For the air/wind theme at Brickfair this year, I made a half-pitch of Quidditch at the last minute (i.e. started it at 10pm the night before Brickfair!).
Three Castles
August 30, 2014
brickfair, castle, moc Leave a comment
Here are the three Eilean Donan Castles I brought to Brickfair this year!
I made the big one and the small one previously, of course, but I build the micro one for the minicon in the middle of Brickfair. I was disappointed more people didn’t participate in the minicon, because it’s such a cute idea, to have a mini version of the entire Brickfair!
I added some sheep to the main MOC as well, which are not actual LEGO, so I couldn’t include them in the LEGO Store version of this castle. But any Scottish castle needs sheep!
For World of Lights, I added a light to one of the parts of the castle. I might have done more but my MOC was in an area by emergency lighting and so it wasn’t as impressive as in other parts of the room where it was darker and the lighting could be more dramatic.
Eilean Donan Castle
September 29, 2013
castle, historic, moc 4 Comments
(More photos below)
I’ve been wanting to build this castle for years now, so much so that I had to make it one of my 101 Things in 1001 Days in order to see if I could actually get it done. It was my first attempt at building something that actually exists in real life. Yes, there is some level of accuracy to the movies and books required in Harry Potter MOCs, but in general I’m able to use my imagination to get things to look the way I want them to. As long as I have the essentials mentioned in canon (either canon) I consider it a success. In this case, however, it’s a real building people may be familiar with. Eilean Donan Castle is the most photographed castle in all of Scotland. It’s also the castle used in the first Highlander movie, and one of the castles I visited with my high school best friends during our post-college trip to Ireland and Scotland. It’s a gorgeous castle, so I wanted to do it justice. When I signed up for the October 2013 Potomac Mills LEGO store display, I thought that would be a great kick in the pants to finally get it done.
I ended up procrastinating. The castle was supposed to be done by August for Brickfair, but I didn’t have enough tan pieces then. I ended up freaking out because I’ve never built anything like this before and wasn’t sure what I’d need. I started and realized I’d be good on arches but low on roof pieces. $80 on Bricklink later, I felt confident I’d have enough to work with, but not exactly sure how to start. I built the bridge three times, as that seemed like an easy place to start. I built a microscale version of the castle to get my bearings. But my Bricklink order didn’t come in, so I procrastinated. I got my order on TUESDAY and the MOC was due at the LEGO store on SUNDAY. Yeah. And did I work on it on Tuesday? A little, when I got home from my volunteer job at 9pm. I didn’t get home until 10pm on Wednesday (and I didn’t really build a thing that night–did I mention I am a great procrastinator?). And I didn’t get home until 7:30 pm Thursday. Thus, I ended up taking the day off of work on Friday in order to get this castle built. I built almost all day on Friday and a little Saturday night (I got home at 6:30pm). How long did this take me? It took me Season 1 of Prison Break and 8 episodes of Season 2 of Revenge. However, the first 8 episodes of that time was spent organizing so I could figure out what bricks to buy. So, in total, about 16 hours of actual building time spread over one intense day and a few nights.
I realized a few things about halfway through:
1- In order to do a properly historically accurate MOC, I needed more overhead shots and something that showed more of the MIDDLE of the castle (I found one good overhead shot at an angle that helped with the front and sides, but not the middle)
2- In order to build this thing properly, I needed twice as much space as the display case in the store had (which is the size of 2 gray baseplates plus a little bit of wiggle room on each side)
3- No one except me, probably, would be able to identify it as Eilean Donan and, therefore, no one would be judging me on its historical accuracy, so I needed to just STOP freaking out about it not being perfect.
In the end, I got some aspects VERY close, some kind of close, and a few not remotely close and are pure imagination. I’m happy with the result, however. There are lots of little things I added that have made me smile. It was a series of firsts for me: first time trying a historical building (I used about 20 different reference photos from different angles), the first time I’d done something microscale, the first time covering blue paseplates with trans plates for water, the first time building a proper border around my whole MOC, the first time I’ve tried this technique for a tree, the first time I’ve used a chicken in a MOC (LOL), the first time I didn’t fill out each building’s interior (that’s my favorite part of a project, the set decoration, if you will–maybe my high school background in the theater props department showing through?), my first time doing a period piece, the first time building a base on top of a base to support substantial weight, and probably more I’m not remembering.
Here’s the final product in the LEGO store:
Metro Map
August 1, 2013
brickfair, moc, mosaic Leave a comment
I made this just before Brickfair 2013.
It’s a mosaic-like map of the Washington, D.C., Metro system. It was inspired by the LEGO map in London, England, of their Tube system.
I also added a stand that has posts like the ones that indicate our colored lines, a tiny little train with three cars, and the national mall’s two monuments of the Washington Memorial and the Capitol Building.
Burning Day
July 28, 2013
brickfair, harry potter, moc Leave a comment
Made for Brickfair 2014, as the theme this year is birds. This is an adaptation of a scene I made for a Harry Potter book contest a few years back. It was a lot of fun trying to find three of each item and build the Dumbedore’s office set identically three times.
Harry Potter & the Sorcerer’s Stone Story Tower
July 28, 2013
brickfair, harry potter, moc, story tower Leave a comment
My dream is to make all seven books into story towers with bookends. After making the first book into a story tower with seven scenes, I realized how big they would have to be and I’m starting to rethink my strategy. I might have to make mini story towers instead or I might have to make them one at a time.
The Owlry
July 28, 2013
brickfair, harry potter, moc Leave a comment
I built this for Brickfair 2014. The annual theme was “birds” and someone last year (forgive me!) suggested I make another owlry. My first project of this sort was part of my town of Hogsmeade MOC two years ago and was designed so that the Hogsmeade Post Office resembled a British post office box in style, structure, and appearance. This is a more classic Owlry, closer to the sort you see at Hogwarts in the movies. It’s not supposed to look exactly like the movie version, but it is meant to look closer to what you might see as part of Hogwarts.
I had great fun gathering up all my owls for this project. Of course I added a few fun extras like some rats the owls will soon be eating. And the roof is intentionally kind of crazy.
It Started with Cup Stacking
August 8, 2011
I made a few images from a Blibbering Humdingers song for one story in a month-long project of mine. They turned out to be funny enough for me to want to do the whole song.
WRock: Nobody Expects the Blibbering Humdingers
See it on MOC Pages: http://www.mocpages.com/moc.php/272828
Torchwood Cast MOC
August 7, 2011
My take on the Torchwood Cast (circa series 1-2)
L-R: Jack, Ianto, Gwen, Owen, Tosh
Top: Myfanwy
Another view: http://www.flickr.com/photos/esteemedhelga/6013563636/in/photostream/
BrickFair 2010 MOCs
August 17, 2010
bookcrossing, brickfair, harry potter, hockey, moc brickfair, hp scene, moc Leave a comment
Here’s a list of all my MOCs from BrickFair 2010: