LEGO Community Headlines and Highlights for August 2021
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The LEGO community is lucky to have so many blogs, magazines and channels that create amazing content about our hobby. At BrickNerd, we celebrate getting nerdy about the bricks! This past month, we’ve launched a cube contest, counted Adventurers, cleaned muddly LEGO, built illegal cottages, and hugged some plushies. We’ve visited the LEGO House, Indonesia, Bricks Cascade and BrickFair VA in the eyes of a new AFOL. We’ve taken a look at LEGO planes, yellow brick roads, alt builds, microscale malls, a rotating spaceship and more! Whew! In fact, we’ve included an interactive calendar of all our articles at the bottom of this post so you can make sure you didn’t miss a thing.
But there are many more fascinating stories to be told from within the LEGO community, so here are some of the best LEGO articles that caught our contributors’ attention throughout the month of August. We applaud the effort that went into each of these features, so click on the headlines or photos to head to each story or video. They are well worth your time!
AFOL TV: How to Make Realistic LEGO Water
Here’s a tutorial on how to create realistic-looking LEGO water using a multicolored and layered approach. It may be brick intensive but the results are impressive!
Beyond the Brick: Building Impossible Shapes with Brick Bending
Learn how to make LEGO creations that can impossibly bend and move. Which sculpture is your favorite?
Bits N’ Bricks: Junkbot - The Lovable LEGO Garbage Game
“He just likes to eat trash. He’s a robot whose goal in life is to eat trash. How can you not kind of love that? And he’s a little bit dopey and dorky.” – Naomi Clark, producer of LEGO.com’s classic Junkbot
Blocks Magazine: Why You Should Leave Reviews on LEGO sets at LEGO.com
Why leave a review? It’s not only helpful for other buyers but it’s useful for the LEGO design team too. They do take feedback from online LEGO.com reviews and it can help make future sets better.
Boone Builds: Q&A With LEGO Typewriter Designers James May and Wes Talbott
Take a deep dive into the typewriter with the LEGO product designers behind the model! We take a closer look at this new set and hear the story about how it went from an idea to shelves.
Brick Fanatics: LEGO Harry Potter New Hedwig Was Revealed Six Months Ago
It turns out Hedwig was originally revealed in a Rebuild the World poster published six months ago. The eventual set was based on a model designed by Wes Talbott for a marketing campaign.
Brickset: Using SPIKE Prime for GBCs
I've been building Great Ball Contraptions (GBCs) for around five years now and enjoy displaying them at public events. I exhibited at three of them during August, which finally gave me a chance to test out my SPIKE-powered modules over a long period of time.
Jay’s Brick Blog: LEGO Leaks Ruin the Fan Experience
While I am very guilty of consuming and seeking out leaks for my own personal curiosity, I ultimately believe that they ruin the LEGO fan experience, and detract from the enjoyment, and surprise of LEGO sets. Here’s why.
LEGO Newsroom: LEGO Foundation and KIRKBI Announce Grant to Support Vulnerable Children In Haiti and Afghanistan
LEGO is creating a 100M DKK grant (equivalent to $15.7M USD) to support vulnerable children in Haiti and Afghanistan with UNICEF and the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR).
New Elementary: 5X5 Fest: Thomas Jenkins' MOCs
We sent five challenging LEGO sets to five builders and asked them to use the new parts in interesting original creations. These parts were designed with a specific purpose or function in mind. It was great fun playing around with them and subverting their intended use.
Rambling Brick: Builders’ Journeys - Sue Ann and the Tea Garden Cafe
Welcome to Builders’ Journeys, where AFOLs present a set that was pivotal in their development as a builder. Sue Ann has been around the LEGO fan community for many years and shares a set from 1974 that inspired her earliest attempts to create a MOC.
Rambling Brick: Whatever Happened To Classic LEGO Themes? Part I - Prelude
I’m going to explore the history of the play themes, look at how they have evolved over the years and look to see where the old content has gone to; but today, I’ll present an overview of some of this material, going back to the beginning…
Rebrickable: LEGO Helicopters - The Good, The Bad & The Ugly
My knowledge on helicopters consists of them being that thing that Arnie demands people get to. This list is in no way reflective of any realistic depiction of a helicopter, rather what I think looks like a great helicopter and also a great LEGO experience.
Rebrickable: Friend's is One of the Best LEGO Themes
One we missed last month! Friends is quite controversial for LEGO fans who didn’t grow up with minidolls, but you don’t have to look very deep to find why LEGO owes a lot to the Friends theme.
Sariel’s Brick & Pets: How to Make a LEGO + IKEA DIY Heavy-Duty Video Turntable
This is how you make a heavy-duty turntable for videos/photos based on IKEA’s Snudda Lazy Susan—or even for rotating MOCs automatically at a convention.
StoneWars: Behind the Scenes of an Official LEGO Brick Film - Hansel & Gretel (translated)
How are the brick films for the LEGO Rebuild the World campaign actually made? I'll take you behind the scenes and give you an exclusive insight.
StoneWars: Aquazone, Bionicle, Star Wars - Interview with former Creative Director Christian Faber
We were given the opportunity to find out everything about his time as Creative Director at the advertising agency Advance and his 28 years of collaboration with LEGO.
Stuck in Plastic: To Photoshop or Not To Photoshop?
From the beginning of photography, images have been transformed and altered in the photographic darkroom. The evolution of the digital darkroom allows artists to creatively engage with their work in amazing new ways. However, some critics would consider the use of photoshop as a cheat method.
The Brick Blogger: The Summer Joust – LEGO Castle Building Contest
Every year, the quantity and quality of castle themed LEGO creations built for the Summer Joust is astonishing, but this year I was especially impressed. So let’s take a look at some of the 2021 Summer Joust winners!
The Brothers Brick: Octopus Time! An Alternate Build for LEGO 31203 World Map
Chris Doyle is back with more mosaic madness! This time, he’s reworked the LEGO Art 31203 World Map into a vibrant octopus. He also shares the instructions necessary to build this version of the World Map yourself.
The LEGO Car Blog: Life-Size LEGO Supra
LEGO has a long tradition of building life-size vehicles. Cue LEGO’s latest full-size creation, this time constructed for LEGOLAND Japan over 4,500 hours, it’s the stunning Toyota GR Supra built from 477,303 mostly-yellow bricks in 1:1 scale.
Tips&Bricks: Leafy Tree Designs Using the Plant Plate
You can never have too many tree techniques, and today we’re bringing you two techniques that both make use of a common and versatile piece—the plant plate! With a hollow stud and three leaves, this unassuming plate can look lush and vibrant when used in large quantities!
Toy Photographers: An Introduction to Masking
Masking is a concept that builds on our understanding that the human mind will recognize a face in just about anything. From a light socket to a garbage can, the human mind will create a face where often there isn’t one.
Zusammengebaut: Illuminating LEGO Models Vividly (translated)
How can relatively inexpensive, self-made, and very lively lighting of sets and MOCs be implemented? We look at creating your own lighting solutions from scratch in this two-part series.
If all of those amazing features weren’t enough to satisfy your LEGO community craving, here is an interactive calendar of everything that BrickNerd has published this last month to make sure you didn’t miss a single article.
Did we miss any of your favorite LEGO articles and content from around the internet? Leave your thoughts in the comments below.
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