Luke.stirling

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Maybe this is more aspirational than descriptive.

There are a few things that make a LEGO model stand out if executed particularly well – life in motion, and organic shapes. This build by Timofey Tkachev does both well, with this killer whale in an iconic breaching display. It is strange to know that to date, we have little knowledge on why whales perform this elegant dance of the waves, with only guesses on what it could mean. We still enjoy their majestic maneuvers nevertheless – and find ourselves amazed by it not only in real life but with this cleverly constructed jump that almost seems to be defying gravity.

The post Grace and elegance of an orca whale breaching appeared first on The Brothers Brick.

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Frankly, I'm surprised there are only three mushroom clouds.

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They only have a limited quanted, so while get whilst they're gettable!

Fried rice is a triumph of resourcefulness. It’s budget-friendly, all leftovers are welcome, and there’s no strict formula or ingredient list, just stir-frying cooked rice with whatever you have around — eggs, scraps of vegetables, seafood, or meat — and seasoning the lot of it with soy sauce and garlic. This single-skillet/wok dinner is ready to be torn into in 10 minutes.

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Amsterdam’s 165 canals were created over the centuries to stimulate trade and transport, reclaiming land to expand the city. They continue to define the city’s landscape as a network of ‘water streets’ and in 2010 Amsterdam’s canal ring was recognised as a UNESCO world heritage site. Palixa and the Bricks built a canal corner in LEGO, capturing the essentials of the canal, canal house, and two barges. There’s a busy street scene with a florist, book store and a cheese shop on the ground floors and lots more going on inside the modular buildings.

Each of the buildings has a full interior, with some lovely little builds to furnish the stores in particular. The book store and cheese shop are my own favourites from the array of stores on display.

Even the barges are fully furnished, with this particular resident choosing a vibrant interior complete with floral tablecloth in position.

The post Cruising the aquatic streets of Amsterdam appeared first on The Brothers Brick.

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Maybe we could just make a law that marshmallows have to taste like boiled asparagus?

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Do you enjoy the soothing sounds of moving water? How about the clatter of LEGO crystals jostling together? If so, you’ll love Jarren Harkema‘s perpetual-motion style fountain. Jarren says his creation was inspired by M.C. Escher’s Waterfall lithograph, which depicts water flowing uphill .

The crystal fountain’s gravity-defying effect was achieved by using two Power Functions L-Motors and six ladders held together with 40 gears. To see the fountain in action, check out the video below.

The post A gravity-defying LEGO waterfall appeared first on The Brothers Brick.

Perfectly horizontal.  Really.

Based on the classic "cafe wall" optical illusion.

If you like this, note that the TYWKIWDBI category of optical illusions currently has 68 entries.

Via Boing Boing.

(Reposted from 2017 because I still find it hard to believe...)

Everyone is familiar with driverless cars and driverless long-distance trucks.  Next come crewless ships:

Two Norwegian companies are teaming together to construct a short-range, all-electric coastal container ship that will eventually operate autonomously—eliminating up to 40,000 diesel truck trips per year. The ship, the Yara Birkeland, will begin operations in 2018 with a crew, but it's expected to operate largely autonomously (and crewless) by 2020...

Birkeland will be a relatively small "feeder" cargo ship; its journeys will be short jaunts down a fjord on Norway's Baltic Sea coast from Yara's factory to a larger port. There, containers of fertilizer will be loaded onto larger seagoing ships for international transport. Currently, Yara ships these containers over land.

"Every day, more than 100 diesel truck journeys are needed to transport products from Yara's Porsgrunn plant to ports in Brevik and Larvik," Yara's president and CEO, Svein Tore Holsether, said in a statement issued by the two companies. "With this new autonomous battery-driven container vessel we move transport from road to sea and thereby reduce noise and dust emissions, improve the safety of local roads, and reduce nitrous oxide and CO2 emissions."

Naysayers will note that this development also eliminates jobs. 

I read recently (??where???) an interesting commentary on our new robotic world.  The writer noted that we are now reaching the future that was predicted (and lavishly praised) in our childhood - a world where drones and robots do the drudge-jobs, freeing humans from mindless labor and allowing us to redirect our time and energy to more rewarding tasks.  But now, as this future arrives, it seems to be hurting the common man rather than being a benefit. 

I believe the author postulated that the reason for the lack of improvement for ordinary people is that because of the structure of current economic systems, the benefits of automation only accrue to owners and management, not to employees. 

I would like to find that essay, but I may have read it in a paper magazine (Atlantic, Harpers etc) rather than online.

With so many LEGO D-Day dioramas out there, it is easy to forget other important battles of the time. The siege of Bastogne was the last major German offensive on the Western Front during WW2 and an important turning point. Lasting from 21-26 december 1944, the battle took many lives, as did the frigid cold. This collaborative display depicting the battle, directed by Ekjohnson1, won multiple awards at Brickfair Virginia.

There is so much to see in the diorama, but some of the highlights include the excellent battle damage on the houses, the church, and the forested area just outside the town. Collaborations can be very hard to do with builders of different styles and skills, but the team managed to create a seamlessly flowing whole, a respectable feat indeed.

The attention to detail on some of the buildings is impressive. Check out the frontage on this townhouse…

The post Huge LEGO version of the siege of Bastogne appeared first on The Brothers Brick.

Despite all the different “genres” in LEGO building, there’s something deeply satisfying when our beloved bricks are used to build a really nice house. This creation by betweenbrickwalls is stunning — a stylish contemporary home, with a hint of Modernism about the design. You might imagine a predominantly dark grey and tan colour scheme would look drab, but here it lends the model a smart contrast, and offsets the surrounding autumnal tones. I particularly like some of the details of the structure — those four brick fin-like pillars, and the raised section over the stream.

Don’t miss the detailed interior, including a beautiful spiral staircase…

Some of the modern furniture on display is wonderful. The dining chairs fashioned from wheel mudguard parts are a definite highlight…

Like the best LEGO buildings, it’s the little touches which make the model spark. This minimalist kitchen decor is fantastic, and wouldn’t look out of place in a fancy interiors magazine…

The post Who wouldn’t want to live in this LEGO house? appeared first on The Brothers Brick.

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This comic was originally published on Everyday Feminism.

Privacy and surveillance are pet topics of mine both personally and professionally and I keep trying to figure out ways to contextualize them in accessible ways. Privacy as consent is a framework that works really well to break down ideas that things Should or Can’t be ‘private’ and that different people will make different decisions about their own privacy!

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Proposal: eRNA be changed so that the e stands for Evil instead of Enhancer.

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While it’s hard to surpass Tyler’s LEGO Blade Runner spinner police hover-car, many great LEGO builders continue to take up the challenge, and we can all enjoy the results. The latest challenger is Calin, who achieves a smooth, virtually stud-free look with some great parts usage — just check out the baseball cap on the front “wheel.”

With the new Blade Runner 2049 due out in just a couple of months, it’s also great to see LEGO creations inspired by the next movie. Calin has built a small-scale version of the police hover-car, with its more angular lines.

The post It’s too bad she won’t live! But then again, who does? appeared first on The Brothers Brick.

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Logically, next he should ask for a cure for the placebo effect.

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Hey, you probably haven't heard of it, but me and Kelly wrote a book called Soonish, and we'd appreciate if you checked it out.

In many cases of Driving Something Unusual While Intoxicated, the legal issue is whether the thing driven is a “vehicle” or “motor vehicle” under state law. Sometimes it’s a thing that’s usually not motorized (picnic tables, beer coolers, bar stools), sometimes it’s usually not operated on a street (Zambonis, inner tubes), and sometimes it’s a horse. That’s not the issue here, though, because the machine pictured above is, apparently, a real motorized vehicle designed for use by adult human beings on actual public streets. That is, it’s “unusual” only because of what’s attached to it. But that does make it unusual, and the driver was intoxicated, so I decree it to be within the bounds of DSUWI.

As you may have noticed, the picture shows two large metal shafts, said to be lampposts, strapped to the roof of what experts believe is a Renault Twingo. Specifically, it appears to be a Twingo I, made in France at some point between 1993 and 2007. According to Wikipedia, the Twingo I originally had a one-liter engine (!) that could generate up to 60 horsepower, although later models were souped-up to a full 75. It had a wheelbase of 2,345 millimeters, was just 1,420 mm high, and looks like it could be crushed by a small suitcase. And yet someone in Lelystad, the Netherlands, tried to use one as shown above.

“What exactly the man was planning to do with the lampposts is unclear,” according to the report, and indeed, much remains unclear about the incident last Tuesday. Police believe the lampposts were stolen from the nearby town of Almere. The man must have had help stealing and mounting the things, but no one was with him in the car. And this may shock you, but he had been drinking. Or, at least, police claimed they smelled alcohol and the man refused to take a breath test.

I was also curious as to why the man may have believed no one would notice him, since I doubted that somebody drunk enough to believe that was possible would even be able to drive. As I’m sure you know, the quickest way between Almere and Lelystad is to take the A6. That’s usually about a 30-minute drive. But even in the middle of the night, when I assume this happened, there might be significant traffic on that road. This report says he was stopped on the A6, but others say it was on the Oostvaardersdijk:

That trip would take twice as long, but maybe there’s less traffic?

Based on this more recent report, though, it may be that our hero did try to take the A6 but his car broke down. Because according to the report, somebody came along and helpfully gave him a tow.

Here’s what the report says about it, as Google translated it from the original Dutch:

This man [the good Samaritan] had nothing to do with the lantern transport. “He saw that the Twingo was in a dangerous place on the A6 with his special cargo and took him towed and left behind in a parking lot at the Oostvaardersdijk. There the agents saw the car with the masts on the roof,” said a spokesman for the police [of] Flevoland ….

Again, questions remain. The most obvious being: What are the odds this guy would be rescued by someone in a car even more embarrassing than his own?

The report says that’s a “Citroën 2 Chevaux,” and if this is correct then that car is not less than 27 years old and has an engine that delivers, at most, 29 horsepower. Less than half the power of a Twingo! How does a car like that tow anything, much less a fully loaded lantern transport? And regardless of the horsepower, how could towing have been safer than leaving it or just pushing it off the road? Hope the guy doesn’t pass out while you’re towing him, because good luck coming to a stop without getting your clown car impaled by a lamppost.

The more recent report did provide a little more detail on the charges against the lamppost-stealer. Not only was he allegedly intoxicated and in possession of stolen property, he didn’t have insurance, his license was expired, and of course, “cargo may not be transported in this way.” More charges may be pending. (Possibly my favorite Google translation here: the suspect “is still enclosed for research.”)

Still nothing on the details of the theft, or what his motive might have been. Though we do get this (again via Google Translate):

The Twingo driver is a 28-year-old resident of Almere. Where the man has the lampposts is not known yet. No reports have been reported. He came from Lelystad. “We have not seen this before. You also wonder what to do with such a booty. Sell ​​like old iron?”

I think that means the plan was probably to cut up the poles and sell them for scrap, although it would’ve been a lot easier to cut them up before moving them. That might have attracted attention, though.

The case immediately made me think of the Great Totem Pole Caper of 2011, although that guy at least had the sense to use a truck to move his booty.

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Technically, Earth is moving relative to those galaxies, so those spacelords are time-shared with other little girls.

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Hey geeks! If you want the new books signed, at a big discount, they're only available for a little bit longer!

I know bakers see a lot of unusual names these days, but sometimes you've still got to wonder: 

 

 ...are they doing "the drugs?"

 

 (That's me channeling a little bit of my mom for you, right there. She puts a "the" in front of everything, like going to "the Walmart" or seeing "the Star Wars" or disowning "the daughter.")

 

Not cool, man. NOT COOL.

 

There are so many wrecky butterfly cakes coming in this month that my first thought for this next one was that it actually wasn't so bad:

Oops. 

(Funny thing: this one's a lot less phallic than most butterfly wrecks, too.)

 

From a bakery that uses a lot of clipart:

(Yes, really.)

On the plus side, I've *seen* most bakery clip art out there, and believe me, this is an improvement.

 

Do you think this next baker finished the cake, looked down, and thought, "Hey, what a coincidence!"?

(And no, for you positive Pollys out there - the birthday boy was not named Nemo.)

 

Now, you might think you could avoid your own birthday wreck by just having nothing on it.

And, hey, you might be right.

 

Or...

 

....yeeeah.

 

Thanks to Kasha D., Windy S., Anony M., Heather K., Aisha A., Sue P., & Kristen H. for not naming any names.

*****

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We’ve featured a few of Heikki Mattila‘s stunning LEGO interiors, but they just keep getting better and better. This beauty uses a touch of forced perspective to create a sense of space and openness — the shelf on the far wall, and the TV and speakers, are built lower and to a slightly smaller scale than the rest of the apartment. As ever, the clean lines of Heikki’s scene wouldn’t look out of place in a fancy furniture catalog or interiors magazine. Personally I think it’d make a great venue for a stylish party. Where’s my invitation?

The post Living space for living it up appeared first on The Brothers Brick.

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New plan - win lottery, have Abby Howard draw all of my comics.

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Hey geeks! We're doing this little crossover thing to celebrate Abby's new book, which features properly protofeathered dinosaurs. Check it out!

PS: She'll also be doing an AMA today on reddit.

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I am not responsible for anyone who decides this is a good idea.

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Hey geeks! We have upcoming BAHFests in Sydney, Houston, Seattle, and San Francisco! Check it out!

"Eva Knop’s team from the Institute of Ecology and Evolution at the University of Bern, shows for the first time, that nocturnal pollinators can be affected by artificial light leading to a disruption of the pollination service they provide. “So far, nocturnal pollinators have been largely neglected in the discussion of the worldwide known pollinator crisis”... The study has now been published in the magazine “Nature”...

The team investigated a total of 100 cabbage thistles, which were growing on five meadows experimentally illuminated with LED street lamps, and five meadows without artificial light. The illuminated plants were visited much more rarely by pollinating insects at night, than the unlit plants. The decline in pollinators had a significant influence on the reproduction of the cabbage thistles: at the end of the test phase, the average number of fruits per plants was around 13% lower. “The pollination during the day obviously cannot compensate for the losses in the night”, says Knop."

Additional information here.  The Nature abstract is here.

Instead of using conventional astronomical data, this map depicts Google search interest.

As described at Smithsonian Insider:

Rice: As with a lot of things in science, we stumbled upon this notion of Bird Friendly coffee. In the early 1990s, the then-director of the Smithsonian Migratory Bird Center was conducting ornithological research in Mexico when he saw a distant “forest” across a valley that ended up actually being coffee grown beneath a diverse canopy cover of native trees. This “agroforest” was serving as viable habitat for birds, while still successfully growing coffee.

 Marra: Coffee can be grown in sun or shade. It used to be grown in forests, where people would grow food and maintain a healthy habitat for wildlife at the same time. Coffee is a huge crop in terms of the amount of habitat it requires—not to mention it’s easier to harvest without trees around—so growers cut down the forests that many animals depend on. But it is possible to grow coffee in forests, with many benefits to animals, birds, and growers.

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The best part about considering myself a brand is that even my most potentially honorable acts have been sullied by PR considerations!

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Hey geeks! We're running another contest at Goodreads! Enter to win a free advance copy of Soonish!

Star Trek: The Next Generation turns 30 years old this September! This gave TBB’s very own Iain Heath just the excuse he needed to created this STNG diorama. Inspired by Kadigan Photography‘s printed tile version, Iain came up with a way to brick-build the holographic environment simulator’s famous yellow grid (you can even see how he did it in his Flickr album).

Fans of the show will appreciate Iain’s take on the holodeck, entitled Safety Protocols Disabled, as it was a common trope the writers used to create extra excitement and tension. Captain Picard looks awfully concerned as Data is getting the Donald Gennaro treatment from Rexy, while Crusher’s face seems to suggest she saw it coming. Perhaps she was sick of Data getting all the best one-liners and disabled those protocols herself?

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