The Cutest Lego, Ever!

If you've played the Nintendo video games Pikmin/Pikmin 2, you'll be familiar with the tiny part-animal, part-plant creatures that are the pikmin themselves, and the numerous monstrous beasts which attack the peaceful pikmin in many strange ways. The otherworldly designs of the monsters are inventive and beautiful; from frog-like spotty “Bulborbs” which munch up the pikmin like a quick and tasty snack; to the floating “Blowhogs” which puff tornado-like blasts to scatter the tiny pikmin into the path of other monsters which threaten to squash, burn, or poison them. In the game, the “Piklopedia” is the name given to the collection of pictures and information about the monsters, which you gather as you progress through the game and discover more, and weirder, animals.

I stumbled across Filip Felberg's Lego Piklopedia on Flickr quite by chance, and I'm so glad that I did. Filip has been making his versions of the wonderful creatures in Pikmin, almost entirely in Lego bricks, and has shared many of them on Flickr. I got in touch with Filip and he agreed to answer a few questions about his unique project.

I think I can confidently say that we all liked playing with Lego bricks when we were kids, and some of us haven't lost that love of the brightly-coloured, well-designed plastic blocks. For Filip, it was only by chance that he rediscovered them. “One day after I played the first Pikmin game and I was baby-sitting my little brothers, I started building a Red Pikmin with the Lego bricks they were playing with. Then I made the other Pikmins and started building some monsters; after I started uploading them on the Internet I couldn't stop!”

Filip told me that he's been working on this project since February 2009. “At the start I only used pieces that I already owned, I didn't buy any bricks at all. In this period I remember that I built pretty much every week. But after a while I needed more and more Lego in specific colours and began buying some “Lego Basic Bricks Deluxe” sets. Soon I started to buy special parts from Bricklink and because I had to wait a week or two till the packages arrived, it went weeks without any Lego building. But when I do get the packages, though, I can spend the entire evening building creations!”
The process which Filip uses to transform the designs from the game into Lego models is quite intuitive and playful. “Some of my models was made using a previous model as a guide, but only those that are really similar, like the Red Bulborb and the Orange Bulborb. Most of the time, however, I print out images from the net and use them as inspirations for my models. I don't make any drawings before I start, but I always think long and hard about what the model should look like before building”.

“I've had a lot of favourite creations from my project, but I must say that my Careening Dirigibug (pictured below) is currently my favorite, mostly because it is my most accurate creation yet (in my opinion), but also because it's very cool creature. Gotta love the Tingle reference! :P”
As well as making the models himself, Filip has also created instructions on how to make many of the monsters so that anyone else with a bit of Lego can have a go at making them. You can see Filip's instructions here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/39134527@N04/sets/72157622947948779/

and here: http://mocpages.com/home.php/23092

“There's only thing that annoys me about Lego, and that is that none of their bricks are perfect squares/cubes. It really annoys me when I try to make pixelated creations, and it would be a lot more easier for people to make something that is a perfect circle or something like that. But then again, I couldn't bear it if the Lego Group suddenly began to produce their Lego in perfect squares”.
Lego have brought out their versions of Star Wars, Spongebob Squarepants and Harry Potter, to name a few. I asked what else Filip would like to see made into Lego sets. “Besides Pikmin I would really like James Cameron's Avatar to be made in Lego. It could introduce some really interesting and unique new Lego parts seeing as the Na'vi people are taller than the people from Earth. It shouldn't be impossible either, seeing as the film is one of the most successful films of all time and I'm sure that the Lego Group would like to take a part of that success! Fantastic movie, by the way!”Filip said that if he had as much time and as many bricks as he needed, he might make the whole first stage in the original Donkey Kong game. He said, “it would require a lot of bricks but I think it would be cool. Perhaps I will do it in the future”.
Filip told me that what he enjoys most about building with Lego, “is to get comments on my creations. It's always fun when someone comments on my stuff, and it helps me to continue with this project”. So, if you've enjoyed reading about Filip's Piklopedia and seeing his models, please leave your comments below and on his Flickr stream: http://www.flickr.com/photos/39134527@N04/

Official Pikmin site: http://www.pikmin.com/

Many thanks to Filip for his kind permission for this feature and for using pictures from his Piklopedia.


Warm wishes,
Joey x