projects

TartanLUG Engagement Officer

I’ve been pretty quiet here recently, but I have good news to share:

I’ve been elected as the Engagement Officer for TartanLUG, the Scottish Lego User Group! I take over the role previously held by Stewart Lamb Cromar, who of course left me incredibly big shoes to fill.

I’ve been a part of the LUG for a few years now, and it’s had a huge positive effect on me as a builder- it’s been inspirational meeting so many other creative, passionate, AFOLs. I’ve written about that joy, and many of the events I attended, previously.

As Engagement Officer, i’ll be looking to do likewise for others, highlighting some of the excellent shows and builds that the LUG produces, as well as sharing news in and outwith the group. It’s all very exciting- you can help me out by following some of the TartanLUG social media channels to help me out!

I’ve never had a minifig sigfig- enjoy my new hastily constructed avatar until something better appears!

Accidentally Wes Anderson: Wick Lifeboat Shed

Wes Anderson is a well-celebrated film director, known for his set-framing, colour, and above all, whimsy. Accidentally Wes Anderson is an inspired community, sharing images and locations that feel like they would comfortably belong in his films. I received the book of the same name as a gift, and since then i’ve been trying to capture my own images.

I will never get tired of walking past and admiring the old Wick Lifeboat Shed. With it’s entrance in it’s current light blue and red colour scheme, along with it’s nautical importance, it’s an obvious candidate for the project, and very reminiscent of The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou. The diving pioneer and oceanographer would easily be right at home here.

Accidentally Wes Anderson: Highland Folk Museum

Wes Anderson is a well-celebrated film director, known for his set-framing, colour, and above all, whimsy. Accidentally Wes Anderson is an inspired community, sharing images and locations that feel like they would comfortably belong in his films. I received the book of the same name as a gift, and since then i’ve been trying to capture my own images.

Earlier this summer I visited the Highland Folk Museum. An open-air living-history attraction, with period accurate cottages, laid out as a small town, a uniquely fascinating museum to explore and inhabit. Along with a tailor, blacksmith, and village shop, one of the buildings was a schoolhouse, complete with teaching diagrams, old-fashioned desks, and wood-panelling as interior detailing. The room was empty, but upon entering it immediately felt like a possible set or location for a Wes Anderson film, evoking memories of a childhood camp summer, not that far removed from Moonrise Kingdom.

There was no sign of Ed Norton or Bill Murray anywhere unfortunately.

MOC: 6075 Wolfpack Tower Remake

With my previous Lego project being so Forestmen heavy, the next thing I wanted to do was make similar big forts and dioramas for many of the other Lego Castle factions. Next up, was the Wolfpack.

The Wolfpack faction subtheme of Lego Castle released in 1992, a perfect year for a VERY six year old me, admittedly, but regrettably a theme with only the three sets. These minifigs were pretty kickass while I was younger, and while, sure, the Wolfpack are on the surface very much a reskin of the Forestmen faction before them, I like to think they’re probably the more crass and less charming rivals of their tree-swinging Robin Hood-esque counterparts. With so few sets released and no big appearances I feel they’ve been somewhat sidelined as a faction, but worse, not really given their own identity.

For my MOC I wanted to remedy that a little. I wanted to build a crumbly ruined inaccessable base away from prying eyes, on an island in the middle of a swampy marsh. The forests belong to the Forestmen, the Wolfpack, I guessed, would take whatever they could get. The end result is something that accidentally became a remake of 6075 Wolfpack Tower. This was lots of fun to do, but also good practice for me in a lot of ways.! First, i’ve never tried tiled water, but I think all the trans light blue tiles here look superb. Secondly, i’ve not really dabbled in angled building like this before either, but I think it actually came out alright! As a third deviation, the island is elevated on a DUPLO footprint to build height- this was a bit tricker than I had anticipated. Overall it’s a bit different from it’s source material set, but hopefully it still looks recognisable enough too.


The Lion King’s chief enforcer, Ser Galien, The Warden, has been tasked with ‘cleansing’ the kingdom. His current quest finds him at a long forgotten derelict tall black tower, on a small island in a swamp. The band of hoodlums he finds there call themselves The Wolfpack…

MOC: Widmore in Fall

Earlier this year, I built a Lego Castle, with the plan of displaying it at Lego shows. That never happened, but I kept it built nonetheless, just in case. Last month, and with my Lego User Group’s meet-up scheduled for the end of November, I gave it a Fall/Autumnal refresh. Storm Arwen coincided that very same weekend, and with snow showers, sheet lightning, and plenty of fallen trees on the road during that drive down, the event was rescheduled, with display, again, postponed. Nonethless, the MOC got a new lick of paint, and it’s all set once again for showing online!

Structurally it’s the exact same model as before. The landscaping is a little bit different -hundreds of leaf pieces!- and there’s a little bit of time progression and new character detail, but other than that it’s a seasonal reskin. I’m already planning the Winter version, which will, I expect, look a *lot* different.

“Widmore in Fall. As Autumn lands in the great forests, the despicable Lion Knight stronghold lies empty of prisoners. With their comrades free, the Forestmen now strike for greater riches.”

MOC: Medieval Blacksmith 21325 Barn

Earlier in March I built and streamed Lego 21325 Medieval Blacksmith on Twitch. The set is great; it’s incredibly detailed, tall, and looks fantastic on display. It’s been on my desk since, with a rotating cast of knights and peasants minifigs next to it every so often. Since then, I’ve wanted to build something to sit next to and accompany it, so this month I decided to build a barn, as much in the same style as I could.

When the set was announced late 2020/early 2021 one of the most common requests and ‘complaints’ from AFOLs (in my circles at least) were the absence of goats from the set. The goat element in question had only appeared in one set previously, 7189 Mill Village Raid, and now goes for astronomical prices on the aftermarket: anywhere between £40-£100. Fan anticipation was hoping the Blacksmith set would bring the piece out of retirement or reissue it, but the original mold for the goat has since been lost. The set designers confirmed this. So my barn MOC is a means to continue the civilian castle theme, remedy the original set, and mostly just flex that I own goats. Yes, really.

The MOC was built independently from the set but continues the same colour patterns, and for the most part building techniques, with plenty of SNOT bricks and tiling on the sides. I’m not very good at building roofs so I designed a flat log roof instead using log pieces; no where near as complex or advanced as that of the host Blacksmith building, but as a simple barn for livestock, why would it be? I wanted to introduce a bit more colour so there’s more crops and some flowers too at the base. The barn doesn’t physically connect to the Blacksmith set in any way currently, but the curved plates both structures share allow for some nice pasture land in between for the goats and apple picking.

The MOC did really well on social-media channels and I even had a message from someone asking for instructions. As far as AFOL inside-memes go, I guess I’ve officially made it! Along with Widmore Keep previously I’d really love to display the MOC in public, and that’s my hope, maybe even with more goats. The Barn will probably stay built and on the desk for a while in case that opportunity ever presents itself.

March Status Update

March was…

As The Crow Flies (working title)

Inspiration struck! Earlier this month I had an idea to run a small week-long RPG over messages in a Choose Your Own Adventure style, and I spent a few days writing it all up. Some paths work a lot better than others narratively and it’s mostly finished…but it’s something that I really want to develop further! At just under 3000 words it’s kind of taken on a life of it’s own, BUT I love that, and I’m really excited to continue with it, either in it’s current format or something else entirely.

Wandavision

After pretty much an entire year of no cinema trips or superhero films, Wandavision releasing recently on Disney+ was an unexpected treat. Both ‘Scarlett Witch’ and Vision have been notoriously under-utilised in the Avengers and wider Marvel Cinematic Universe films so I really enjoyed this six hour piece. It was incredibly satisfying having this to look forward to and theorise about each week, and I loved watching it progress into a great mystery that builds and subsequently unravels in nine episodes, tinged with love, grief, life, and existentialism. A superb experiment that finally gave emotional resonance and character moments to a MCU that’s mostly without. A lot better than I anticipated!

Building and Streaming Lego Medieval Blacksmith 21325

This month I continued building the new Lego Medieval Blacksmith 21325 set and streaming progress over on my Twitch channel. The set is incredibly detailed and makes a great display piece and I had lots of fun building it with all the new bricks and techniques used. Streaming the build was a bit of an interesting one -people actually watched!- and I enjoyed nattering on about Lego history and pieces. It definitely gave me a new appreciation for the hard work that streaming requires, but I don’t think it’s something I can commit to regularly. Hard work! I recorded all the video and trimmed all 7 hours into a time-lapsed 25 minutes, but without audio -and still too long?- I’ve yet to upload. This might be something that gets finished and uploaded online or I might honestly just keep for myself as a memento. Streaming may be something I take-up every so often.

marchblacksmith.jpg

Big Decisions

With a disastrous February, I re-evaluated quite a bit. After a lot of consideration I came to the difficult decision of withdrawing from my Post-Graduate study. This was really hard to do but came down to ultimately being frazzled from full-time work, winter mental stuff, and continued pandemic exhaustion. I really enjoyed what I was studying but was always scraping by each week by only studying the absolute minimum and skipping lots of stuff- I really wasn’t able to give the materials the time, energy, or love that it needed. I would have much preferred spending more time on it, or having the time in the first place. So i’m annoyed at that but will pick it up again at a better time, in a few years or even later in life. The positive effects of that decision however have been immediate. Less stress, more relaxing, oysters of free time, and honestly just a sunnier outlook. I’m not griefing myself the same about sitting doing nothing or not working. It’s a good feeling.

April is…

looking promising! Next month I want to start work on a new Lego project, play lots of games, and if everything goes to plan, get back to normal and have more frequent meets and meals with friends. Fingers crossed!

MOC: Widmore Keep

After two lockdowns, several weekend builds, and a great supply of Light Bluish Grey bricks from my Lego User Group, Widmore Keep is finally finished! The MOC is a remake of a Castle I built 11 years ago, but expanded, bigger, and with a few new bricks and building techniques from the subsequent years. This was something I was building with intentions to display at a number of Lego fairs and exhibitions last year, and while that’s still the plan, it’s entirely dependent on the world (and it’s governments) sorting itself out again. The castle and scene are inspired by many of the Lego catalogue dioramas from the late 80s with armies of minifigs battling and trying to attack castles. Impossible for me to ever fully recreate as a kid, but fortunately the images and ideas were brought forward with me to where we are now: an Adult Fan of Lego! I’m very happy with how it turned out, so there are plenty of photos and some narrative text below while some making-of pics can be found here. There will be a video at some point- it’s taking a bit longer to sort out. Enjoy!

“Widmore Keep- a small holding fortress recognised across the country and on the borders of the greater forests. The High Sherriff William Thomas holds court here, a keeper of key and shrewd to the core, he wants to outlaw and punish many of the forest bandits, rogues, and families for apparent crimes against the crown. Assisted by Quartermaster Wulfstan Reede, Master Bowman Edeline Mille, and a small infantry, the walls are thick and defences are kept secure. Master Dolfair the appointed leader of the Forestpeople has been wrongly captured and sat in a cell for months now, long forgotten, his imprisonment is a cruel ongoing message. Enough is enough- his protégé, Rowan the Cunning, a folk legend hero of break ins, breaks outs, and brimming with deviousness, plots to break him out…”

A Lego Castle WIP

This year -amongst other things- I was planning to attend a few Lego shows across Scotland, and most excitingly, display some builds too. I’ve written previously about plans and how big a fuck up 2020 as a whole has been, and the same unfortunately extends to my ambitions for Lego-based travel too. Nonetheless I’ve had a great year pottering away and building those projects, particularly the big Castle MOC I was planning. This was a build that was supposed to be finished for display in April but as one thing led to another and deadlines changed to July, it still remains sadly unfinished...

So, here it is, in not quite but almost there completion! I’m posting it here because it represents quite a bit of my time this year but it also serves as a big to-do reminder for the upcoming months, where -hopefully- it will be getting displayed publicly. The other reason of course is that while all photos and videos of Lego MOCs online are brilliant, there’s a certain fascination to seeing something not quite finished; a work in progress, rough and ready, where techniques and inspiration can be found. This isn’t the most technical or complicated Lego Castle out there by any means but hopefully someone will find it’s development interesting, or at the very least, inspire them to do their own! I’ve been posting regular updates over on my Lego specific Instagram, but here they all rounded up to show the progress.

I’ve built Lego Castles before -this is going to be a bigger, better, and more complete iteration of my Widmore series- and it’s great seeing that progress over a big 15 year AFOL period. Keeping the mostly same landscaping and shape make comparisons easy, and it’s just satisfying having that all play out like a little child. I’m building for me. Send this back in time so I can play with it! There’s still trees and more landscaping to add as well as further interior details and the addition of actual Lego minifig knights to populate it. With good intentions and a few more weeks it will be finished soon- assuming I don’t get distracted or -more likely- try to make it even bigger!