Despite the blocky, herky-jerky quality of their visuals, 2014’s The Lego Movie and its box-office-ruling spinoff, The Lego Batman Movie, were not actually filmed in stop-motion. (It would have cost tens of thousands of dollars to buy the bricks alone.) Instead, The Lego Batman Movie director Chris McKay labored to replicate the analog effect digitally, drawing on his work for TV shows like Robot Chicken. Given his experience, we asked him for some tips on how to make a (legitimately stop-motion) Lego movie of our own. Low-budget, of course—we don’t have tens of thousands either. Getting that perfect stop-motion feel requires keeping both your camera and the set nice and stable. McKay recommends a GorillaPod, a flexible tripod that can anchor a phone to most surfaces. Securing the Legos is easier, since the pieces are designed to stick together. Just weigh down the sides of the set to make sure you don’t accidentally move it between frames. Good illumination is essential to achieving a professional look, but the small scale of the Lego pieces makes it tricky to use traditional stage lighting.
Craft and hobby stores—especially those selling trains and holiday figurines—usually stock mini LEDs. McKay says they give Lego sets a cinematic sheen that makes the bricks look larger and more alive.Apps like Stop Motion Studio save you from having to manually stitch hundreds or thousands of images into a video. Simply open the app, take a photo, move your character a tiny bit, and then repeat. “You have to build or find everything you need on set. You can’t draw your way out of a problem,” McKay says. “It’s a lot more like live-action filmmaking than it is like animation.” Except you can bend surly actors to your will. As you’re manipulating figurines through a scene, don’t try to create hyperrealistic movements. It’s OK to have your Lego star’s hand go from up in the air to down on a table in one frame. As McKay says: “I think that is beautiful in its own charming way.” This article appears in the February issue. 3D artist Nathan Sawya has turned the iconic children’s toy into high-end, contemporary art.
This exhibition at Paris Expo-Porte De Versailles opened May 12, and holds over 100 lego sculptures, and the sculptures are created out of more than 1 million Lego bricks. Sawya was a former lawyer who quit his day job in NYC around 2007. His obsession with Lego drove him to start creating these giant masterpieces. His passion has taken him to hold exhibitions all around North America, Asia, Australia, and Europe. His replica of Venus de Milo is even displayed in The Louvre. His most famous is work, “Yellow”, a male opening his own chest with pouring Lego bricks. It’s currently being shown at the Discovery Center in Times Square, New York City. “The great thing about Lego bricks is it’s a universal toy… In Africa, I met some folks who’d never played with Lego and never even heard of it. And yet they immediately got it when I brought out a few bricks. And that’s the great thing about using the medium: it makes the art very accessible,” said Sawaya. The exhibition will run until August 30.
Please enter your e-mail address. You will receive a new password via e-mail.Heads up, LEGO fans. LEGO’s BrickUniverse convention is coming to Plano on June 11-12. In addition to large, intricate displays of LEGO creations, there will be a LEGO Star Wars Building Area and professional LEGO artists, showing their masterpieces.Attractions at the LEGO BrickUniverse include:LEGO Friends Building Area: tons of LEGO Friends bricks to built withBig Brick Building: younger visitors can explore imagination through building with larger LEGO Duplo bricksLEGO Retail: purchase LEGO merchandise and goodiesFan Zone: with creations from some of the world’s best LEGO Fan BuildersBIONICLE Warrior Building: construct a LEGO BIONICLE WarriorBRICK Theater: learn from LEGO experts, artists, master builders, and author in teaching session throughout the dayMinifigure Art: Get your your “legoized”LEGO Architecture: Build intricate and detailed LEGO models using thousands of white LEGO Architecture bricksTickets are $15 and can be purchased now (kids 2 and under are free).
The last LEGO show sold out, so early booking is advised. The BrickUniverse happens at the Plano Centre on June 11-12 from 10am-6pm. View all Portraiture Architectural models Sculpture Home decor Children's books Available for sale or lease The following is a reprint of an interview with Sean from TOPIC Magazine, August 2005. City Blocks into LEGO Blocks Sean Kenney began building LEGO creations at the age of four, and has since become one of the world’s foremost LEGO builders. He is perhaps best known for “The Brick Apple,” a 50,000-piece scale model of Greenwich Village, complete with cabbies, bagel carts and harried pedestrians. Sean recently became the first person in the world ever to be authorized by the LEGO company as a business affiliate. He spoke with Topic’s Jonathan Sherman-Presser.TOPIC: It seems like most kids these days are building the pirate- and outer space-themed LEGO kits, while you've devoted yourself to replicating real-life buildings and cities.
Sean: People build models based on what fascinates them. A kid will watch "The Matrix" and then pull out the LEGO pieces to build a hovercraft; I'll walk along 7th Avenue in Manhattan and go model a cool high-rise. In fact, I was in Madrid a few weeks ago having lunch in a beautiful Spanish plaza, and out of nowhere I got an urge to build the entire plaza! I spent about 20 minutes photographing every building, tree, you name it. The local Spaniards were looking at me like I was crazy—"Some American took a picture of my garbage can!"TOPIC: At what scale do you build landmarks like that?Sean: Well, it really depends on how large a model I plan on building. A famous landmark like the Chrysler Building or Empire State Building can be easily recognized no matter how abstracted the model may be. I've built them as small as 1:2500 scale—only a few inches tall. But for structures with more ornate facades or more subtle curves and details, I need to build a model much larger before it begins to resemble something so specific.
Generally 1:40 scale (the scale of the little LEGO people, called mini-figures) is sufficient to render the character, clutter and detail of a specific real-life place. At 1:20 scale (the scale that the LEGO theme parks are built at), the "blocky" nature of LEGO structures begins to disappear and more fluid curves can be built.TOPIC: What scale is your model of Greenwich Village built at?Sean: My Greenwich Village model is 1:40 scale. When I built the Village, my challenge was to make all the buildings smaller than I was used to, but to cram in twice the detail in the process. Some buildings have signs of renovation or additions, as evident by changes of architectural style, while others still have window air conditioners, rooftop water towers and stone steps. Then there are fire hydrants, parking meters, crosswalk signs, trees, dumpsters, traffic lights, litter, you name it. And of course it's not Greenwich Village without all the people: I've got LEGO folks stepping down on the pavement against the "Don't Walk" sign waiting for a gap in traffic so they can cross, guys with bagel carts, someone running after a departing bus, window shoppers, tourists, folks tossing produce down through metal gates in the sidewalk and masses of people crossing an avenue as a taxi tries to poke its way through the crowd.
TOPIC: How long did it take to put that all together?Sean: The whole model took over six months of on-and-off construction and nearly 50,000 pieces. The model epitomizes the average New Yorker's day, the things that are often skipped by tourists who are otherwise bound for The Empire State Building or the Bull at Bowling Green. I wanted to show the world the side of New York that New Yorkers are used to.TOPIC: Do you have any plans to create the rest of the city?Sean: Well, the city acts more like an inspiration than as a template. My model of Greenwich Village isn't a literal reproduction of any particular street corner, or of actual buildings. I just wanted to capture the feel of the neighborhood. But there are some parts of town that I would like to create literal reproductions of at some point. Times Square comes to mind—complete with some little LCD televisions! I also thought it would be fun to research a random street corner and build it from the exact same angle in different time periods, say, in 1930, 1970 and today.
You could watch it transform from paddy wagons to Vespas to SUVs as the buildings adapt (or crumble) over time. Mulberry Street seemed like a fun place to try out something like that.TOPIC: Have you ever considered quitting your day job and going to work for LEGO as a builder?Sean: Well, actually, I did quit my day job. I am self-employed and build LEGO models on commission. My clients range from marketing teams to grandmothers.TOPIC: Are there many other practicing LEGO artists?Sean: There are now three other people in my shoes who do similar freelance work. The LEGO Company also employs about 40 to 50 "Master Builders" who work on staff full-time, designing their toys, building models for shows.TOPIC: Do they ever hold try-outs for that kind of thing?Sean: Only once in recent memory. In late 2003, the LEGO Company needed a new Master Builder for their California theme park, so the other Master Builders toured the country and held local building competitions. TOPIC: Did you enter?Sean: I actually never entered the competition.
I was in the process of moving from New York to Austin for my wedding. It wasn't the best time in the world to consider moving to California. The work in the theme park is also pretty hard; models are constantly being nibbled on by squirrels, bleached by the sun or rained on. Much of the job involves repairing and replacing the existing models.TOPIC: How many LEGO pieces do you own?Sean: About a quarter million, although I haven't really counted each one, and they're going in and out the door pretty fast. That may sound like a lot, but without fail, whenever a new project comes along, I'll never have what I need. I worked on a model last year that required about 10,000 clear LEGO pieces, and I only had a few hundred. I was on a tight deadline, so I bought out the entire supply of clear pieces from a LEGO store in New Jersey and another in Chicago.TOPIC: Roughly how much do you spend on this hobby each year, if you don’t mind my asking?Sean: Well, it's not a hobby anymore, per se, it’s a business, so the money spent on LEGO elements is paid for by my clients.
This past year, I spent between $20,000 and $25,000 on LEGO pieces. Back when LEGO was still just my hobby, I gave myself a $200-per-month budget. But I'm no millionaire, and bills got in the way, so I finally started limiting myself. I would dismantle old creations to build new ones, and I used as much of my collection—at the time, a mere 80,000 pieces—as I could for each major project. Limiting my budget actually helped spur my creativity. It forced me to say, "How can I build this model with what I have?" instead of, "I can build this model if I order 37 new little brown pieces.”TOPIC: Do you have a favorite LEGO creation?Sean: It's hard to say. Perhaps my favorite is my sculpture of Homer Simpson. From the minute I was first inspired to build him, I barely slept until the model was done.TOPIC: How long was that?Sean: I worked non-stop for about six days. Then, a week later, I finished him up with another day or two of work. The first day, I must have worked for twelve hours straight on his head and face.
I then worked another five days on his torso, legs and arms. The whole time, I would literally work until the point of exhaustion, go to sleep, then wake up and start working again immediately. I was living in a one-bedroom Manhattan apartment at the time, so my bed was in my LEGO studio.TOPIC: Have you ever thought about making LEGO furniture?Sean: I started a desk chair at one point after noticing I had a surplus of black pieces, but I had to set it aside after only the first leg was done. I may be building a large desk for a client in the Dominican Republic later this year. The trick with something like furniture is being able to design a shape that will be sturdy enough to hold as much weight as a wooden structure. I even did the math to see what it would cost to live in a LEGO house. It's a few thousand times more expensive than drywall and lumber.TOPIC: LEGO pieces are economical in a way—you can always reuse them.Sean: That, in fact, was the driving force behind my pursuit of LEGO-building as a serious hobby and, later, a career.