Cyclopic Bricks

This seems to became a "Old MOC Revamp" month... But be no afraid, I have new project under construction too, and some of them are 95% finished. But until then, I have some old revisited Klaanon characters.

This is Matoro "The Blacksnow", who could said to be the main character of Klaanon. At the beginning of the story he was an eager hero looking for adventures. He has become "darker and edgier" since them, after fighting Makuta Abzumo at a falling cathedral sphere airship with a black heart using one of the shards of Nimda, a powerful artifact with massive mind powers. He also lost his right (i guess) hand when fighting the dreadful Marionette (Coming soon!), one of Avde's puppets.

On his left hand Matoro now has a six-hooked harpoon. Especially at the first half of the story Matoro's harpoon was an important plot element, causing many daring escapes and unexpected (well, not really) survivals. In his right hand he has a mind-sword generated using a shard of Nimda.

And yes, the creation. The old version is here. When I saw "Kopaka, Master of Ice" for the first time, I knew the mask would look great on Matoro. Of course the old Akaku is a true classic, but the round shape didn't look that good on Matoro, and his mask isn't Akaku but Kanohi Cencord, prototype mask of mind in the story anyway (with added telescopes). New Akaku has a lower brow which makes it look edgier, a fitting detail with Matoro's character development during the story.

I also bulked up the shoulders, re-designed the torso armor and made some tweaks on the limbs; Boat studs make excellent back armor to Ben10 limbs with T-bars, by the way. I also gave Matoro brick-built hand to allow more diverse posing.

-Eero

Well, hello... This isn't really a new MOC nor old MOC revamp, as the MOC itself is pretty much same than the previous version (Ball joint on neck has been changed into a white one) but this has some important accessories; headband, scarf and shoulder bag, as requested by the character's creator. At least to ones who have read Klaanon (multi-author giant novel thing, in progress) these garments define the character.

The only interesting building technique used here is the strap of the shoulder bag. Dark brown 1x1 round bricks have been put on a LEGO string, which is simply squeezed between the plates on the bag. Simple, effective and 100% purist.

This post also features a pose with Snowie's friend Kepe. They are, as the TvTropes page suggests, "Non-action hetero sexual life partners" and such lovable characters.

-Eero

I just realized I hadn't taken any cool group shots of the "Northern Akamai Gang" of Klaanon (Korpraun, Muothka and Ursanga). So here's some.

-Eero

Despite building Dwalin in his Battle of the Five Armies gear I'm not doing another series of the dwarves in their Erebor gear. Definitely not. I might (and will, and have already...) make some more spin-off-dwarf-stuff including stuff like Dain Ironfoot, but yeah, here's Dwalin, the bruiser, the muscle, Thorin's best buddy. The head is exactly the same than on the current travel gear version, but I copied it so these can be displayed simultaneously.

I do not know the exact reason for building Erebor gear version of Dwalin. Of course he is a cool character and has small yet important role on the last film, but I think I ended up building him because of the pieces available. I got 100 of those short chains for 9€ from Bricklink bulk store via member of our LUG during an exhibit at Imatra on February. I also got some olive green car hood slopes from LUG support bags and traded a few from my LUG members and then just began working on Dwalin, beginning with the upper torso and the shoulders (the amount of the chain enormous; 54 at the end) and finishing with the boots and the axe, as usually.

The torso came out very nicely. It has tons of SNOT, and the shoulder connection is not very ideal (Two half-pins and half of an axle) but the finished model is quite sturdy. Dwalin has more depth than your average dwarf, which is ideal as he's the muscle of the group. The torso is solid and heavy, being full of brackets and SNOT bricks and layers of plates. Olive green cheese (thanks god it's cheap) and the car hood slopes ice the cake. Dwalin's mantle has a very pleasing colors, olive green and browns.

The arms were a bit problematic, but arm bands saves the shape of the lower arm; Another solution using 2x2 round tiles with holes and travis bricks, very cool pieces both of them. I came up with those when at work. Minifig legs work as elbow joints, just like on Ridcully and Bilbo. They are sturdy joint pieces and available in pleasingly wide array of colors.

The axe was very interesting. It is not so visible in the movies where the colors are not that bright, but according to Weta's Chronicles books the axe's blades are green stone native to New Zealand, so I ended up making it dark green. In addition to that, the shape is quite strange, having bars on 45 degree angles rather than 90 degrees. I fiddles with it a long time and finally found a solution using travis bricks, bars with clips and, as the seed parts, magnifying glasses; Clips attach nicely to their edges. The result is quite cool, if you don't mind me saying.

-Eero

To cease all of your suffering
A faceless doll of dread
The pale hand of the Crimson Man
Will drown your corpse in red

-Tarip the Rust-eyed/Gurvana

The Marionette, the pale swordsman, is one and probably - just probably - the deadliest of The Puppets, six creepy servants - or, as they say, children - of Avde.

The White Hand of the Crimson Man is an important Klaanon... well, not character, but something. He - IT - has been around since 2010 or 2011, when it fought Ämkoo, who was still on Clan's side, cut his right arm off (it (the hand, not the Marionette) was later eaten by the tapir) and stole his sword Aeon and stole a shard of Nimda from Snowie (he didn't cut Snowie's arm of, because the big sissy was unable to fight back). Later on, he fought Matoro the Blacksnow (and Captain Notfun), cut Matoro's right hand off (he was able to fight back but didn't stand a chance) and nearly killed him anyway. The Marionette has never been beaten in a sword fight. Bullets swerve it. Missiled sweve it, if you pardon the stupid joke (which no one is going to understand anyway...).

And its mouth is on its left hand.

Yeah. A disturbing sort of fellow. The Ventriloquist was the first of the puppets I built. There as six in total; Four of them we have seen, or read about, properly.

Mario was on a WIP stage for few months. The arms, upper torso and head came together quite easily, though the lower arms changed from regular ball joints into the smaller ones and more SYSTEM-oriented. HF torso armor was going to be used from the beginning, and the HF shells worked wonderfully to create the completely flat surfaces without any mechanical of biomechanical details. The inner upper leg is probably my favourite bit technically, with the t-bar-connected boat studs covering the one side of the Y-joint.

The legs turned out pretty thin. The Marionette denies most of the laws of physics (well, they are a bit different in the Klaanon universe anyway, though not as ridiculous as in the Bionicle canon) and floats, it doesn't need legs strong enough to carry it. The knee joints are a bit loose, which gives the posing some real puppet quality. The feet could have had a bit better shaping, but 2x4 will do.

The sword is exactly the same to Ämkoo's sword Genesis; They are a pair. After losing Aeon to The Marionette, Ämkoo stole Genesis from his old master Atya's grave. I though it was natural to build them identical.

-Eero

Here's another important Klaanon character after The Marionette, though this one does only have two Bionicle parts (matoran feet) and two TECHNIC pieces (Hole with a pin and a blue axle-pin). But yes, Superintendent Harkel of the Blue Cloaks Nui-Koro, the greatest village on the Island of Bio-Klaani, after the city grown around the Clan's fortress. Harkel's the cop of the village. Not the chief, no, and he once was suspended because his inquiries about the Mayor Tahae's tax avoidance crimes. Harkel's veteran cop, he has seen crime and knows his city (which is, by the way, already invaded by the Nazorak Empire).

But in reality, Harkel is a police moustache connected into a matoran. The moustache is important. The narrator loves it.

Harkel is a Po-Matoran and a large one. He has a black Faxon, Hahli Mahri's mask, which I built using SYSTEM pieces as Faxon is not available in black and Harkel's version differs from the underwater Mahri version. I'm very happy with the result. Harkel has a bit sad stare, almost beagle-like. He also has a cop helmet.

The main gimmick here - aside the moustache - is the blue cloack, Nui-Koro's Police Department's main symbol. It also has the crab badge, Hahnah crab being the signature animal of the village (in contrast to Bio-Klaani's silver ussal on blue background). I built the cloak very dramatically on one shoulder, covering the left arm. I'm very happy with it - I fortunately gathered some dark blue curved slopes from Bricklink a few months ago.

I also gave Harkel some police accessories. He has a stick, a badge (compass), and a "Wanted" poster of a mayor's mook. Alright, the mook looks quite a bit like a minifig, and those are not really bionicle letters, but anywhy... The handcuffs are too small for Bionicle figs so let's say it's pocket watch's chain.

In addition, here's a photos of two another Klaanon creations, built by friend "Snobie" using my parts - Blue Cloak's secretary Suflerly (Or Sulfrey?) and Gahlok Va (Some sort of a librarian gnome; Definitely not a half-bohrok).

-Eero

I turned the loo's taps to puke sewage!
I set Volmar's toupee to fire, sank his Corvette to the canal!
That's right: I am the postman of Job!
The prophet of the doctrine of unpositive attidude, yes!

I am the mole, scumbags!

Earthmover! Terminator!

Under your dwellings I shall dig my catacombs!

And I shall not wait for your invitations but I'll invite myself;

For your guest, for your blight, and your home is my castle!

Your kitchen into a Turkish sauna and customer in there!
So I sit on a freezer, ladling water to the stoves! Yes:
I nest in shallow waters!
I nest in shallow waters!

Ch.:

And now I'm having a Polaroid hidden in the ceiling...
A recorder behind a painting...
And harm watch will be harm catch!

And in those days one fellow raved the whole month about mammals...

After a hurricane snatches the furniture I shall eat the chosen bits
of your lawn and the small feet groove all night...
And when "ring ring" says the phone inside the head
The ambulancemen don't say even that!
Buy this:

Ch.:

And your mole goes:
And nests in shallow waters!
Rises out from your hot tub...
Now!

Yeah. This needs probably some explanation. The MOC is inspired by song Minä olen myyrä, I Am a Mole, by Finnish hardcore-proge-rock-something band YUP (1987-2009). Minä olen myyrä was recorded and released two times; Firstly as a demo-ish version on a EP with same name in 1993, and in 1994 on story album Toppatakkeja ja Toledon Terästä. The song was composed by Valtteri Tynkkynen and written by Jarkko Martikainen. The English translation seen up there was done by me, moment ago.

The song can be listened on Youtube's music service, EP version here and final version here.

As the background information, the song is about singing detective Henri Blavatsky who inquires the happenings at the unfortunate factory and terrorizes the mansion of the factory owner Volmar Pätsi. This song is about that terror: One-man underground army versus the manor, or "Molework", myyräntyö in Finnish.

The MOC grew a lot bigger than intended. I made the head a year ago, and was about to build sort of mole-earthmover-terminator-mecha, but the idea didn't fly. So the head kept staying on my tables, until couple a months ago when I made the grin better and got interested on this project again. The head design, and the whole mole, is based on the cover art of Minä Olen Myyrä EP by Jarkko Martikainen.

On the first sketch, the MOC was 16x16 or 20x20 studs but otherwise quite similar. But when I started to build the mole, the armchair turned out to be 16x16 studs and as I was going to place diagonally, the base had to be bigger, so I used 32x32 modular base. The mole became a bit more relaxed posed, which looked great. I'm especially happy with the face and the eyes, as they were the last tweaks. I also gave him a couple of wine bottles to go with the monocle and the cigar. I also added some catacomb digging accessories - I'm quite proud of that spade.

There had to be environment. There are those huge stone pillars, which ate pretty much all of my dark bley inverted slopes. They support the upper level, which has Volmar's terrorized mansion in mini-scale. I like the size contrast between the huge mole and the small mansion.

For the mansion, I searched some mansions on google images but ended up with rather traditional, grandiose European design. I think the coats of arms work great on the gate and the facade. Then there are some basic minifig leg greebles and windows built using groove 1x2 bricks. The molework includes sewage raining from the loo window, steam rising from the kitchen, a cypress tree on fire and mole mounds all over the lawn.

-Eero

PS. I nest in shallow waters!

The story behind this MOC ei rather unfortunate. It was going to be Balin in his battle costume from Battle of the Five Armies to go with Dwalin posted a few weeks ago. I it looked quite good with the studded leather armor and all, but was way too fragile for my standards; The arms kept falling of all the time and there were some mathematical problems. So I got rather irritated by it and quited, but had already reworked a rather nice new Balin head. The old version from 2012 had been seriously outdated with the more recent dwarves on my Hobbitsplosion project, so I decided to give old Balin the new head. It turned out rather challenging, as the torso built two and a half years ago wasn't very sturdy, so I ended up reworking the whole dwarf.

There were a lot problems on the older version. There were too much straight lines, some of the cloak details didn't exist, and somehow it lacked the puffiness of the character. Balin's coat is my favourite piece of clothing in the Hobbit movies; It looks so comfortable (though it wasn't according to the actor Ken Stott; Which is understandable with all the prosthetics, beard, nose, fat suit and all).

The angle of the arms was another thing that looked unnatural, even though it is somehing expected for LEGO bricks. It was hard to get the angle right without making the shoulders too wide or too thin and allow some trimmings to the sleeve. There are also some dark bley details on the overcoat. The gloves are redone. Boot toes are new too (though the studs look a bit out-of-place) but the cheese-slopes-in-trans-black-panel detail is the same than in the original. The inner construction is a lot more solid than on the old MOC. That's it, basically.

I think I'll be able to post Dain II Ironfoot later this week, as reguested by many. Stay tuned for that, the guv's missing only a few parts now; He has a lot. But for then, enjoy Balin. He's a nice guy. My favourite dwarf from the Hobbit.

-Eero

Good mornings. What we have here today is Dain II Ironfoot, Lord of the Iron Hills, King under the Mountain of Erebor and that Billy Connoly dwarf boss who rode the pig. Yes, pig included. Couldn't resist, always liked them pigs.

Dain has been the hardest dwarf to build because the riding stance with the pig. I began with the head, as usual, and helmet, as unusual, as Dain is the only dwarf so far with one. It came out rather nicely, even though my pearl silver collection is limited. I'm especially happy with the gold details around the face slit.

After the head I built the upper torso and the arms, though I had to rebuild it few times as it was too wide. The big dark brown fur cape (I'd like to think it's bear skin, just because) covers most of the armor and upper arms anyway, so it wasn't that hard. I had fortunately quite good array of dark brown plates (1x2 and 2x6 mostly) from last years LUGBULK so it wasn't a problem.

The lower arms had similar grey and pearl gold color scheme than the helmet (which was dark bley at the beginning). The fingers of Dain's leather gloves should actually be dark red, but they have big knuckle armors, so I just simply made them pearl silver; Sole dark red thumb wouldn't have looked that good. The arms have pretty good poseability, the hammer arm having a small ball joint and the harness arm having a t-bar joint. The hammer is similar to Thrain's but has two edges instead. The beard didn't have any surprised, it came out just as planned, if probably bit shorter in the end. Clip-bars made a nice, edgy beard jewellery.

Before finishing the dwarf itself, I built the pig armor. At first I didn't think 1x4 plate hinges could work on the nape plates, but I was wrong; The angled armor looked a lot better than a flat one. The there was the T-piece, what ever it is called, knob or something, some spike-like armor to slice orcs with, and the saddle; Basic stuff. Getting Dain to sit there was harder, as all of my dwarves have been standing still before this. The armor skirt with grey plates,dark red leather and some chain mail took few tries, as it turned out too big at first. The cape saved me again as I didn't have to bother the back of the skirt. The legs are very thing to go between the saddle and the skirt and they have two small ball joints. Dain can stand but looks ridiculous, as the skirt is rather stiff. The pig, however, work fine on it's own, as you can see at the end of this post.

The pig caused some problems as I had already built the armor and I had to fit it under it. Well, I always used to build most of the houses and other building from roof to floor so had some experiences... Well, I made the face first, despite having a little reference material; the pig design changed a lot from the concept art on Weta's Chronicles books. The face come out rather expressive. There are some crazy SNOT inside as the whole pig had to be odd studs wide due to the armor, which had one-stud wide base. There were some illegal connections at some point, caused by 1/4 plate offset or something, but I fixed it. Otherwise the shaping was quite fun. I used dark bley and old dark grey pieces mixed carelessly, as the pig definitely isn't very clean fellow. Then there had to be the pigtail, curvy as it should be, and as the animal had some nasty tusks I though it as male.

So, this is Dain and the pig. Now I have a few WIPs left waiting to be finished. Of course there are some, or several, but it somehow feels like starting fresh on new projects. We'll see for that, I'm not promising anything. I'm still having two moths of work on the civilian service, but after that, plenty of time for building (and less money).

-Eero

Let's give these bastards a good hammering!

Hey! This is not Hero Factory MOC. Definitely not a revamp of Breakout Breez (which is the best Hero set there was). Nope, this is a Klaanon MOC. Breez (second) is one of ~~four~~ three Selakhian (Pridak and Same's species) sisters, known as Breznikova Triplets (Formerly Breznikova Quartet; Kova is plural suffix on Selakhian language). They were Xian bounty hunters until the eldest one died at the hands of Purifier. Now they are part of organization called Nascosto working for Killjoy and the seek avenge on Purifier.

Their real backstory is different. Last summer me and this guy called Jörbäle (whose Klaanon characters this and Killjoy and Purifier) were wandering around the horrible city of Kajaani. We were about to buy ice cream (why not) but found some 2€ Brain Attack Breezes and 5€ Bruizers (terrible set). So we ended up having three Breezes and two Bruizers, and it turned out like this.

Some eleven months later I was just reading Klaanon, no big deal. And suddenly, three bounty hunters named Brez.

Some ten moths later I was reading Klaanon again, no big deal. And suddenly, Dance battle between Breznikova triplets and Vatuka "Bruiser" Brothers hired by Roodaka on Xian nighclub yatch XMS Donovan. Yeaaaah. And it didn't stop there, I tell you.

This is the second oldest of Breznikova. I drew some inspiration from these Matobro's drawings, but took also some heavy liberties concerning colors and the mask especially. I began working with the legs and they turned out well quite quickly; The kneepads were already ordered from Bricklink. I really like the dark red color splashes on the inner thigh. The armoring of the boots looks quite neat too.

I wanted to have an armor coat with long tails to give some "officer quality" to this MOC as this Brez is the oldest one alive. Use of those Technic panels and wing pieces were there from the beginning. Rocket heel shoes with breakout armor created quite heavily armored upper torso, and not using those road armor add-ons was out of question. Piraka flipper on the back is connected via Cordak bullets to create similar pattern than on the chest plate.

The arms are rather simple, basic bone on the upper arm (it doesn't move very freely) and axle with ball joints on the lower part (The best technique with CCBS). My basic hand design, presenting heavy glove, is used hre connected to a shell with T-bar.

The head is custom-build as any Breez heads were too small. I'm happy with it. The white patterns were a bit forced as I didn't have any lime brackets, but I quite like them. The mask looks a bit less flat with them.

Brez's weapons are combination of Brain Attack and Breakout Breezes. The holo shield and sword pieces from the Breakout version are seriously underused but cool parts. The blade weapon has similar construction to Brain Attack version, being bendable and agile yet hard to use. Every one of the Breznikova has that sort of weapon with different blades.

-Eero

I play no blues, I play po'n'roll!

This is Toa Kyberi, Toa of Sonic, tetriary member and Po musician of safehaven organization Bio-Klaani. He's adored ans squeee'd by most of the citizens because he can rock so freaking hard. And he has frigging rocking ~~hairstyle~~ helmet and gorram cool ~~bare chest and leather jacket~~ interesting armor design. His natural choice of weapon is an Axe-Guitar plugged into ~~Marshall~~ Barraki amp. I think it is more of a guitar than an axe, because it's easier to beat people with a guitar than play power chords with an axe.

Kyberi is a tertiary character and has couple of appearances. In 2011 or something he beat the hell out of two Zyglak pillagers with his heavenly beats. And on last December in my posts he was part of a ruse of distraction where a few not-that-important characters played some Po-Music to Nazorak invaders on a boat BKS Hildemar to keep their focus out of their Air Force's support station to allow Clan's spies to get in.

Kyberi was never described except for the Axe-Guitar. I got some pieces from Bricklink (AFOL Supply, excellent store for CCBS parts) on Friday and looked at Queen Beast upper jaw (didn't have any of those beast heads before, they were sooo expensive) and though that hell, add some wedge plates and some good mask and that would make great Elvis Presley/Rockabilly/Teddy- style hair. Bionicle character doesn't have much hair though (except facial hair on Klaanon, of course, facial hair!), so it is freaking rocking cool helmet. The rest of the MOC was built around that idea. The mask was chrome silver Hau (Rua) at the beginning, but I though there was already too many Hau characters and Miru's emotion was just perfect. Rock'n'roll! The golden streaks iced the cake.

I was firstly going for rather basic grey Toa-of-Sonic color scemed armor, but didn't got any good ideas. Grey and silver are so dull... So I separated the shades and went for strong black-and-white contrast and a leather jacket. The jacket was dark pearl grey at first, but didn't have enough pieces on it. The black was a lot better, and allowed buffed up rock'n'roll shoulders. The arms are basic-CCBS with some Technic cams. The legs are not that exciting, but they use dark pearl grey parts as I just had to include the super cool amplifier armor add-ons from Breakout Stringer (Breakout was great) to this MOC. They were on shoulders, they were on gauntlets, they were as a belt buckle (Didn't work, trust me), but they eded up on the knees.

Then there was the Guitar-Axe. I tried several blade designs (There are WAY TOO MUCH Bionicle blade pieces, but most of them are buried deep in the cupboard), including Mata Nui shield half Flying V and Axonn's mega-axe basic models, but those Antroz blades had just sweet profiles and I went for them, connecting them via three-axle-connector and adding the SYSTEM-build simple fretboard. I knew I had to build an amp too. Making one using those 8x8 grate plates had been on my mind for some while and there was a perfect chance. I also added the iconic protective covers to the corners and some controls to the top. The amp was also excellent accessory while photographing the creation. Kyber turned out hell of a cover boy.

Rock on.

-Eero

Here's my newest big project finished, Savoia S-21 flying boat from my favorite movie ever, Hayao Miyazaki's Porco Rosso, in miniland scale.

I saw Porco Rosso for the first time in around 9 years ago when our local cinema featured old Ghibli films on their smallest screen. I instantly loved it, like every other Miyazaki film (expect Howl's Moving Castle. Never liked that one much.), but with time it grew better and better. It's undoublty one of Miyazaki's lighter movies, compared to Mononoke or Nausicaä for example, but also one aimed more to mature audiences; it worked perfectly on me when I was 11 or 12, with air pirates and dogfights and all the humour, but it clearly has references to facism, The Great Recession on so on. And every character is just so natural, they have clear sense of who they are. At least on the Finnish translation; English dub keeps explaining obvious things a bit too much for my liking, haven't seen it but there's the screenplay on Art of Porco Rosso book which I used as a reference material here.

I've built Porco's seaplane two times before. The first version was built immendiately after seeing the movie and there is no photos taken. The second version was built in 2009 and the photos can be found in the Brickshelf folder if old good 'shelf isn't down. Those were somewhere between minifig and miniland scale. This one was built in Miniland scale because the engine worked the best on it and it made it possible to build an accurate fig of Porco to the cockpit. Accurate pig minifigs do not exist.

A word or two must be said of Porco's plane here. It is Savoia S-21, though the name doesn't appear in the film. The plane model is not real, but Savoia is actual Italian plane manufacturer. The design of Porco's seaplane, despite looking a bit odd, isn't that far from the reality; Miyazaki based it on Macchi M.33, which lost to American Curtiss R3C-2 in 1925 Schneider Trophy race, as referred by Porco at Hotel Adriano's club. Donald Curtis, Porco's rival, flies modified Curtiss R3C-2 in the film. Savoia S-21 has water-cooled 12V 12 600 hp Isotta-Fraschini Asso engine, its maximum speed is 330 km/h and it is armed with two 7.92 mm Spandau machine guns. My MOC represents the plane as it is at the beginning of the movie. It get a major overhaul at Piccolo's in Milano.

I began working on this last summer. I whipped up the engine, most of the fuselage and a prototype of the wings in rather short time, and then the project halted. A few moths later I made a Bricklink order and bough the curved sloped for the wings. The project halted again. It was announced that Finnish LUG Palikkatakomo would have an exhibit on an anime convention in Kuopion, medium-sized Finnish city 150 kilometers from me. I would naturally take part. Our theme was "popular culture overall" (con's theme, "Sport in anime" was a bit too small...) but I though it would be nice to have some anime stuff too, especially when Miyazaki's art has always had so huge influence on me. So I decided to finish Porco's flying boat. It took two Bricklink orders more and painly designing with pontoons, which are a bit offset to put them on line with the fuselage; The support cords were tricky too. This is not super sturdy, but stays on one piece with some swooshing and basic handling. The angled wings were challenging. The rest on two 4x4 plates with four studs.

I had worked on things based on reference photos before with my Hobbit project, but this was quite different. It was more shape and measure-based model than those dwarves. Fortunately Art of Porco Rosso book had plenty of photos, including the blueprints of the plane. I managed to make it rather polished and aerodynamic. There are some studs on the sides, but I'm not bothered by them as there isn't much substitutes for those 12x3 wedges. The wings and the rudder took lot of curved sloped, but it was totally worth it. The details populate the engine, which was a pleasing bit to build. The propellor was a tricky bit: Two minifig hammer go inside the 2x2x3 cone, 1x1 cones are connected to them. There weren't any proper yellow propellor pieces so I had to built it. It doesn't spin freely.

I also built the pilot himself, Marco Pagotti, the Crimson Pig. I have been fiddling with character builds a lot lately so it was just natural. Not easy though, as it was challenging to make aviation goggles, snout and the handlebar moustache in such a small space. It came out quite well. It's also fun that the handlebar moustache is actually a handlebar...

Savoia S-21 also needed a base. It needed to be slightly angled to make the display dynamic. I first tried to build it in white, but didn't have enough TECHIC bricks of liftarms, so I made it black and tiled it nicely. The plane was just small enough to fit in my photo studio and the pictured turned out nice.

It's better to be a pig than a facist pig. Remember that, boys and girls all over the world.

-Eero

Here's another MOC from Klaanon universe, the original "Femme Fatale" from 2010, Sheelika. She is a Toa of electricity with some apparent shadow powers. She was a friend of Tawa before the founding of Bio-Klaani and later followed her there. Desperate incidents led him to murder some matorans and Guardian ordered her to be executed; However, Tawa's mercy changed the sentence into exile. Sheelika was driven into Destral where some nasty stuff happened; That is unknown by the time, but something formed Sheelika into the dark and hateful person she currently is. She tried to eliminate Tawa earlier, but was beaten by the yellow admin. She escaped from Clan's cells with help from Zorak von Maxtrillian VIII Arstein's Avhrak Feterra.

It is a bit surprising that I haven't built Sheelika before as she is rather old Klaanon character. One reason is that there is already a MOC built by character's creator. An another reason is that Sheelika hasn't dome much lately due to inactivity of some authors. However, playing Sheelika on Salsa (Official Klaanon strategy card game) got me interested on the character (there were plenty of interesting artwork on the game (including several of my MOCs and drawings as well), as every character has three different cards (basic, good temper, bad temper)) and I decided to whip up my own version.

The scale here is quite large, probably biggest of my current Klaanon figures. I needed enough scale to work with right parts and shapes here; I had rather strong visions from the beginning. The torso is very similar to Tawa's, with CBBS chest armor and roborider face under it. The Inika shoulder pads make the flank shaping once again, a trick I use rather often. The shape achieves humanoid muscles rather nicely, leaving a cutting for the shoulder axle.

I happened to ditch most of dark blue. The stark contrast between black and white looked cool and worked well with Sheelika's backstory. I think the curved line between the sides looks rather slick, while white hands and shoes balance the scheme. Dark blue is used on the inner upper arms, inner thighs and the mask for the same reason.

There are nothing special on the legs; they use my standard female leg design seen on Karmenna and Belsa with a high heel modification (Sheelika is the femme fatale of the story so pardon the impractical footwear choice). The feet design originates from Japanese builder TAN, but I've modified it using these cool toothed TECHINC connectors. Still not sure how the original design with 90 degree connection works, probably stressing the brick; I never figured it out. 3L CBBS bone (best CBBS piece) enables the connection between bohrok feet and rahkshi leg and creates a nice profile.

I wanted the arms to have radically different designs. The black one ended up with the spiky KK2 armor as in the reference material, and the spiky feel continued through the limb. The white side is more aerodynamic and stylised. This motif is used on the weaponry, too; the brutal shield consists of the black spiky underside and odd, curved white area. This is not a piece of protective equipment, it's going to hurt people. Sheelika also has a spear, as she was a Toa Hagah, Guardian-Toa. I'm quite happy with the white tail, piece circling around the bright blue blade.

Weapons aside, Sheelika needed some extra equipment to catch the femme fatale noir feel. The wide-brim hat appeared on the card game, and while it isn't exactly canon, it was just a perfect posing tool. The reference material had a noble trans-blue Ruru (I think I originally suggested it) but I didn't want to went for it for several reasons; It was way too small, overused, and the mask isn't even Ruru in the story but a mask of hypnosis (though this has been discussed about; Most think that Sheelika doesn't need a mask of hypnosis to lure people.) I also gave her a dark blue short cape (KK2, King Mathias I think) and a vampire-esque collar to go with it to add some masquerade.

-Eero

Here's another Bricks of Character with a facial hair of huge magnitude, but this is not from The Hobbit films. This manly man is Lord Yupa from Hayao Miyazaki's over thousand-page long Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind comic (or manga, if you like, and also in the film adaption, but I prefer the manga for it's a lot more powerful). He's the mightiest swordman of Fukai, the Sea of Corruption, protagonist Nausicaä's mentor and overall very very cool man who either kicks ass or (more often) prevents others from kicking each other's ass.

Yupa was a rather easy build. I had already built another Nausicaä character (coming soon) and I had to make Yupa on the same scale (something between miniland and dwarves). The head ended up two studs and two plates wide with the hood. I was going with a plank face but added a cheese slope nose as it looked perfect. The moustache is as huge as it should be (though it seems to transform froma moustache to a full beard during the comic; compare book 1, page 17, 10th panel (original right-to-left print) and book 7, page 68, panel 4. Well, there's 12 years between drawing these panels) and covers most of the head. Yupa also has his brimmed hat. I first tried to build it using dark orange 6x6 dish, but it was too small. The barrel was a last-minute mod and I'm very happy with it. It's slightly angled. The dark flesh band adds some color to the MOC.

The torso is very basic stuff, similar to the dwarves. The binoculars represent the bullet pockets. I decided to cover the arms with the cape to achieve a dramatic effect; that's how Yupa usually appears, after all. This made building a lot easier. The trousers use a neat technique combining 2x4 curved slopes with Travis bricks. Boots are pretty basic stuff, with a little trick of using a very old car tyres that look almost dark tan. They have a nice old beat-up feel on them, which works rather nicely on this character. I also made a little base with some toxic spores of Fukai.

Also as I said, I have built an another Nausicaä character and I'm possibly (likely, definitely?) doing more. Stay tuned.

-Eero

Here's the second character on my Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind series. This is Kushana, the princess of Torukmenia. My MOC is based solely on the manga, as she is entirely different character on the movie adaption (and has a golden armor, orange hair and white cape). In the comic Kushana is definitely one of the best characters, being a great example of Miyazaki's character that is neither entirely good or bad; Though she's a bit more on the protagonist side, at least in the last volumes.

I built Kushana before Yupa and she took a lot more time. I tried to build her a few months ago, using 1x1 plates with tooth as the scale main, but that turned out impossible. Now some weeks ago I though that cheese slopes could do the same trick easily, and I had hundreds of them in light bley from LUGBULK. The scale mail consist of simple SNOT. The upper torso area was more challenging, with the half-circle shaped chest plate and the neck guard. I reworked the shoulders a few times.

The limbs came out rather nicely. The are full clad in plate armor, so they look rather natural. The boat stud joints are quite stiff but allow some movement. The posing is based on the cover art of issue 3 (see below), a gorgeous watercolor by the master himself. I tried to make the flag pole, but abandoned it due technical difficulties and ended up with a different posture with the sword. This one is a bit more realistic.

The head was challenging, as they usually are, but 2x2 curved slope with some cheese slopes worked rather nicely. 1x4 double curved slopes (wonderful pieces) made a nice headress. The hair is dark tan to work with the tan skin; Kushana cut her braids upon witnessing her soldiers dying.

The cape was a nightmare. Kushana needed a flowing cape like in the reference material. I wasn't sure about the color, as the manga is in black and white, but the cover art it looked dark red or dark purple. I don't have much purple so I went for the dark red, which is definitely one of the best LEGO colors. I had some dark red wedge plates, but arranging them correctly and in the correct layers wasn't easy; I had to build it two or three times. Those 4x18 or something wedges added some bulk and shape to it, and they are such stupid pieces anyway that I'm glad to have them on a MOC somewhere rather than consuming space on their box...

I also built a small deserted base, as Kushana's legs are not very stable and the cape deems some balancing.
-Eero

Volume 3 cover art by Hayao Miyazaki, scan by minitokyo.net

After building Yupa and Kushana from Hayao Miyazaki's Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind manga, it was just natural to build the hero herself, Nausicaä.

There were a lot of reference material as Nausicaä appears on every cover art except volume 3 and on six watercolor posters included in the books. I chose to build her in the modified Dorok costume dyed blue by Ohmu's blood on volume 2. The chest with white and red ornament was the beginning point along with the bullet pockets similar to Yupa's (common on Eftalian costumes). Shaping was a bit challening here, but TECHNIC pin with 90 degree hole helped here - such a great piece, I'll get 100 from LUGBULK soon. That connects the upper part to 4x4 round brick and enables the 45 degree angle of the upper torso.

The skirt was another hard point. It took three times to get it right; The first one was too loose and the legs were unnaturally close to each other and the second one was too boxy. The final result is sturdy and solid and mixel joint connected legs have some poseability.

Limbs were pretty painless; the feet were not that simple but came out nicely. Some CBBS shells are used there, as they were perfect for Nausicaä's gaiters and I had plenty of them in blue. The arms are not that poseable, and rather blocky anyway, but I think the work well on this MOC. The shoulder connection was bit of a compromise, as I didn't have any 1x1 tiles with clip. The right arm has a bandage tied by Asbel (and re-tied by Mito).

As her accessories, Nausicaä has his ceramic knife with a little bag, Eftalian rifle (last minute addition) and of course her fox-squirrel friend Teto.

I photographed Nausicaä using only one backdrop sheet, as Bricknerd's Tommy noted that the old studio wasn't perfect on his blogging on Kushana (Thanks Tommy). It looks rather nice now, right?

-Eero

Poster of volume 3 by Hayao Miyazaki, scan by Minitokyo.net

Hello folks and sorry for some inactivity recently. I have been travelling far and wide. My civilian service (alternative for almost-obligatory military service in Finland) ended two weeks ago, and I had a week-long trip with three friends in Th Great Britain (four nights in London, three nights in Scotland (Edinburgh, Glasgow, ROY frigging BRIDGE, BritRail passes, three LEGO stores, six Pratchett books, Jamaican take-away and sitting inna pub). That was great. I bought two big and one small PaB cups, the Steampunk Mixels (they are a jolly lot) and a set of build-your-own minifigures.

Now I'm idle. No job, no income, no worries. I have still some money from my civil service salaries, so I can cope without problems. I didn't really have a summer holiday, so I'll just concentrate on art project and stuff for a while, and try to get into a university when it's possible. Today included ceramic sculpting, raspberry picking and photographing some MOCs, as you can notice.

Yes, the creation. This is Mito, the sergeant-of-arms (according to Internet; Finnish translation doesn't tell his rank and addresses him only as one of the castle granddads) of the Valley of the Wind on Hayao Miyazaki's Nausicaä manga (and the film too, though this is based on the comic, as the rest of my Nausicaä figures). Mito's one of the main supporting characters on the manga, appearing on every issue, usually piloting Valley's destructive and ancient gunship and aiding Nausicaä and Yupa on their missions. He's loyal and down-to-earth type character with a remarkable moustache - all signs of traditional miyazakian supporting character! He also has an eye-patch, which is a cool plus.

This MOC was built in two parts, before and after my trip. The first part (Head and torso, mostly) was rather chaotic, as my godfather/uncle was visiting us and his 5-year-old son (my cousin, that is) was super exited of my bricks, Star Wars and Ninjago especially. That is alright to me, the minifigs are made to be played with and I don't have that much use to my old SW stuff, and I'd loved to had an AFOL cousin when I was at that age. But of course it's a bit challenging the concentrate on figure building in the middle of all that enthusiasm and hype...

I finished the build after the trip. It didn't took that much time. The gloves were bit challenging, as well as the head's slight tilt. The color scheme wasn't that easy neither. Miyazaki's manga in in black and white, and I didn't want to use the movie as a reference material, as Kushana's color scheme differs vastly between the formats, for example. I tried sand blue and other combinations of greys and browns, and ended with this one. The brown was good for the gloves and the trousers because my inventories, and I didn't want to make the torso dark tan as it would have looked to much like Yupa.

This is the last of Nausicaä figures for some while; I have other stuff to post, though I might return to this subject later. I also bough recently Art of Laputa book from Amazon, so I might be making some other Miyazaki stuff soon. But before that, some group shots:

-Eero

Yeah yeah, on the last post I said Mito would be the last Nausicaä figure for a while, well nope. I was asked to build Kurotowa, and I'm building Charuka/Chikuku as a one MOC, so suspect them to be finished before other stuff being posted. But don't worry, I have two finalized and photographed MOCs waiting.

Kurotowa is an old soldier obsessed with ambition, according to his own words. He's not a bad man by any means, and usually tried to adapt to the current situation. He was sent to look after Kushana by her father, King Wu, but Kurotowa concluded that his final reward would be death in any case, so he ends up just playing along. On the film he's something like traditional Disney minor villain, but the manga naturally boosts the character and makes him a bit more likable. Very human man, Kurotowa, in some way. Also a very good aircraft pilot, having flown those crappy Torukmenian corvettes for years.

The main challenges here were the colors. In the film he has a blue cloak and a green suit. I really didn't look for the same colors, but ended up something similar, mostly due to the parts I had available by the time. He ended up having a purple cape and dark green suit, something a bit grandiose as he came from the Royal War School. The green suit had also nice military feel on it. The hair and facial hair became dark tan, to fit with Kushana. The gloves and the trousers (using old smooth car tyres) are black purely due to inventorial reasons.

The torso is five-stud-wide with some added wedge slopes. The odd width was challenging to work with, especially with dark green being a bit rarer color, but 6 studs would have looked too muscular and 4 way too puny. Kuorotwa had to be a bit slimmer than Yupa or Mito, but still more masculine than Kushana or Nausicaä. I also made him a little bit shorter than Kushana (tallest figure on the series). One more tyres on the trousers were a last-second mod before photographing to balance the heights. Yeah, I took some shots with Kushana, but they didn't turn out that good. Didn't manage to find a horizontal bit of our yard (which is rather angled - I take photos outside for better lighting) and Kushana needs some heavy balancing due her heavy cape and dynamic posing. She didn't manage to stand up very much...

But anyway, this was Kurotowa. Glad I picked up those 1x2 dark purple tiles on a LEGO store somewhere in Britain, despite not liking the color that much.

-Eero

Here are the last Nausicaä MOCs for now. Yeah, I said that on Mito, but my original plan-ish also included Charuka and Kurotowa and here they are now. And Chikuku thrown in as a extra, but he's a small lad anyway.

Charuka (Chalka in the Finnish translation) is one of my favourite characters from Hayao Miyazaki's Nausicaä manga. He's another Miyazakian character without clear good/bad status, but he's definitely a practical person who puts his people's well-being above everything else. He's first seen as an antagonist, being the field commander of the Siege of Sapata in the third volume, but in other hand he's trying to get back his people's hometown and free the prisoners here. He's also a priest and a monk, as Dorok leaders usually are.

Chikuku is a kid with strong mental powers found by Nausicaä near ancient Dorok shrine, but everything else about him is rather spoiler-ridden, so let's not talk about them, alright?

The big and sloppy sleeves were the most challenging part here, but fortunately the color scheme was very easy to work with. There are again no colored pictures on him, but I always imaged the cloak being black and dark red. The white bandage adds some contrast.

The head differs a bit from the unusual style on these Nausicaä figs, but Charuka has a wide and large head, so it was quite fitting. Chikuku is rather simple and has boat-stud face.

That's all for now. Tomorrow there will be some group shots again, and on Saturday is Klaanon's fifth birthday and I will naturally post something for it.

-Eero

Old MOC Revamp: Matoro the Blacksnow

Super important Klaanon stuff: Solid Snowman

Juts because: The Warriors of the Northern Wilderland

MOC: Dwalin - Battle of the Five Armies

MOC: The Marionette

MOC: Superintendent Harkel

MOC: I Am A Mole

MOC reboot: Balin

MOC: Dain II Ironfoot

MOC: Brez II

MOC: Toa Kyberi

MOC: Porco Rosso's Savoia S-21

MOC: Toa Sheelika

MOC: Lord Yupa

MOC: Princess Kushana

MOC: Nausicaä

MOC: Mito

MOC: Kurotowa

MOC: Charuka & Chikuku

Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind group shots!