LEGO's Booth at New York Comic Con

Name of Model: LEGO Systems, Inc. - New York Comic Con 2012

Created by: Creatacor, LEGO

Found at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/creatacor/sets/72157631746209680/

Details: Today's featured model is actually the LEGO company's booth at last weekend's Comic Con, in New York City. Creatacor has photos of both setup and the completed booth. This is the first year that LEGO has had an official presence at this event - in the past they've stuck with the larger Comic Con in San Diego. LEGO was there to announce next year's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles series - you'll notice the turtles and a large TMNT mosaic in many of the photos. Here's a round-up of NYCC photos I've come by that include the LEGO displays. Most of these photosets are of the event in general (I haven't done my usual check for all-ages appropriateness but I doubt there's anything worse than your average superhero costumes). FBTB's official coverage dreyesceron's flickr photos EJP Photo's flickr photos sonicstarlight's flickr photos (focusing on the I LUG NY fan display) Official LEGO Press Release on LUGNET merhawk's flickr photos ericdecker's flickr photos cloudcity's flickr photos saebaryo's flickr photos marchawkins' flickr photos Rad_TV's flickr photos halloween jack

New Year's Eve, 2010

Name of Model: LEGO LUG Showcase Model for Rockefeller Center January 2011

Created by: notenoughbricks

Found at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/notenoughbricks/sets/72157625591250103/with/5311001736/

Details: It's hard to believe that 2010 is coming to an end. We've shared one model here for each of these past 365 days, and it looks like we're good to go for another year. I'm sure that most of my readers are familiar with the popular New Year's ritual of watching a large object dropped near a crowd in a large city - you may also be aware of the annual TV special that features the "ball" dropping in New York City's Times Square. Here we see the best part of that captured in LEGO form (sorry, Justin Bieber fans - most of us only tune in for the countdown). The "ball" here looks great, thanks to the mix of clear plates and translucent 1x1 round plates - apparently it's a variation on the design that Legohaulic provided instructions for. This model will be on display in the Rockefeller Center LEGO store for the month of January, 2011.

Big Apple and More at NYC LEGO Flagship Store

Name of Page: New LEGO NY Store takes a bite out of the Big Apple

Created by various Master Builders for the LEGO company

Found at: http://modelbuildingsecrets.wordpress.com/2010/07/01/new-lego-ny-store-takes-a-bite-out-of-the-big-apple/

Details: This big apple (a play on New York's nickname) will be on display through next Tuesday at New York’s Rockefeller Center. The sculpture was built to commemorate the opening of a brand new LEGO store, which is open now. The store is a "flagship" store, which seems to be like the "Imagination Centers" we've seen sprout up elsewhere. Several smaller sculptures are in the store as permanent fixtures. There are more photos of the shop and sculpture at the recap linked above, alternately you can check out the official webpage for the new store (which has the location details so you can plan your trip). Rounding up additional photos and coverage: MovinOverTheMoon's flickr photos Vengeance of Lego's flickr photos jacquelinemortimer's flickr photos erockonvolks's flickr photos notenoughbricks' flickr photos (focused on the "ribbon"-style models that are unique to this location) Kinzcove's Brickshelf gallery

Citigroup Center, New York

Name of Model: Citigroup Center, New York

Created by: Spencer_R

Found at: http://www.flickr.com/photos/51130204@N04/sets/72157624372848782/

Details: This microscale model of the Citigroup Center in New York (more specifically, downtown midtown Manhattan) is surprisingly recognizable for its small size. The scale of this model is actually smaller than the micropolis standard - in the LEGO world, a term like "microscale" is really a blanket term to describe a variety of sizes that are very small.

I LEGO N.Y.

Name of Book: I LEGO N.Y.

Created by: Christoph Niemann

Available at: Amazon (Disclosure: LMOTD received a review copy)

Details: You may recall that about a year ago, a New York Times blog post featuring sketches in LEGO form of various things (focused on New York city) became something of a viral phenomenon. That post is now coming out in book form, with 13 new illustrations added to the 17 included in the original article. I recently received a review copy and was surprised to find that the book is printed as a small board book - perfect for withstanding use by kids. While none of the sketches are particularly exciting from a technical standpoint, many of them are surprisingly effective at matching the captions. Scale is treated as a non-object, with some pages intentionally referring to things as being at very different scales for comedic effect. Beyond the zen-like simplicity of the illustrations, I think that this book could serve a purpose as a kid-friendly idea book. LEGO hasn't published an official idea book in years (the life cycle of a LEGO set is too short now for that to make any sense - it's no longer safe to assume that a special part will still be available in 6 months, never mind a few years later). While there are many ideas and model photographs online in various venues, I haven't seen anything else that attempts to take very basic (and common) parts and challenges you to see them as everyday objects, people, and places at various scales. Parents who aren't comfortable letting their kids loose online but still want to give their kids LEGO-related ideas will love this (I'm sure it will also help that you could build your own version of anything in the book without more than a handful of parts). While the book is fairly New York-centric, only 6 of the pictures are specific enough to be confusing for non-New Yorkers. While I'd generally point people interested in LEGO and New York towards more advanced models like Sean Kenney's creations, this book might be a bit more appropriate for youngsters (and parents) trying to figure out how to make something evocative with very few parts. I LEGO NY officially comes out on March 1st but Amazon appears to be selling it now.

World Trade Center Vignette

Name of Model: World Trade Center

Created by: Todd Webb

Found at: http://www.toddwebb.com/Lego-WTC.shtm

Details: Generally I try to avoid posting models that could be deemed offensive, but this one is timely and I bet that most people already know what's being depicted in this model. Things to note in this model are the use of scale, the way that the smoke was created using a mottled design of various dark colos, and the great use of half-stud spaces in the facade of the buildings. That fountain looks great too.

This is Wednesday's model of the day.

New York Skyline Mosaic

Name of Model: New York, New York

Created by: Eric Harshbarger

Found at: http://ericharshbarger.com/lego/nyc_skyline.html

Details: Here's one of Eric Harshbarger's mosaics. This one is a bit unusual in that it is made with plates in a studs-out fashion (close up). This provides better resolution than using bricks in a studs-up fashion, but it's not as good resolution-wise as using plates in a studs-up fashion. For those of you not familiar with Harshbarger, he uses a java program of his own design called Pixelego to give him "instructions" for his mosaics. I'm not one to count that as cheating though - it's much more egregious that some buildings were moved to make the image more interesting. In any case, this is another beautiful mosaic from one of the greats of LEGO building.