This is my tribute in celebration of the 20th Anniversary of my favorite LEGO theme,
#BIONICLE
. The Great Spirit Robot never ended up with any kind of physical representation, so it seemed like a great opportunity. I have made the full instructions and a Studio file public below.
With the
#Ninjago
summer sets of 2024 unveiled, here is my usual thread! Starting off, this is the last wave I worked on as a designer, as I have moved to a concept design role, looking at the whole portfolio and paving a way with concepts for the team further ahead.
As one of the people in
#LEGO
Design that likes
#BIONICLE
, I was lucky enough to get to give my input on
@PrinceGalidor
’s new Tahu and Takua GWP! He did a great job in capturing something for everyone in a small set. I can’t wait to get mine!
This is a thread about Ninjago Core development! In the spring of 2020, we got the brief for what our leadership had in mind for 2022. We were asked to come up with a line of Ninjago that would not only stand on its own without content but also be the epitome of Ninjago toys.
The Dragons Rising sets have been revealed and I wanted to share some pictures that show off the combined and separate forms of the Team Mechs. While I did a lot of sketch models for this wave, this one I finished myself.
#LEGO
#Ninjago
#DragonsRising
It’s that time of year again! I’m excited for people to see the new wave of
#Ninjago
sets. This year, we have 3 waves. This one is mostly centered around our new mix-and-mech play concept. Each of the 4 mechs can be customized with parts of the others.
Thanks so much for the positive response to the
#Ninjago
summer sets for this year! I was lucky enough to get to design 2 sets for this wave. Here is a thread on the development of the Hydro Bounty.
Are you ready for the summer 2022
#LEGO
#NINJAGO
sets? I made a fun bike for Jay and a huge mech for Nya l, once more as Samurai X. I’m looking forward to seeing people get their hands on these. This wave turned out pretty fantastic. Lots of large models, gold and crazy figures.
I hope everyone is liking the winter 2023 sets that just got revealed! I love working on
#Ninjago
Core line, they are the waves I am most proud of. This time, I worked on a couple of the sets in various stages of the development.
#LEGO
Last night, I asked my incredible girlfriend Laura to marry me. She said yes! I feel so lucky and excited to have her in my life, I am looking forward to spending it with her. <3 💖<3
I got to design another
#Ninjago
Legacy set for next year. As a big fan of the original set, I was very excited when I was briefed to make a new big version of Zane’s mech. I am really happy with how this thing turned out.
🔥 △ 🔥 “A group of hostile mutants who are able to create and control fire. While escaping confinment, Mad Burnish wreaks havoc to the people of Promepolis.” 🔥 △ 🔥
#PROMARE
#プロメア
#MADBURNISH
#LEGO
Today marks 1 year since the passing of one of the greatest LEGO designers of all time, Jørn Thomsen. This coincides with the release of the last set he designed, the Technic orrery. Last week, we built it together with friends and family and enjoyed one more amazing build.
March launch! This wave, I did not finalize any sets myself, I was working on the summer wave. However, I still wanted to make a little thread to talk about these exciting new
#Ninjago
sets!
Today marks the 5 year anniversary of my first day as a designer at LEGO. This day represents realization of a lifelong goal and guiding star for all of my childhood and young adult life. I don’t think I can properly put into words how this feels, but I will try nevertheless.
It’s finally here. The Voltron model I designed based on Lendy’s idea. It’s hard to believe. The past year and a half of my life has been consumed by making this thing a reality. Thanks Sam, for giving me the opportunity, it was one hell of a ride!
#voltron
All done! This was incredibly fun and a great way for me to push outside of my comfort zone. Thank you to everyone who gave suggestions, it was a tough pick. I’ll format these so I can post them individually later!
#SixFanarts
#LEGO
#Ninjago
#HiddenSide
#BIONICLE
Insert the SCCBS! (System Character and Creature Building System, patent pending...) Here I pitched a number of potential pieces to make appealing mechs while keeping the building experience 6+ appropriate.
I worked on some concepts for the Macaque's mech for
#LEGO
#MonkieKid
back when it was known as the "War Rig". I liked the idea of using the new CITY monkey mold in all black with glowing eyes as the Shadow Monkeys.
We had another miniature painting day with the
#LEGO
#Ninjago
team, last week. I am continuing my set of Ninjago Core Primaris Marines. This time, it was Cole's turn. Hopefully, in a couple of months, I could have the whole team.
#warhammer40k
Very excited to receive my copy of this year’s Employee Holiday Gift set! (Best part is that it doesn’t include any new elements, color changes or prints so it can be recreated at home.) Thanks for the drop off
@Concore
!
2 years ago, the SH manager, approached me with a simple but interesting brief. “Make a huge, wall mounted Batwing.” I made a sketch for the structure and silhouette, including the curves and leading edge. Adam Grabowski took the concept model and made it into a fantastic set.
It features an enormous amount of articulation, including a waist swivel, thigh and bicep rotation, double jointed elbows to allow for an almost 180° bend, double piston supported ankles and knees with a sliding kneecap that moves with the joint.
The store at the
#LEGO
house reopened and it includes a small part of the
#N1NJAG0
exhibition. In particular the part that shows off some of my sketches and the final Legacy Titan Mech side by side with sketches for the original 2015 set. Very excited to be part of this!
We got to make 2 new elements. We made a shell piece to expand SCCBS that allows us to make bigger mech and to cover some of the joints. For the swapping system, we made a new linear rotation ratchet joint, a piece I’ve been wanting for a long time for mechs big and small.
GWPs are weird in all their restrictions in complexity and price as well as target demographic. Nico managed to both make something for the more casual fans with Tahu and then something a little extra special for the hardcore fans with Takua. I think Takua is my favorite part. <3
I designed one more
#LEGO
set for the first half of 2020! This is also my first official Ninjago set and it has a mech! I am really excited for this thing to come out.
Because we knew Wu would be left on the surface, I really liked the idea of him calling in remotely on a television with legs. That idea turned into the Wu Bots. (Or Tea-Vee as I have seen him be called <3) Thanks for reading this thread! Hope it was insightful.
It is the biggest mech we’ve ever done in Ninjago and that is measured to its shoulders, not the tip of the wings. It is the first 12+ mech we have made as this set is meant to appeal as a display piece to older Ninjago fans and people that just like mechs.
5 weeks ago, we welcomed into the world our incredible daughter Lyrik! She’s super cute and I feel very lucky to get parental leave so I can enjoy this very special time as a family.
By focusing the entire budget on the mech, it allowed us to keep all those things that make this set extra special for an older audience. We chose this option in favor of superfluous minifigures that would just be puny in the face of a mech of this set.
The Kai mech has a transparent orange recolor for the energy piece we made for last year. I am very happy to have been able to include a substantial villain model in this set. It borrows some ideas from on old unused Nexo sketch model for the Malware Wolf.
Back when development started for
#LEGO
Nexo Knights 2018, I helped out with some sketch models. Because I felt so inspired by the theme, then called "TerrorBytes", I ended up building a lot of models. This first one is inspired by one of my favorites, 6037 Witch Gondola.
I’m so excited about people’s reaction to
#DragonsRising
! It was a huge project to create this new take on the Ninjago world and characters and seeing that pay off in the excitement, discussion and fan art is amazing. Thanks everyone, for building the sets and watching the show!
I was tasked to start concept work on the mech and buildable character direction. I started exploring potential building platforms and upgrade mechanics.
I just want to clear up something I have seen in a lot of comments on the Cole Dragon Titan Mech reviews. This is not the new standard for Ninjago Mechs. This is a very specific product with a very different target from our usual 6-9 kids.
The Ninjago Core wave is without a doubt the toy launch that I am most proud off. I think they represent a fresh, yet classic range of Ninjago toys with a fun building experience and innovation in both build and element design. I am so excited to talk about it!
I designed the Cole and Kai mechs! The idea was to create a large but affordable mech that are appropriate to build for 7 year olds, looked as good as possible and could “glinch” with the other mechs in the range. The Cole mech is my fav, with his bulky build and mech lava arms!
Secondly, this being a set targeted at an older audience and more display than our usual assortment, having only one figure seemed like the right call.
The Jay Titan Mech was my main focus. I did the sketch and finished the model. This one was super different from the mechs I usually do. We went a uper sleek and streamlined this time, which can be quite hard when it is this big.
Around this time last year, I was working on the Thunder Raider, my first
#ninjago
set. For the holidays, I was out of town and away from bricks, so I sketched for a while. The focus here was trying to capture the attitude and exaggerate the original. Here’s some of the sketches.
I see some “why didn’t they include this?” “It would have been so easy to have replaced it with that!” on the summer sets. We design the sets together with the rough outlines for the episodes. Sometimes things in the show change afterwards. I hope that clears things up.
#Ninjago
Then there is the minifigure. A crazy cool design by our designer Angel who made this sleek white mech suit to go with the aesthetic of the set. He also comes with 2 transparent orange katanas. I know, one figure isn’t much for such a big set. Our reasoning was two-fold.
There was an older sketch model by Theo Bonner, that explored the aesthetic and concept. I took it from here and was tasked to make it into a submarine version of the Bounty, then named the Sword of the Sea. I did some sketches to start off with to explore the shape and features.
The new Hidden Side fire truck was my favorite Hidden Side set to design so far! With it releasing soon, I thought it would be cool to share some of my process on this set. Here are my initial quick sketches from January 2019.
#LEGO
The Sora and Lloyd mechs were made by our newest designer, Petros. As his first sets, we designed these 4 mechs in tandem to show him the ropes. They turned out fantastic! he did a great job with these and with making them so different in silhouette. A bright future to be sure!
After the specialized launches like Prime Empire and Seabound, the markets asked for a wave with the classic Ninjago identity. We would not get any story continuing content in order to make sure we could get started on 2HY 2022 as early as possible. Thus, Core was born.
I remembered last night that I still had this picture of the
#LEGO
#HiddenSide
Supernatural Racecar sketch model saved somewhere. This was back when we were exploring Vaughn's backstory and we weren't sure how far back we would place him. I went for a more 70s direction.
🔥💖🔥Happy 1st Anniversary Promare! I was lucky enough to catch this movie in cinemas in Japan last year and it was an experience that will stick with me forever! 🔥💖🔥 #プロメア1st
This is the first model I developed mostly from home during the pandemic so I have less fully build pictures as I was mostly tinkering with the model instead of building new versions from the ground up.
The backpack can be taken off easily for a more nimble model and the sword is the new Ornithopter wing. When that piece was first being discussed, I knew we had to use it as a sword at some point, and this set presented the perfect opportunity.
The general idea for the mech was that it is rock underneath. Rock wearing a suit of black and white armor with some magma showing through the cracks. This is why the under suit, if you will, is dark grey with some rock texture.
Been seeing a lot of strong opinions, both positive and negative, about LEGO products with all the new stuff launching. Twitter is a great place to state opinions, but might be even better. It is a really important feedback tool that often gets overlooked.
Because BIONICLE means so many different things to many different people, I hope that this set manages to hit as many of those touch points as possible. We had a lot of people pitch in with different ideas and directions and this one seemed to check the most boxes.
In order to ensure an appropriate building experience for the 6+ agemark we started a lot of model and element concepts to explore the 3 cornerstones of Ninjago: Vehicles, dragons and mechs.
Firstly, when we take a sketch model and start turning it into a real LEGO product, we often end up having to shave off expensive, superfluous stuff like joints, detail and finishing elements, to fit the set price point.
On top of all that, there was an ask to make sure this line helped recruit younger kids into Ninjago. Between our 4+ and our usual 7+ and up sets, there was a gap. We wanted to have a number of 6+ sets to fill that gap.
Although going forward, I won’t be responsible for finalizing individual products, I might still do the odd set every now and then. Which is why I am super happy that the Cole Dragon Titan Mech turned out the way it did.
💖💖Oh boy! The January 2020 launch of Hidden Side has been revealed. :D The buggy, the portal and the lighthouse are my work. I am super excited for these to hit the shelves. 💖💖
We had a great day with the
#LEGO
#Ninjago
team painting figures. For most people it was their first time paining so it was fun to show people the ropes. I painted my Space Marine to look like Core Kai.
#warhammer40k
Trying to get quicker and looser with my art. Behold, Metabee! This show definitely is the reason I turned out to be such a weeb, it resonated with my being. Also, my first exposure to Hiroyuki Imaishi’s animation and direction.
#medarot
#medabots
I came up with a neat mechanism to fold out the fins on the turbines. The final model includes a string mechanism that allows you to unfold both sides by pulling the rear facing cannons on the Bounty.
Happy Halloween! A couple of years ago, I made a Halloween Mixels tribe for fun. This year I finally remembered to post them in time for the actual holiday. Frenk, Pumblin and Trombun of the Weenzies tribe are ready to party!
#LEGO
I really liked the idea of a mech being the figurehead of the ship and explored a lot of different transformations to make it integrate well with the bigger submarine.
@TheSokoda
Glad this is finally out. This is one of the things that excited me the most about the concept of the merged realms. Initially I really tried to have a Chima beaver join the team. To no avail, sadly.
For the fire truck, I wanted to include some kind of villain, much like we did for the bus. Nehmaar Reem, The Harbinger, was a figure that I had been playing around with since late 2018.
Getting the proportions right, while making sure the joints were strong enough to hold not only the long limbs but also the biggest Ninjago sword ever was a challenge.
To me personally this is an exciting set, because from as early as 2016 Nico and I have been concepting and building what a mini-balljoint based action figures could look like. This set uses a lot of the thoughts we have had over the years.
Sora’s bike was a huge challenge as making a vehicle solid enough for an 8y/o to play with and build, that can also transform into an articulated mech is not easy. Almost everyone in the team took a stab at it, but designer Markus was the one to crack this one!
Amazingly, Lee made the crazy wishes of your managers come true by making it able to be suspended from the hooks and the hook on a wire. A headache to fit within our quality standards. The final product is amazing, Lee can be proud of his mech! Thanks
@Duck_Bricks
for the pic!
I explored several accent colors but ended up going for the simple but elegant black and white. I really wanted to include the dark tan shields unprinted and found a cool turbine build that I liked.
A lot of development time was spent figuring out the structure and how to build something that was elegant but could also house 2 of the smaller submarines. Additionally, a bounty needs a transformation feature on the back.
The door construction proved to be a real pickle as we needed something that could open wide enough to let the subs pass through but also be strong enough. My friend Milan Madge was facing a similar problem with his shuttle, so I stole his solution and turn it transparent blue.
Continuing the Lee train, the Dragon Stone Shrine is straight from his brain. He built it for fun at some point and it got so much love, both internally and in testing that we HAD to make it real. Another masterpiece that needs no more explanation.
Lastly a set I had 0 involvement in whatsoever, but turned out amazing. Our newest designer at the time, Lee absolutely aced this one. It is a fantastic play set with a bunch of neat functions and details. Lee’s a real powerhouse already. A bright future for him ahead.
Welcome to Twonix City, an independent city state filled to the brim with experimental technology & dubious safety standards! Twice per day these activities threaten the fabric of reality, but justice enforcing freedom fighters are close at hand.
#N1NJAG0
#FanArt
I did the original sketch model for the Photac Beast based on a concept drawing by
@NMSeverin
. Our design manager Heiko was then tasked with the huge challenge of making it buildable for the low age mark as this is the smallest set. I think it turned out great!
🔥 🔥 "The only thing burning should be my soul!” 🔥 🔥
Galo is the newest recruit of Burning Rescue with a big attitude and muscles for brains.
#PROMARE
#プロメア