In order to close the year, I would like to talk about the beginning of my story, the blog and give you some statistics. Let’s back to January 2007, it was the end of my dark-age thanks to the 8420. During 8 months, I created moc with my small collection only composed of the 8420, 8436 and 8284. It was mainly trucks and cars. In September, I discovered the french community Setechnic, I was consequently not alone working with Lego. Then with my diligent work at setechnic, I became a moderator and continue to create mocs. In December, 2010 I decided to create my own blog in English, why ? For many reasons : I have tried Mocpages but it was not really good (loading time, convenience, user-friendly). At the same time, I was featured many time on Technicbricks and started to read Eurobricks Forum. That is because I had had English readers that I decided to create this blog. In order to reduce the amount of time to manage my website, I decided to put all my work on my blog for English people and used the blog for the storage of building instructions.
My website groups all my work with Lego, as far as I started to take pictures. Since 2009, I decided to create the building instructions because people always asked for it. The statistics show that it is the most searched things for those who read the blog. That is why, I recently decided to group all the building instructions on nico71.fr rather than Brickshelf. Also, I have decided to put online exclusively HD pictures on nico71.fr, the lower resolution are hosted at brickshelf and are used for forum convenience. The aim is to regroup all you need here to build my moc, including of course the building instructions, the bill of material and picture taken from the finished model. This is the purpose of this blog : Here are some stats about my blog. I would like to thank you my source of traffic like Sariel, Sheepo, Crowkiller, Technicbrick Rebrickable… It is not surprising that the most searched things on this blog are the building instructions or things related to. The most source of traffic :
Stats are displayed for one year. Since February, 2010, I was invited to join the partner program from YouTube. This program enables the broadcasters to display ads on their video and receive incomes for that. Today, All my video are monetized. In order to put music on my videos without problem of commercial uses or copyrights, I have decided to put music under common licences with authorization of commercial uses. I have always the same questions about the partner program : how many do I earn ? I wouldn’t answer because of the TOS of google and because it is out of place to talk about money in a passion. But, if you want an estimation, I earn enough money to buy all Lego set in a year I want, what I do not because of the place I have in my collection. I have of course also some expenditures for running the blog (host and domain) which are covered by the monthly earning. An other advantage from the partner program is the possibility to display special background on my channel with is in fact a copy of linked nico71.fr’s banner.
The most viewed video is the Crawler Excavator which is clearly NOT my favorite video. In 2010 I buy a bridge camera with HD video in order to make better videos, and I think I am on the good way to do the achievement. The best marked videos are the Morgan three Wheeler and the Pneumatic Vehicle which are in fact exotic mocs. The Morgan is one of my favorite moc, with the Trial Jeep, Tatra T815, Roadster and some excavator I did. As I said, the development of the blog has started in December 2010. I have started with some written posts and gallery but I have implemented many other functions after. The first was of course the browsing gallery which enables me to manage the pictures and the gallery with the thick-box navigation system. I have implemented after the YouTube box and the facebook account and write the Frequently Asked Questions because I was tired t to always repeat the same thing in comment of by email. In 2011 I have decided to group all building instructions on the blog, either in PDF file of ZIP file.
This is the best achievement I did because now all is on my blog, there are not building instructions on brickshelf or elsewhere. There is only one place to get all needed things to build my mocs. Of course, all mocs who have digital instructions have been indexed on rebrickable in order to facilitate the matching with your parts. At the moment, I think the functions of the blog are quite sufficient to follow my work, read and comment. Today I am mainly working to increase the speed of the blog and searching options. Concerning creating moc, I always create moc with lot of ideas. You have certainly noticed that I have not made construction equipment for some time, that is why I was quite tired by this field and consequently decided to create some more exotic things like machines, specials car and so on. The last choice I decided is to make more building instructions. Now when I have made a moc that you like, I made building instructions as well as photo-sequence and a bill of material by using the part picker from Rebrickable.
That is why you can now match your parts with my mocs even if there are not digital files for the moc. To compare with using SR3D builder and then Lpub4.0 for rendering the building instructions, it takes me really less time to create the instructions using a photo sequence and the part picker of rebrickable, which I think is enough for building my mocs. To finish, I would like to thank you for your remark, comment and your support and wish you merry Christmas and happy new year ! Remoted Lunar Roving VehicleContinuously Variable TransmissionMechanical Slot MachineHow to create a building instructionMinion LegosMinions BuildMinions EtcLego Building PlansBuilding IdeasLego PlanMinion BrickBrick DespicableLego DespicableForwardInstructions to build my Pick a Brick Despicable Me Minion, using parts only found on the LEGO brand retail store's Pick a Brick wall. Your mileage may vary. Sign up or log in to customize your list. Here's how it works: Anybody can ask a question
The best answers are voted up and rise to the top In the past, I made MOC's out of my Lego Star Wars sets. At this point in my life, I don't really want to take those apart for pieces and I'd much rather have them on display. Recently, I have been buying sets on-sale at Walmart that from the City and Creator lines, (sets which I won't have the urge to assemble and display like Star Wars). Now, I have a decent pile of pieces, but I'm having trouble making anything with a unified color palette and style. I would like to make detailed real life buildings and buildings/scenes from Star Wars, but I can't seem to find sets that are not overly expensive and aren't Star Wars that contain pieces (mainly bricks) that I need. I'm a bit apprehensive of buying Lego lots online because the sellers rarely show what you'll actually be receiving, and the thrift store near me hardly has any toys, let alone Lego. Are there any sets that have a good price per piece or any other suggestions to help fill out my brick selection?
(I've looked at Bricklink, but I don't want to buy individual bricks since I don't know what I am building) This is what I have gotten so far: 10698 LEGO Classic Large Creative Brick Box 10696 LEGO Classic Medium Creative Brick Box 10692 LEGO Classic Creative Bricks 60047 LEGO City Police Station Building Set 60117 LEGO City Van & Caravan 60081 LEGO City Pickup Tow Truck 60107 LEGO City Fire Fire Ladder Truck 60118 LEGO City Garbage Truck 60119 LEGO City Ferry Edit: I'm not really asking how to get bricks cheaply, more or less I was trying to see how I could get pieces that matched a specific style. I feel like the answers both do a good job giving both shopping and building tips for this problem. Buying random LEGO sets hoping that it will have parts that will fit with what you want to build is an expensive process that can leave you with a huge number of unwanted pieces, and still not have what you want. Having said that, it is still a good idea to buy some sets that have a good number of pieces and/or building styles that you like and fit your project.
For example, if you are planning to build a Star Wars scene, narrow down what scene you would like to build, and see if LEGO has already done any sets from that setting. LEGO actually considers all their sets as "seeds" that will hopefully inspire LEGO fans to expand on further. So, you buy that Star Wars set that fits your idea, then you start to expand on it. LEGO designers probably already worked out some of the most iconic features of that setting, so all you need to do is expand on them. If you have a good number of parts, but they are in a rainbow of colors, you can still work on the project you want, but focus on the shapes and techniques rather than the colors. Once you are happy with the design, you can swap out the wrong colored pieces with the correct ones by purchasing them on BrickLink or at LEGO's Pick-A-Brick section. It is sometimes difficult however to ignore a bunch of bright colors when all you want to build is a mostly gray space-station. So you can combine building with the bricks you have, and virtual building in LEGO Digital Designer.
Once you are done, you can count exactly how many bricks you need to buy in which color. In general I found that even if you are on a smaller budget or lacking space, it is a good idea to have a fairly large stack of bricks in one neutral color (grays, tans and white are the best in my experience), so you can model pretty much anything without being distracted by a rainbow of colors. This way you can work out the shape, size and design of pretty much anything, and then later switch out the pieces with the correct colors. This technique also significantly reduces the cost of projects, because you don't end up buying sets and pieces you don't want. However if you are completely against shopping on BrickLink or at Pick-A-Brick, there are some sets that might work with your Star Wars project. I'm particularly thinking of the LEGO Minecraft sets because they contain large quantities of basic pieces in earth-tone colors (tans, browns, greens, grays, blues, white and black). They are pretty much the same as the LEGO Classic Brick Boxes that you purchased already, but with earthy tones.
They are very useful for creating more realistic landscapes, buildings, etc. While I wholeheartedly agree with all of TheBrickBlogger's advice here I would add a few suggestions: The LEGO Architecture Studio has 1200 bricks that are mostly white with a few transparent parts. That is a huge number and variety of bricks all in the same color. They chose white because it is the classic color for architectural models, but it became the classic color because it blends nicely with almost everything. Since it isn't a bright color it won't clash with whatever you're trying to do as long as it isn't Bat Man. You have a lot of city elements already which use white alot so this should fit nicely. Use your bright bricks for structural elements. Many LEGO sets include red and blue bricks that you never see when the model is completed. Having these be a nice contrasting color makes their instruction books easier to follow, but it also helps you by using your available bricks more efficiently.