Kai NRG

The wagon by itself looks really good, but having it actually open with a puppet show inside takes it to another level! Using the back side of profile bricks was a great idea too!

Thanks! And yes, the jury is still out on the Challenge results but it shouldn't take too much longer!

Never heard of wind power used to drive a pump but that's a really neat idea! I like the way you did the sails too, simple but it sure looks the part!

Really cool office buildings, you nailed the colonial style! The tower looks great and effective use of yellowed bricks!

Great tower, very recognizably in your Mesozoic style! The double dome is pretty neat and nice use of that crown sticker under the balcony!

Wow! I thought you guys and gals killed it last year but you outdid yourselves with this one! If I could have been there just to see one display this would have been it, stunning work. So many details to take in - I love the GoH tomes (of course ), the giant cauldron, the ornate shelving, hanging plant, the sign, the chimes... A brilliant collaboration!

As I mentioned on Flickr, you did a good job of incorporating the vibrant color of the carrots into this MOC! And as I didn't mention, that's a lovely collection of pigeons and I really like your use of the new three-leaf pieces to create vines along the low walls!

Thank you! Thanks Titus! I took the basic shield idea from Exetrius. I'll probably be using it again in future GoH MOCs!

A lot of details to like about this MOC - the bold autumn colors (especially on the ground), the slight angle of the building, the use of hands, to name a few!

You got me there! Kali is bigger, so it was easier to have more going on there... plus it was where I started and set the scale for the rest. So not necessarily purely guild bias... Thanks!

Thanks en_zoo! Actually, I wasn't thinking about the story mood at all when I decided where the sun should be in the sky. In that sense the sunset might be better because it conveys the end-of-the-old life which I am building toward. You've given me something to think about though as far as looking at story MOCs in the context of their broader stories instead of just what works best for the one single MOC. Hmm! Here's hoping the next installment will make it in time to be part of the Summer Joust!

Wow! Massive castle here, I really like the layout with the pointy angles sticking out of the central keep. The transclear water looks really good too, it has a cold feel to it that seems very Mitgardian!

Great fig combos and nice selection of animals too! Where does that "doll" nanofig come from? It's really cute!

Personally I'd consider that since GoH is kind of its own subcommunity, we can have discussions among ourselves that would be of a considerably different character if we took them outside of the subforum to a dedicated thread; and it's not like this thread is one piece of consistent on topic discussion (what's on topic discussion in a new member guide anyways?), so if we want to discuss pieces here why not? If Kaliphlinians wanted to discuss pieces in their thread there wouldn't be any issues right? or if a couple builders asked me on one of my build threads about pieces and we got into a discussion that'd be fine so what's special about this thread? Case in point, I didn't know horses are available on B&P and sure, I may have discovered this some other way in days to come or maybe not (on the principle of lead me not into temptation I don't follow all the B&P developments - which is not perhaps a cause for thanking Grover for bringing them to my attention but we all know the inconsistency of the human heart right?) but the fact does interest me. Now we could make a case for the new member guide not being the best place for general discussion among the GoH community but that's what it's become (I think in previous books there was a dedicated general discussion thread). So I'm not sure we should shut Grover up on this topic, if no one is interested and no one responds he'll get the point and stop posting B&P updates soon enough but if some of us are interested, why not let it keep going? And I'm sure Exetrius wasn't trying to be rude or anything but don't forget the importance of small talk for any community and for LEGO builders isn't small talk about bricks and pieces? Pun totally intended.

A bit late to the party here but I don't know how I missed this earlier! The colors really make the MOC here for me, I love the bright greens, yellow flowers, and red 'shrooms. The forge is great too, and the texture on the tower is really well done although I'm unsure about the black roof... it seems to clash in style. But overall impressive work!

In order to make an edit look reasonable it's important that the original background and the edit color are tolerably close in shade. Otherwise you'll have an odd fade line if for instance you take pictures against a dark background and then edit in a light one. So when I take pictures of a MOC that's too large for my backgrounds, I still take it against a background and make sure that every edge of the MOC is touching the background, but beyond the edge, corners etc., don't matter if I'm going to cut it out. Another option is to simply fill in the corners afterwards. I do this a lot for MOCs that are small enough to fit on a poster sheet or two (for really large MOCs I move up to a bedsheet and that leaves so many wrinkles I always have to cut the whole MOC out digitally). It's pretty easy to use paint to select part of the neutral space on a corner and then stretch it to cover unwanted background corner space. The larger a space of background color you can select and stretch, the less noise you'll get. Occasionally you'll get a line or other imperfection but retouch or an equivalent button on your usual editor should be able to take care of that. So for instance in this recent build I started with this: A bit of touch-up on the brightness/contrast/shadows etc., and then just stretching out the edges with Paint and I pretty quickly end up with this: Now I took that pretty far off to the right because I wanted to do this (yes I corrected the color and cropped it some): The technique of stretching the background really lets you angle large creations with much more flexibility than you have if you try to get a full-background shot every time. Hope I explained it clearly enough!

Lovely spring color you've achieved with the trees there! I don't know what it is but the transition from pink to lavender to a light green on the other side of the tower makes the whole MOC flow color-wise. My favorite part is probably the arch over the door though, very Mitgardian!

The first shot here looks really nice with that light blue background! Great curve on the walk and the vines over it look really good!

Thanks SK! Curves were my favorite part. I need more dark grey pizza tiles. Thank you! Clouds are sometimes hit-or-miss but these turned out nice and fluffy!

Thank you! Thanks Navarre! I wanted to make it actually look like a trophy, thus the rather elaborate base! Thanks! Random inspiration there with the grill tile that came to me while I was doing something totally unrelated! Thanks Grover!

Quite a bit to like about this display! Really nice job on the wedge plate path to the left, and the wood steps on the other side are equally well done. But my favorite bit is probably the little boat; great use of those arches to make a super compact vessel!

Now that is a tiled floor! Magnificent cheese work, I love the dark blue. Very impressive pillar height too and great use of corner tiles to add some architectural design. Revolword's little balcony is really well done too, I especially like the gold hanging off the bottom - not something I would have ever thought of but it really works!

Some seriously impressive lighting here! The hieroglyphic panels on the wall really make the MOC, and I also like the slanted 2x1 tiles on top, great pattern. The strangely wide section off in the back corner looks a little out of place but impressive job on otherwise getting those slanted panels in there without any hitches! I really like the simple sarcophagi too and the broken bits are very convincing!

Yay for some Kaliphlinian entries!

The monkeys have ships of their own? I really like the unusual colorscheme for their vessels and the seagull bomber idea is hilarious!