to be more like frog-orc warriors. But maybe a bit inspiring too? Attack of the desert mummies: Underground library:

I only have another day of unlimited Midjourney access this time (might renew my subscription later after the 10-year challenge is finished). But I feel like old Nocty really should be given some concept art too, so give me some input what I should try to generate for Nocturnus! I'll update this post with the generated pictures later. Ping to the old Nocty crowd: @I Scream Clone @Exetrius @Carson Haupt @Lord Vladivus @MassEditor @Jorrith @halixon @The Maestro @jaapxaap @Angeli @Cij Daoke @Dr Rod @Captain Nemo @Blufiji @-Sunder- @Jacob Nion @Dr.Cogg @Umbra-Manis

Tried to make some concept art for Varlyrio also before my Midjourney susbscription runs out. I've based most of these prompts on my understanding of the contents of the Varlyrio wiki page. Illyria was tricky for the AI, perhaps not so much to make suitable Mediterranean Medieval/Renaissance enviroments but to not have them spammed with modern day tourists and other details by the AI And if you don't mind the electrical cables and parked bicycles that the AI kept adding: Dwarven dwelling in the Coluna mountains: Inland sea: Plantations/orchards: Quarry: Some concepts for the inhabitants of Varlyrio. Dwarven artisans: Leander merchant in Illyria Orc raiders: Minotaur pirate:

Generated some more southern Kaliphlin concept art ("fortress in the style of an Egyptian temple"):

I think I liked the last fortress picture of a more Egyptian style fortress the best, it fits best with my thinking of the south Kali architecture. Maybe I should be a bit careful with the “high detail” and “intricate” in the prompts 🙃 The AI also seems to tend to interpret “castle” more like “château” than fortress. But the Midjourney pictures in general (except for the swamp château) is definitely inspiring me to build a bit more ornate Kali builds, rather than the nougat brick and tan rough-hewn stone style I tend to end up in.

Fantastic swamp! And great storytelling

Lovely build and interpretation of the card from the game! The overgrown fence and the rounded tiles as irregular beams in the facades are probably my favorites here (Different rules for parental leave despite the names of the countries regularly getting mixed up, here we get 10 days at a kid's birth...and each parent is expected to take at least 90 out of the 480 days parental leave in total, which is in addition to the first 10 "father days")

Great figbarf and presentation! (I really want to stick to yellows, but every so often a post like this makes me want to reconsider the direction of my figure collecting )

Great revisit, with a very recognizeable style but definitely showing a level of polish in both build and presentation that demonstrates the progress of the builder over the years

No bandits spawned on command...but it created some suggestions for the setting at least It was interpreted as more of the "stately home" kind of castle, but with some more fortifications maybe a good inspiration?

No problem! It's great to have something useful to create when practicing the prompt crafting A couple of more upscales finished now: (I'm doing something wrong here, they seem to get more blurred/painted the more I scale them up right now)