I don't know if it would help to imagine a minifigure James Lipton, but we are pleased to present our first series of interviews with unique and innovative people in the world of LEGO minifig customization. Our first subject is no stranger this blog, being only one of a handful of people to have a post tag in his name. I'm speaking of JasBrick, a customizer out of the UK who specializes in hand-painted and sculpted designs.
We conducted a correspondence over the past few weeks talking about a wide variety of topics relevant to LEGO minifigures. We will be publishing Jas' thoughts throughout the week. Today we begin by having him tell us the story of his Brickviet soldier, a creation he has adopted as his signature, and where much of his LEGO modding experience began...
"The Brikviet soldier or 'Shocktrooper' as I refer to him is still one of my favourite pieces, it just sums up my style, attitude and philosophy in one angry piece of plastic. The development of the Shocktrooper was very organic... I would love to say that it was all planned and I knew exactly what I was doing, but that was not the case here. It all stems from the fact that my 'Dark Ages' involved quite a substantial amount of wargaming and role-playing where the aesthetic was very dark and aggressive, and when you compare that to the cheerful brightness of lovable little minifigs it does not quite gel too well. Therefore I decided to mix the two aspects of my personality by developing a more militaristic approach to LEGO.
The armour itself is made entirely from LEGO parts, albeit cut/glued/painted, and I toyed with a variety of possible combinations before finally arriving at what I have now. The main consideration was to avoid this turning into something that did not look like LEGO, and I know some may disagree but I really feel that it retains the 'minifig'esque' aesthetic. Prior to this fig I had not thought of painting LEGO and it was only to blend the various components together that I decided to have at it with the brush... did I think it would work?...Not really, this was an experiment. The end result was very pleasing (at least to me) and it seemed from reactions on Flickr and BrickArms that others thought so too.
I have adopted this fig as a sort of mascot/signature as I genuinely believe it was the turning point for me personally to say, "Why have self imposed limits that conflict with my imagination?"
Please visit us again tomorrow when we discuss the topics of inspiration, family, and custom houses.
We conducted a correspondence over the past few weeks talking about a wide variety of topics relevant to LEGO minifigures. We will be publishing Jas' thoughts throughout the week. Today we begin by having him tell us the story of his Brickviet soldier, a creation he has adopted as his signature, and where much of his LEGO modding experience began...
"The Brikviet soldier or 'Shocktrooper' as I refer to him is still one of my favourite pieces, it just sums up my style, attitude and philosophy in one angry piece of plastic. The development of the Shocktrooper was very organic... I would love to say that it was all planned and I knew exactly what I was doing, but that was not the case here. It all stems from the fact that my 'Dark Ages' involved quite a substantial amount of wargaming and role-playing where the aesthetic was very dark and aggressive, and when you compare that to the cheerful brightness of lovable little minifigs it does not quite gel too well. Therefore I decided to mix the two aspects of my personality by developing a more militaristic approach to LEGO.The armour itself is made entirely from LEGO parts, albeit cut/glued/painted, and I toyed with a variety of possible combinations before finally arriving at what I have now. The main consideration was to avoid this turning into something that did not look like LEGO, and I know some may disagree but I really feel that it retains the 'minifig'esque' aesthetic. Prior to this fig I had not thought of painting LEGO and it was only to blend the various components together that I decided to have at it with the brush... did I think it would work?...Not really, this was an experiment. The end result was very pleasing (at least to me) and it seemed from reactions on Flickr and BrickArms that others thought so too.
I have adopted this fig as a sort of mascot/signature as I genuinely believe it was the turning point for me personally to say, "Why have self imposed limits that conflict with my imagination?"
Please visit us again tomorrow when we discuss the topics of inspiration, family, and custom houses.
(Pictures via JasBrick's Flickr stream)
