King Leo's Summer Palace

This incredible structure is brought to you courtesy of David Lines. King Leo's Summer Palace is very pleasing to the eyes. The reds and greens fit in very nicely with the grays and tans on this piece. The center spire is full of some nice detail (check out the use of dinosaur heads near the top). The best feature, in my opinion, is the little fountain in front of the palace framed on both sides by a curved staircase. What a great piece!

MOC Monday: Don't Look Behind Now!

This mini scene actually made me chuckle out loud a bit because of the pirate rowing in the tiny wooden tub seemingly unaware of the giant black octopus emerging behind him. The scene (created by Antonio Silva) reminds me of the memorable scene in the Disney version of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea when the Nautilus is attacked by a giant squid. I like the use of different colored and jumbled tiles for the ocean, and the red eyes on the octopus are a great touch.

Stay Tuned

I'm really wanting to do some more work and develop this blog, but I've been a little busy lately. All of this is culminating in me being out of the country through next week for a mission trip. However, once I'm back, I think I'll be able to slip into a routine. Here's some of my goals for the blog and my Lego hobby in general.

• Keep looking at other peoples MOCs and posting about design ideas and processes from my favorite creations.
• I'm hoping to start making some MOCs myself in the near future, so hopefully I will start posting about those soon.
• I'm experimenting with making some LDD and POV-RAY tutorials on YouTube. I just find that visual tutorials like that work better than trying to explain them in a blog post.
• and, of course, continuing on with Project 10179.

So stay tuned and I will try to get into a nice rhythm once I'm back in the states.

Simple, but Effective

For today's MOC Monday, I really liked this Simple built U-Boat by MocPages user Lego 4 Life. It only uses one color, but it has very clean and tidy lines. I love the way the whole pieces comes together but doesn't need a ton of pieces to do it. On top of it all, there's not a stud to be seen on this piece from most angles. So unless you know what you're looking for, it looks more like an actual scale model and less like a Lego creation.

Project 10179: The Beginning

Millenium Falcon 10179

I've been slowly building up a random collection of bricks and used/new sets. I don't have a lot of money to spend, but when done right, having a Lego hobby can actually pay for itself in some ways. So in addition to buying used sets and bricks, I've been doing a little selling on side using eBay and BrickLink (there's a link to my BL store in the tabs above).
To add an additional element of fun to my hobby/business, I've started up a little side project which I've dubbed "Project 10179". Lego Star Wars fans will know the number right away as the set ID of the Ultimate Collector's edition of the Millenium Falcon. This is a monster set. At 5,195 pieces it is the second largest set ever put into production by Lego, and definately the biggest Star Wars set. My goal is to eventually buy/collect all the pieces needed to build this monstrosity, but with a net cost of $0.00. A complete set goes for anywhere between $1000 and $2500 on eBay and Amazon, but buying pieces individually or scavenging them from used sets, the cost goes down signigantly.
So why am I doing this? Mostly for fun. I just want to say that I've actually built this thing, kind of like a Lego pilgrimage of sorts. I'm not trying to build a perfect set from all original parts so I can resell it for thousands, so I can cut corners here and there. For instance, the instruction manual (at a whopping 300+ pages) can be downloaded for free as a pdf from the Lego website. So how far into "Project 10179" am I? I currently have 326 pieces. I'm 6% of the way there! Stay tuned for progress updates.

MOC Monday

I'm starting a new feature on the blog, MOC Monday, where I share one of the many fantastic creations on MOC Pages and other fan sites that just really struck a chord or caught my eye this week. This week is the lovely Anselm Castle by Mark Erickson. The first thing that drew me in on this design is the greenery. Mark uses a variety of tree designs and green pieces to make a very lush scene outside the castle. The castle itself appears to use every shade of gray, both old and new, to give it's walls a varied appearance. Inside the castle is a great representation of a market square. Once again, Mark uses several different colors to show a well trodden dirt ground in the market place. To top it off, the gentle slope leading up to the castle, the moat outside the wall, and the way the castle wall slightly angles just lends a great deal of realism to this creation.

Acronyms and Jargon

Any internet community that shares some interest in common will eventually form their own insider language and jargon. The Lego fan community is no exception. You don't have to look around the forums much before you start asking, "What is an AFOL?" and "Why is this person complaining about the use of BURPs?". There are several references online for the many terms you will come across, like at Brickipeda or the Brothers Brick blog. Below are some of my favorites, as found on Bricklink's great reference.

The following are acronyms that are used in discussions about LEGO:

• AFOL - Adult Fan Of LEGO
• ALE - Adult LEGO Enthusiast
• BURP - Big Ugly Rock Piece
• CRAPP - Crummy Ramp And Pit Plate
• KABOB - Kid with A Bunch Of Bricks
• KK - Knights Kingdom theme
• LUG - LEGO Users Group
• LURP - Little Ugly Rock Piece
• MISB - Mint In Sealed Box/Bag LEGO set
• MISP - Mint In Sealed Packet/Package/Polybag LEGO set
• MOC - My Own Creation
• PaB - Official LEGO "Pick a Brick" service
• POOP - Parts which can be made Out of Other Parts
• S@H - Official LEGO "Shop at Home" service
• SNOT - Studs Not On Top building technique
• STAMP - STicker Across Multiple Parts
• TLC - The LEGO Company
• TLG - The LEGO Group
• UCS - Ultimate Collectors Series theme
• WTB - Want To Buy

The following are terms that are used in discussions about LEGO:

• Clones - Building blocks which are not LEGO brand, such as Mega Bloks.
• Dark Age - Period of time during which a person is not interested in LEGO.
• Juniorization - Describes inclusion of highly specialized parts in LEGO sets instead of several already existing elements which can be assembled into the same configuration. The idea is to make it easier for younger children to build the sets but it is criticized by AFOLs since it is difficult to use these parts when building alternate models and MOCs.
• Stud - Small round peg which appears on top of most LEGO parts and is used to connect to other LEGO parts.