A Tribute To Trebek

A Tribute To Trebek

With the tragic loss of Alex Trebek last year, I wanted to build a meaningful tribute to the man and his legacy of knowledge. So I built a moving kinetic sculpture of the “Greatest of All Time” tournament and discovered that building LEGO is not too dissimilar to Jeopardy. I knew the answer of where I wanted to go, I just needed to figure out the right questions that would get me there.

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The Mandalorian Trailer...In LEGO

The Mandalorian is finally here, and I’m all in. And I’m not alone, this is the Star Wars extended universe we’ve been waiting for, the fans love it. Brick FORCE Studios was all in even before it premiered, putting a ton of work and love into this stop-motion trailer recreation, check it out.

Mandalorian in LEGO - trailer re-creation.

LEGO + Tools = Win

While I'm a purist when it comes to building, for animation I break all the "rules" all the time. We glue parts, drill them, cut them and modify them to make them work for the project, it's just practical to get the job done. I know it would make a lot of you cry to witness all that activity with tools and bricks in the same space, but here's a fascinating animation by BricksBrosProductions that has both, and as far as I can see, no bricks were harmed in the making, enjoy!

Lego In Real Life 3, our newest stop motion animation, where a boy attempts to make a wooden creation... using Lego. Take a look at the behind the scenes for this video! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGELschP8Tc A HUGE thank you to JK Brickworks for allowing us to use the design of his Classic Lego Duck Pull Toy.

LEGO Life

The cat's out of the bag. The "super secret" project we've been working on at BrickNerd Studios is finally in the wild and we can share. You may have seen some behind the scenes teases through the months, but we've kept what we were working on under wraps. Credit for the structure goes to the LEGO enfield model shop. The animation was done by James Morr and turned out spectacular. I did the cinematography, editing and compositing, as well as built all the equipment. Check out the finished spot.

LEGO Life is a safe, social app for kids that's full of stuff parents can feel good about. It's available on the iOS, Android and Amazon app stores. http://LEGO.com/LIFE

This project required multiple custom built motion control rigs, which kept me busy for weeks. I scratch built an Arduino based motion control unit, a follow focus, giant turntable and dolly track system. The camera rig is a Ditogear slider mounted vertically, with a custom built counterweight system and a Stage-R pan/tilt head. Here's a behind the scenes peek at just a fraction of the work that went into this project.

You can find the final spot here https://youtu.be/2TQc6sWUNvY We worked months on this project, it was very difficult, but we're really happy with the results. It required custom building multiple pieces of motion control equipment and countless hours of work. But as you can see, it was all very worth it.

Sheep

I had the distinct pleasure of seeing this absolutely charming animated short by Maxime Marion at CineBrick in Portugal last month. I won't waste a lot of time trying to sum it up or describe it, I'll just strongly encourage you to take five and half minutes out of your day and watch this, you won't regret it. Maxime would also like to give a big shout out to Kloou for the mad building chops.

Characters and set design: Kloou (http://www.kloou.fr) Directed and animated by Maxime Marion (http://www.maximemarion.com/) Don't forget to subscribe: www.youtube.com/user/studiosepsilon?sub_confirmation=1 Like us on Facebook for more content : https://www.facebook.com/jerome.kloou/ https://www.facebook.com/henriedmond/

Birdemic: Shock And Terror - The LEGO Edition

Something that you might not know about me is my love of bad movies. Not just films that are poorly made, but those movies that are so bad, but made with such earnestness and passion, that somehow they've gone past awful and ended up good again. I'm a huge fan of Mystery Science Theater 3000 and RiffTrax, and they're unique take on the bad movie shared experience. When I heard that RiffTrax was having a contest inviting people to recreate some moments from James Nguyen films, I knew just what had to be done. 

Please note, this is awful, just like the film that inspired it, you've been warned.

One of Birdemic's iconic scenes painfully recreated in LEGO. Produced at BrickNerd Studios Directed by Tommy Williamson visit us at www.bricknerd.com Created for the RiffTrax James Nguyen "Direct it Yourself" Contest With apologies to Mr Nguyen, and anyone else who watches

The Italian Job

Remember The Italian Job?  Where Michael Caine and his lads raced through Turin in iconic Minis to rob a bullion van at the orders of big-time criminal Mr Bridger?

Now you can watch it again, as UK builder and animator Steve Guinness has recreated it as a stop-motion brickfilm, complete with Minis, police chases, and a cliffhanger ending (see what I did there?).

'Hang on lads, I've got an idea...'

Here is my LEGO version of the classic 1969 film The Italian Job. It's my longest and most adventurous project to date and has taken quite a while to plan, build and animate, but I have finally finished it.

American Ninja Warrior

We don't watch much sports at our house (is American Ninja Warrior a sport?) but we do watch this from time to time. And when you combine it with stop motion animation and LEGO, well, that's a winner in our book. Find out what happens when the Ninjago team faces the course. The animation in this is pretty amazing, and the build is fantastic. I don't know who to credit for it, but it's excellent work.

What kind of training does it take to be an American Ninja Warrior? Kristine Leahy takes us behind-the-scenes into a homemade gym where Jay, Lloyd and Kai are training. Alongside other American Ninja Warrior veterans (how many can you spot in this video?)

Robot Breakdance

There are AFOLs in all walks of life, but it makes me especially giddy when one is from the entertainment industry. Builder breakbricks72 happens to be an Emmy winner and producer/director in the animation business, so it comes as no surprise that the animation in this adorable brickfilm is nothing less than outstanding.

Please visit LEGO Ideas and vote to support the LEGO sets I designed for this animation. https://ideas.lego.com/projects/88635 https://ideas.lego.com/projects/124003 If they get enough support LEGO will consider making them into commercially available sets! When I was a kid in the 1980's I became obsessed with arcade games like Donkey Kong, Pac-Man and Q-bert.

Rogue One Trailer In LEGO

I'm very proud to have played a small role in bringing this to life. This is the result of small group of talented artists called The Animators Collective working very hard for just a few short weeks. Two of the shots were completed here at BrickNerd Studios, and we contributed several elements for use in other shots. Check out the breakdown below to see just what went into the 28 frames of the bacta tank shot alone. 

Side-by-Side and BTS content coming early tomorrow morning! Watch more from the animators who brought this trailer to life at http://www.animatorscollective.com/ Check out the VFX Breakdown for the video on Chris' channel: https://youtu.be/w0PiFXoE6zM Each of the animators below played a key role in bringing this incredible trailer to life.
A VFX breakdown of the ominous bacta tank shot from Rogue One: A Star Wars Story in LEGO by the Animators Collective. Watch MORE cool videos: http://www.animatorscollective.com/ I've very proud to have contributed a small part of this epic LEGO animation project.

My Love Story

Collaborator and friend Kevin Ulrich of Brotherhood Workshop is getting hitched this weekend. To celebrate he put together this absolutely adorkable short telling his love story. Give it a view, it will fill you with warm fuzzies. Congrats Kevin and Celina!

I'm getting married this week! To the most fantastic, adorable, and nerdy girl on the planet. This is our love story in 73 seconds. Like us on facebook to keep up to date on our current projects! https://www.facebook.com/BrotherhoodWorkshop Support us on Patreon! https://www.patreon.com/BrotherhoodWorkshop Special thanks to Brickstuff for their miniature light kit!

How It Should Have Ended - The Force Awakens

My pal and animation guru Kevin Ulrich of Brotherhood Workshop has teamed up with How It Should Have Ended to show us how Star Wars The Force Awakens might have ended. In which Kylo gets his emo butt handed to him...oops, spoilers. I even got a shoutout in the credits!

We partnered with Brotherhood Workshop to make this video for the 2016 Video Game Awards at #SXSW Brotherhood Workshop's Channel https://www.youtube.com/user/BrotherhoodWorkshop Watch More HISHEs: https://bit.ly/HISHEPlaylist Subscribe to HISHE: https://bit.ly/HISHEsubscribe FOLLOW HISHE!

Somebody Get Batman Some Eggnog

Ever wonder why Batman is so grumpy this time of year? Happy holidays from BrickNerd!

Ever wonder why Batman is always in a foul mood this time of year? Happy Holidays from BrickNerd Studios! A film by Tommy Williamson Batman: Tommy Williamson Robin: Brian T Stevenson "Jingle Bells" Kevin MacLeod (incompetech.com) Licensed under Creative Commons: By Attribution 3.0 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/

Bricks, Filmed: A Conversation with Director Daniel Junge

Bricks, Filmed: A Conversation with Director Daniel Junge

LAST year, a little film about plastic toy bricks hit theaters and immediately became a worldwide phenomenon.  Starring the voices of Chris Pratt, Elizabeth Banks and Will Ferrell, The LEGO Movie followed the adventures of minifigs Emmett and Wildstyle as they battled the big, bad Lord Business. After pulling in more than $250 million at the box office, TLM was a bonafide pop culture hit.  

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Awesome LEGO Animated Short

Stop motion is not for the faint of heart, and certainly not for the impatient. I've spent a great deal of time in the last couple years working in this medium and it gives me an even greater appreciation for this brilliant short by Rogier Wieland. It's charming and funny, and worth a watch. And take some time to watch the behind the scenes after, see what goes into making such an ambitious project.

This is a short stop motion animated story that we made for Lego China. see the Making of here: https://vimeo.com/127632215 Written and directed by: Rogier Wieland Client: Lego China Agency: AKQA ,Shanghai Production Company: Black and Cameron, Shanghai MADE BY Animators: Rogier Wieland Danièle Knirim Yoana Buzova Suus Hessling Raymon Wittenberg Iris van den Akker Producer: Danièle Knirim Voice over talent & boy in snake suit: Thomas Boyd Art direction & design: Rogier Wieland Set builders: Matthias Hurtl Pieter-Henk van Wijk Special thanks to: Nadine Bradshaw Jasper van Blokland Jesse Hendriks Jean Villanueva Mickey Yang

Making of Lego_Adventure In The City see the original video here: https://vimeo.com/127628756

"We Spared No Expense"

Friend and fellow filmmaker Paul Hollingsworth and his daughter followed in John Hammond's footsteps and spared no expense making this EPIC tribute to Jurassic Park. If you're a fan of animation, LEGO, dinosaurs or humor, you're going to love this film. There's also a great behind the scenes video, where you can see that making these films is as much fun as watching them. I chatted with Paul this morning and he said "Teaching Hailee how to animate has been a great way to spend time together doing what we love." I couldn't agree more.

This is a behind the scenes look at how a Dad, his daughter and all their friends helped create a LEGO brick flick of Jurassic Park. It's a journey into a stop motion wonderland, complete with motion control camera rigs, after effects compositing and an original score composed by Voodoo Highway.

The Right Person

The School of Life released it's latest video, The Right Person. Produced at BrickNerd Studios in collaboration with Spastik Chuwawa. Don't let the misguided standards of dating sites and social pressure prevent you from finding the right person. Be romantic and realize nobody is perfect, including you. Done by James Morr, Dane Erland and me, a crew of three.
 

The most romantic thing you can do is realise that there's no such thing as 'the right person'. Everyone is a bit wrong in fascinating ways - not least, you. And that's OK...

Disaster News

What goes better with death and destruction than minifigs? BrickNerd Studios, in partnership with SpastikChuwawa was recently tasked by The School of Life to do exactly that, and this is the result. We had a great time producing this two minute short, and we're pretty proud of how it turned out.

Why are we so captivated and fascinated by news stories about disasters? Is it ghoulish and voyeuristic? Not at all... SUBSCRIBE to our channel for new films every week: http://tinyurl.com/o28mut7 Brought to you by http://www.theschooloflife.com Produced in collaboration with James Morr https://www.youtube.com/SpastikChuwawa

Batman Vs Superman

BrickNerd Studios is extremely happy to announce our latest project is online, Batman Vs Superman. This was a ton of work but also a ton of fun. I'd like to thank everyone that helped make this a reality. Please watch and share!

BrickNerd Studios is proud to present Batman Vs Superman Batman and Superman square off (for some reason) in this stop-motion animated short. Produced and directed by Tommy Williamson visit us at www.bricknerd.com/studios