New News from TwoMorrows Publishing

Joe Meno 'tweets' that BrickJournal #14 has gone to the printers to ship on March 23rd. The fourteen issue stands out for several reasons...

First the man behind the Jason Burnett (AKA JasBrick) has scored an interview with Matthew Ashton of The LEGO Group about minifigure designs on several play themes, including the Collectible Minifigures line! An excerpt of the interview can be found on pages 19 and 20 of this pdf preview. You'll have to pick up Brick Journal 14 for the full scoop (you can order a digital copy too).

Not only does the latest issue have Jas' interview, it also contains several feature articles on 'brick animation' and a Minifig Customization 101 article from Jared Burks on 'purist customization'.

Speaking of Jared, his new book 'Minifigure Customization: Populate Your World!' goes on sale April 27th!

You can see it all at the TwoMorrows website.

Site Update: Button, Button, Who's Got the Button

Well, so far BrickForge and Fine Clonier. I've added section to the right-hand sidebar that now has buttons that link to the respective sites. These buttons are non-sponsored links. If we feature sponsored links in the future these will be clearly delineated.

If you are a retailer and we don't show a button...it's because I couldn't find one. If you would like to submit a button for consideration, please send it to uglyduck.bricklink@gmail.com. Please consider a button design that is 200 pixels wide and 50 pixels tall (because that's what I'll size it to). Also retailers will be listed in alpha-numeric order based on their brand name. I welcome any and all submissions, but reserve the right as to who ultimately gets placed.

Relevant retailers, blogs, and resources will continue to be listed near the bottom of the sidebar, regardless.

If you have any questions, please let me know.

Cygnet 

Minister of Information 

Ugly Duck Command Center 

Minifig Nation

Inside the Customizer's Studio: Morgan19

A few weeks ago I was privileged to be able to conduct a series of interviews with customizer JasBrick. Fortune has favored me once again, as I've had the honor to connect with another of my favorite custom designers, Morgan19. Over the past couple of weeks we've corresponded on a number of topics related to LEGO minifigures and customization. Those talks have culminated in the series I share with you now.

I will be sharing segments of our discussions over the next week, similar to my last series. Today we start the conversation by talking to Morgan about some of his work on historical minifigures and his Halloween series. Enjoy!

Since emerging from your 'dark ages' and entering the online scene, much ofyour work has gained instant notoriety. Your set of historical figures is one of those. What is the story of how these came about and then expanded into the 90+ figures we see online?

"Although I’ve been playing (err, building?) with LEGO for just about my entire life, I believe my Historical figures were the first group of LEGO minifigs I’d posted online, originally to Brickshelf and then Flickr.

In 2006 I was living with my wife in an apartment that didn’t have much space for MOC-scale building, so most of my bricks were (and still are) stored over at my parents’ house. Despite that, I’d always keep my collection of figures around just to fiddle with when I had time, so I was particularly intrigued when I stumbled upon a minifig-centric contest Kaminoan (Jared, from The Fine Clonier) was hosting. The goal was to create interesting historical minifigs using nothing but 100% pure, unaltered LEGO pieces–easy enough, given that that was all I had available to me! So I thought “what the heck,” and started researching famous historical people.

For the next week or two I’d come home from work and either immediately startpicking through my minifig parts to see if anything inspired me, or go online and look for photographs that would translate well to an existing LEGO torso or face. I never intended to do 90+ entries for the contest; that was more a side effect of enjoying the entire process than anything.

One of the contest’s rules was that each entry needed to include a link to areference photo of the actual person. I, being quite economical, decided to utilize my 'graphicdesignedness' and integrate the photo into the figure’s image. But as I went along I realized just having a photo plopped next to the minifig didn’t look “finished” enough for my taste: the figure needed a photo, the photo needed a related background, the background needed colors to tie everything together, a title to identify it all, etc... And that’s how my chracteristic Photoshopping of LEGO figures began."

Your Halloween minifigures all seem to have a passage from a book, a stanza ofpoetry, or music lyrics accompany them. What often comes first, the figure or the literature/musical reference?

"Like the Historical figures, my set of constantly-expanding Halloween minifigs started because of another Fine Clonier contest in 2007. Beyond having the Photoshopped graphics for each, I had a simple gut feeling that I wanted to add some creepy flavor text to really push them into the next level of presentation– pairing the visual elements (figure, graphics) together with the mental elements (the feel of overall image paired with the mood of the text) to really emphasize each one’s atmosphere.

Because I’m very much a visual person, more often than not the idea of the figure (or the entire completed figure) comes first, followed by some late-night in-depth Googling to track down a poem or lyrics that pairs with it nicely. (The same is usually true for their graphics and names– more often than not I don’t have those decided until the figure is staring at me in Photoshop. As goofy as it sounds, the figure and I sort of discover each its identity as we go.) So although they tend to be rare, there are a few instances where the text inspires the figure. 'The Shattered Maid' is a good example... I had that Evanescence song stuck in my head for months before finally coming up with a figure I was happy enough to pair it with."

Your references are quite varied. What authors/poets/musicians do you findyourself returning to often when you look for design inspiration?

"I wish I could say I had a tremendous backlog of conscious literary inspiration to draw from, but the ideas usually just come straight from my imagination or, more likely, long frustrating hours of staring at my parts bin trying to figure out something fun to make with parts combinations. So I’d say there’s no dedicated “pool of talent” I turn to for inspiration, but putting a creepy movie on while I’m creating or listening to some moody atmospheric music can work wonders to get the creative juices flowing. Evanescence, Within Temptation, Blackmore’s Night, or even my Celtic/New Age station on Pandora are good for that sort of thing."

Please join us again tomorrow when I talk with Morgan about how his background as a graphic designer influences his work with the fig.

Minifig Customization 101: Collected

Let me start this out by saying, "this is NOT my work". These are only links to the KAM forums where the articles reside. I'm only collecting these in the post for ease of navigation. The articles in each pdf are from BrickJournal magazine and brought to you by Joe Meno and BrickJoural Media. The series is titled "Minifig Customization 101".

As 'The Duck' grows and changes over time, we will be exploring different channels of the minifig universe. One of the most interesting and exciting areas I've found on my journey has been minifig customization. This is one of the three pillars by which I hope to take 'UD' into the future, the other two being official minifig coverage (i.e. the guides) and brick media (brick comics and film).

I hope you enjoy each of these articles as they are the product of a lot of time and passion from those who've contributed. As I find more customization resources over time, they will reside on the right-hand side of the blog, growing the knowledge and, hopefully, size of the community. Enjoy!

Decals

• Minifig Customization 101: Decal Design
• Minifig Customization 101: Decal Application
• Minifig Customization 101: Advanced Decal Application

Modding

• Minifig Customization 101: Altering the Color of LEGO
• Minifig Customization 101: Parts Modification
• Minifig Customization 101: Clay Sculpting
• Minifig Customization 101: Silicon Rubber Mold Making
• Minifig Customization 101: Casting Parts in Resin Plastic

Cloth

• Minifig Customization 101: Cloth Accessories

Digital Photography and Effects

• Minifig Customization 101: Macro Digital Photography
• Minifig Customization 101: Digital Backgrounds
• KAM Forums: Resizing Image Tutorial

(Via KAM Forums and BrickJournal)

Brickmania WWII Battle Sets

Dan Siskind of Brickmania has brought two new custom sets to Brickworld Chicago. The first is a US Marines Minifigure set featuring four minifig marines in the classic (read yellow) style. There are two brick built guns including a .30 caliber gun on a tripod. The set features BrickArms weapons and Fine Clonier decals. The set is exclusive to Brickworld for now but Dan states it will be up at the Brickmania site for $75 plus postage.

The second set is that of a WW II era Japanese Garrison. Also with four minifigures and two guns, the set shows off how good design and great custom parts can come together. The Garrison set also will retail for $75 plus postage.

(Via Brickmania Flickr stream)

Little Legends Hit Girl Kicks Ass

Customizer Little Legends had designed and is currently selling this custom minifig of Hit Girl from the movie Kick-Ass.

The minifigure design is very simple and clean. Custom decals on the torso and face provide the main features, complemented by a hand painted version of hair piece 62711. This bob was recently featured on a variety of LEGO Agents heroes and villains and Irina Spalko from Indiana Jones.

The guns are star corps blasters from The Little Arms Shop, while the cape seems to be typical LEGO fare.

If you look at this reference photo from the movie, you can see that you could further plus this figure to make it just that much closer to its celluloid counterpart.

Although I couldn't find one online, it would be great to have a minifigure tartan skirt to adorn this mini-mite. I did find some decal templates on Flickr, but it would be great to see a rubberized piece to best simulate the pleats and motion of the fabric.

The gloves could be simulated by using BrickForge vambraces with hands in in the same color.

The mobility lost may or may not be worth using part 41879 to duplicate her short stature.

Finally, replacing those blasters with a couple of naginata from Fine Clonier would really seal the deal.

(Pictures via Little-Legends.com and Reel Movie News)

Fine Clonier Custom Minifigures On Sale Tomorrow

Fine Clonier has just announced that they've restocked, reloaded, and are ready to re-open this Saturday at 10 am CST.

A lot of custom Star Wars up for grabs, including versions of Bossk, Aayla Secura, Talz, and Ponda Baba. This custom 4-LOM bounty hunter by Kaminoan is one that definitely caught my eye .

You can go to the site and peruse the vast selection of custom Star Wars figs.

(Picture from Fine Clonier's Flickr account)

Classic Pirates Seeks New Parts

Tom Jacobs (aka Bonaparte) is a LEGO Ambassador for Classic-Pirates.com. Tom took the initiative to survey LEGO Pirates AFOLs and present to TLG their requests.

LEGO Pirates, once classified as an evergreen line, was officially discontinued last year. Likely due to lagging sales. LEGO only released set 10210, Imperial Flagship in 2010.

I think Tom might be appealing to the wrong group. This is an area where many of the custom minifigure parts shops like BrickArms, BrickForge, and Fine Clonier might be more interested in the needs and wants of the Pirates AFOL clan.

Didn't BrickForge come out with minifig pigs before LEGO? Doesn't BrickArms have a line of bayonets? It could even be argued that LEGO didn't take action on certain items until the custom houses dared to tread there first.

Custom shops have done well in areas that LEGO has chosen not to play: World War II, Halo, detailed firearms and weapons.

Now, if I were one of the custom shops, I would want to see more numbers for each of the items that the AFOL groups were seeking. It's likely smaller shops take on more risk if a line fails. The more info they have about a new custom part's success, the more likely they might be to oblige.

Now I can't say if anyone from these shops read this blog, but I would, at a minimum, sent them the presentation and try to bring them to the table.

Fine Clonier Ready for Inspection

Fine Clonier has updated their Flickr stream with this image, asking for you to supply the caption. Although not expressed as a contest (people still do things just for fun, don't ya know), you can't help but come up with a few witticisms...

"The Emperor managed to find a way around the Imperial army's 'don't ask, don't tell' policy"

"Here we have Cindy modeling this Spring's clone army line..."

"When Commander Cindy entered the room, the soldiers weren't the only ones standing at attention"

You know, real mature stuff like that.

The clone army you see here is getting ready for BrickMagic in Raleigh, North Carolina. They will be for sale and feature Arealight and MMCB products.

Bonus points for someone who can tell me where the female stormtrooper has appeared before. I feel like I've seen her, maybe as someone's sig fig, but I just can remember. Help!

(Picture from Fine Clonier's Flickr stream)

Fantasy LEGO League: Sword and Sorcery Fantasy

Today's entry into the Fantasy LEGO League is a bit of departure from our previous posts. In the past we've focused on a very specific line or theme that would have amazing minifigure potential. This time were not only looking at a broader overall theme, but we're actually making a case to expand an area where the LEGO Castle sets have already gone!

Sword and Sorcery Fantasy could either exist within LEGO's Castle/Kingdoms line or go the licensed route with Lord of The Rings or Dungeons & Dragons. We'll discuss the pros and cons of both alternatives along the way.

You can see the "rules" of these posts here.

Must-Have Minifigures: We've seen trolls and dwarves via LEGO Castle, but what about elves, ents, and centaurs?! Most professions in LEGO Castle and Kingdoms have been fairly standard over the years, but with fantasy elements you can have rouges, clerics, rangers, and barbarians. A license on the Lord of The Rings movies would bring forth minifig versions of Hobbits, Gandalf, Strider, Ringwraiths, and Smegol.

Propensity for Vehicles (C): No worse than the current Castle/Kindoms line. Depending on how you view it, however, there is one form of transportation that could really take off...Dragons!

Dragons are not unfamiliar territory for LEGO. Movies like "How to Train Your Dragon" have only fanned the proverbial fire.

Aside from the faithful steed, your kind of stuck with carts and war-wagons otherwise.

Preexisting Fan-Base (A): Sword and Sorcery Fantasy has been around in various forms for years. If LEGO took the licensed route with Lord of The Rings they would likely have the biggest fan base to tap into. Other licenses like Dungeons & Dragons may have a slightly narrower band of fans, but still strong.

Depth of Theme (A): Whether treated as a broad unlicensed theme or diving into the worlds of Middle Earth or D&D there's plenty of areas to mine for ideas.

Kid Friendliness: With the Hobbit more directed towards children (Tolkien's original book was anyway) and a movie supposedly in the works, this could easily have kid appeal. The trilogy, however, was perhaps targeted towards an older teen/young adult audience. Rating (B)

D&D on the other hand has been more heavily targeted toward teens and young adults with rumored (and false) ties to Satanism. Maybe its time to revive the old Dungeon's & Dragons cartoon series? Rating (C)

Expanding on the efforts already put forth by the LEGO Castle/Kingdoms line, these should appeal to children equally as well. Rating (A)

Likelihood of License:LEGO and Warner Brothers have partnered in the past with LEGO Batman, Harry Potter, and Ben 10. New Line is a subsidiary of Warner and has the film rights for Tolkien's books, in fact The Hobbit is currently in the planing stages.

Warner owns UK based Traveler's Tales (TT) Games, the folks who currently make the various LEGO licensed games we all love. In fact representatives of TT Games expressed only a few months ago that a LEGO Lord of The Rings license would be a fantastic idea. It was also announced this morning that Warner bought game maker Turbine, developers of Lord of The Rings and Dungeons & Dragons Online, further deepening Warner's ownership of the license in various forms.

Various aspects of Tolkien's legacy have been tied up in litigation in the past. It may be that a LEGO theme would experience similar problems. Perhaps if the sets focused only on the film versions? Rating (C)

Wizards of the Coast, a subsidiary of Hasbro, produces the various Dungeons & Dragons products. There's no track record of licensed themes based off of a series of games. Also, now that LEGO has their own game division, Hasbro might be reluctant to help a competitor make more money. Rating (C-)

Overall (B-): The main question for LEGO is would it be more profitable using or not using a licensed theme? The Star Wars juggernaut continues to roll on, but is LEGO putting too many of their eggs in a single basket? What would happen if Lucas decided to pull the license? It seems like it would be in TLG's best interest to have some other licensing partners with at least as much pull as the Star Wars franchise. Lord of the Rings via Warner seems like the best candidate. Star Wars has practically become the perennial Space theme, while Lord of the Rings would work nicely with Castle/Kingdoms.

The non-licensed route would be simple enough. There are plenty of fantasy creatures and characters not yet explored via Castle/Kingdoms, and to the best of my knowledge no one really 'owns' these concepts. Its likely that LEGO keeps more of the profits associated with non-licensed themes, but licenses can bring in more dollars overall.

And let's not forget future Collectible Minifigure series. Sword and Sorcery Fantasy figs could easily be added into an upcoming series.

Custom Options: Custom options abound. BrickForge and BrickArms each have medieval and fantasy weapons and armor. Fine Clonier has a series of custom decals based on Lord of The Rings already. In fact there are building instructions on the web on how to create your own custom centaur.

(Pictures from Go Gaming Giant and BrickForge.)

Fine Clonier Brings Mo' Hawk

Fine Clonier updates their Flickr stream once more, this time to bring us this killer mohawk custom.

This fig looks like hes serving 20 to life at the pleasure of the state, but when I look at da 'hawk I think of a Roman centurion helmet.

Kaminoan has been stepping out of his traditional neighborhood of custom decals and I like what I'm seeing.

(Picture from Fine Clonier's Flickr stream)

Fine Clonier Takes Wing

Fine Clonier has updated his Flickr stream to present these finely crafted minifigure wings!

Fine Clonier often deals in custom decals and not minifigure parts, so its uncertain if he created these or if he's sharing the work of another creator.

The wings themselves are fantastic! Obviously custom minifig angels come to mind, but what about a custom Hawkman!

It's also difficult to tell exactly how the wings attach from this picture. It may be that other custom uses for these wings are possible...

(Picture from Fine Clonier's Flickr stream)

Fantasy LEGO League: Marvel's X-Men

Hello? Hello! This Charles Xavier communicating with you through the aid of Cerebro. I'm here to tell you're special and you are not alone...you aren't the only one who thinks there should be a line of LEGO X-Men...

You can see the "rules" of these posts here.

Must-Have Minifigures (A): Cyclops, The Beast, Jean Grey, Gambit, and the one and only Wolverine. We've almost had 50 years of mutants to potentially draw on. Imagine a minifigure Juggernaut or Magneto! Jamie Madrox alone would be an instant battle pack (the real fans know what I'm talking about)...

Propensity for Vehicles (C): I could see a UCS Blackbird or a motorcycle for Wolverine, but not much beyond that. Minifigures and playsets like The Danger Room are more likely to drive this line.

Preexisting Fan-Base (A): 50 years of comics, cartoons, and live-action movies. Nuff said.

Depth of Theme (A): You have Charles Xavier's first students, you have X-Force, X-Caliber, New Mutants. Age of the Apocalypse. If the line gets stale, you can have Grant Morrison come in and reboot the whole series with a psychedelic slant!

Kid Friendliness (A): Kids used to love the movies and cartoons, but its been awhile since I've seen Wolverine on a t-shirt adorning anyone under the age of 12. Although I haven't seen the show myself, the kids seem to like The Super Hero Squad Show on Cartoon Network. If you took it in that direction it might be more appealing.

Likelihood of License (B): Last year Disney bought Marvel to up their 'boy-cred', which is desperately needed in its endless kingdoms of fairies and princesses. This seems like it could be a good fit if the Toy Story and Prince of Persia sets are seen as financial successes.

Overall (B+): If done right, this could hit a sweet spot with both AFOLs and kids, but a balance must be struck. Too mature and parents may shy away. Too cutesy and the AFOLs will pass it by. The 'superhero' lines of the past have been a mixed bag. LEGO Batman was not financially successful until after the sets left the shelves and the video game took off. I don't know how successful the Spider-Man line turned out to be before Mega Bloks got the license in 2004. In the end a lack of vehicles may be the downfall of this idea.

Custom Options: Whenever there's a vacuum in the AFOL community, some creative individuals find ways to fill it.

Kubrick had a line of X-Men figures they sold back in 2004. Although still different from a minifigure form, it gives you a sense of what these could look like. This would be an interesting way to add a 'maxifig' scale with Sentinels.

There have also been countless custom minifigures built with the mutant gene. Fine Clonier has decals for key X-Men. BrickForge has their Savage Mask. I've seen some cool claws for Wolverine, but I've heard they are from the Mega Bloks line (Ack! Competitors!). The new claws from the Prince of Persia line just don't cut it.

It would seem that Magneto is threatening mankind once again. Away to me my X-Men! We still need to build the Blackbird before we can save the day...

Fine Clonier's Autograph and Minifigure Collection

Custom minifig designer Fine Clonier has a really cool collection of LEGO minifigures with autographs he's collected from fan conventions and signings.

Here's how it works, he takes a relevant standard or custom minifigure, puts it on one of these cool display plates, and then has the artist sign it. I've included an example of C3PO with actor Anthony Daniels autograph (he's played C3PO in all six Star Wars films).

The autographs range from actors in the films to the voice-actors on Clone Wars. It's a really cool concept. If only I could figure out where to get a few of those stands...

(Picture from Fine Clonier's Flickr stream)