Best of BrickNerd — Article originally published January 27, 2021. You might think since LEGO has populated the world with more than 4 billion minifigures that there would already be every part in existence to satisfy anything a fan could want. Yet the world of custom LEGO minifigures is vast! From head to toe and all the accessories in between, devoted LEGO fans have customized minifigures to be exactly what they want them to be through printing, injection molding, painting, sculpting, cutting and more. But what do all of these terms mean? What goes into each of these processes and why does it matter? These are a few of the questions I aim to answer, but before we start, I must ask another question… What Is Custom LEGO? Custom LEGO could be loosely defined as any official LEGO piece that has been physically modified by the user or any custom accessory...

Today’s guest article comes from Josh Parkinson, a LEGO builder specializing in forced perspective. He shares with us the final build progression and lighting of his North Pole MOC. It was five months since my interview here on BrickNerd, and I had just completed the next major section of my largest build yet, The North Pole. I now had the elf workshops, the foreground foundation built, and the microscale background landscape done (check out Part 1 for the full details). Things were coming together and moving along smoothly. Next up was finishing the foreground trees, building the backdrop, lighting it, and bringing it all to my first LEGO convention, BrickCon. But it was time to put the North Pole MOC away for a bit as I was about to head out on a warm Southern California road trip for my birthday. I had several months before BrickCon—plenty of time, right? Well,...

Today’s guest article comes from Josh Parkinson, a LEGO builder specializing in forced perspective. He shares with us the build progression behind his charming North Pole MOC. Sometimes things don’t go as planned. I’m Josh Parkinson, and my first year of MOC building was a productive one. So much so that I got featured here in BrickNerd a little less than one year after starting to create my own creations. A year later, my look back at my progress was bittersweet. It included my biggest build, my first con, but also a huge gap in my MOC building where life was completely disrupted. No matter what we achieve, there’s the part of us that longs for what we didn’t accomplish, the cons we didn’t get to attend, the numbers we didn’t garner, or the work that we couldn’t complete (or complete to our satisfaction). Especially when life gets in the way. And it...

Welcome back to Gringotts Bank! In our first exploration, we followed a questionable goblin and opened Vault 687. Today’s journey to Gringotts will give us more color, secrets and adrenalin because we’re going to rob the wizarding bank! Remember how Harry Potter was so interested in the secrets of Gringotts’ depths? After six years of waiting (poor Harry!), he’ll finally get to explore them again but maybe not as he expected. Be ready for our heroic mission: Bellatrix Lestrange keeps one of Voldemort’s horcruxes in a high-security vault, and the destruction of these dark artifacts is crucial to defeating the Dark Lord. Today we have two fun tasks as we revisit 76417 Gringotts Wizarding Bank: 1) photograph this second part in an absolutely new way by giving more color to the magical building; and 2) re-tell part of the eighth movie but make the atmosphere seem more alive rather than use...

Welcome to Diagon Alley—a hidden street where we can find all the magical things needed for a new school year at Hogwarts! Today, we'll enjoy visiting one of the most beautiful buildings in the Wizarding World, Gringotts Bank! Gringotts is a fantastic object of art and one of the biggest sets in the LEGO Harry Potter product line. But its size is only one of its values. Every part, side, and corner of the bank is rich in well-thought-out details that nearly guarantee that any builder or visitor, for that matter, experiences an atmosphere of magic. Join us today as we go on a photographic journey of Gringotts Bank, explore the hidden treasures inside, and investigate goblin lore as told through LEGO and a lens. LEGO provided BrickNerd with 76417 Gringotts Wizarding Bank, which I’ve found to be a wonderful architectural creation full of clever and fun surprises. Behind the spectacular...