Dannylonglegs Posted July 6, 2015 Posted July 6, 2015 (edited) Note: I did not finish my original intended project for this week, but I did finish this, which was actually the relevant-to-this-week-story part anyways. Planet: E02 Tags: Land vehicle, Science Excerpt from Clappie Explorer's Guide: "The Lesser Lesser Drigonian Mani-colour Xenoscorpion (Soccerkiddus manticolourus) builds small mounds in the Arid desert, from which they perch to capture the morning dew on their backs, which they then transfer with their delicate front arms into a lime-green pod on their backs. They are a very common inhabitant of the Lesser Drigo dessert." "They are very small, but when crushed release a trans-neon green juice, which can stain clothes if left unattended. Launder using sodium hypochlorite bleach." Reclaiming Lesser Drigo _____________________________________________ Science Officer Ben Nai: "Good morning Dr. Long! Right on schedule, as usual!" Dr. Long: "This is not a good morning Dr. Nai. Not a good morning at all. I am here to clean up your messes." Ben Nai: "Of course, Dr. Long." Dr. Long: "I have been briefed as to the specifics already...." Ben Nai: "Shall I show yo uto your Offi--" Dr. Long: "...Don't Interrupt me. We've found dozens of MANTIS produced micro-tracking devices in water filtered here, And suddenly they all activated, likely revealing the location of all our most important water extraction facilities; Several loading robots are unaccounted for; Several water filtration pipes have been physically removed and stolen; And, to top it all off, our Top Secret Project OMEGA was infiltrated by a MANTIS spy, who proceeded to transfer--unimpeded--an entire Data chip on the beryllium sphere before he was apprehended." Ben Nai: "Now, we don't know how successful his data transfer was ye--" Dr. Long: "Did I say you could speak? No I did not. The only salvageable aspect of this towering monument to your incompetence is that we did capture one of the MANTIS agents responsible." Ben Nai: "I was just about to get to that! Bring him in!" "There he is, Danielle: The mastermind behind this entire MANTIS operation! We'll get him to crack, for sure! Intel indicates his name is 'Scorpio'! Intimidating name if you ask me!" Dr. Long: "Why is he still wearing a communications device on his head?" Dr. Nai: "Umm..." Dr. Long: "The Peacekeepers will see to his safe transferal, and hopefully wipe that smug grin off his face. Show me to my office, Dr. I will be sure to tell the board about all of this during your annual review. Needless to say, you should make sure you're on good terms with the janitorial staff of your facility." "I'm surrounded by idiots." ________ Later.... //"Log date 369, This is Dr. Danielle Long recording from Lab facilities in Octan's new science base on Lesser Drigo. Earlier I received a very promising geological sample obtained by one of our up and coming pilots on E02. I believe it is, in-fact, Mithril. Its appearance on E02 is highly irregular, as our scans suggest that the planet could not possibly have produced it naturally. This, in addition to findings from the Axle's Alien Artifact retrieval squad (called in by explorer Lu caslaug-Hing) on E02, leads me to believe that Freegate, the only location in the Andromeda Gates network known to possess Mithril deposits, may, at some distant time in the past, have been mined for its resources by non-human sentients. Further research on my theory may be conducted should I get a chance to visit Freegate. Now, onto less important matters. One of our exploration teams has procured a specimen of the local F02 fauna for me.... "Oh you have got to be kidding me." "Dr. Long signing off. I may need to visit another planet for a while to escape the boiling incompetence I am forced to endure."// _______________________________________ Ok, this was the first time I've ever attempted vertical rockwork like that! I was so inspired by Soccerkid's beautiful work that I felt compelled to try that for myself. Unfortunately I don't have many parts in the right colours! What you see in this build is most of my available dark tan, and even some of my unavailable dark tan. (don't tell my model-keeping brother... oh well... he already knows. ) and ALL of my nougat... to the point that I mixed with that earthy orange colour. I think it turned out pretty well, all things considered. I also bought a set specifically for the olive green. You are looking at literally my entire collection of olive green. Edit: Better pic of the land vehicle (with actual light this time!) "What did you mean when you said 'get to know my janitors'?" ~Insectoid Aristocrat Edited July 6, 2015 by Dannylonglegs Quote
mccoyed Posted July 6, 2015 Posted July 6, 2015 Love that giant foot. What a great way to start this off. Fun story and great figs as always. Quote
rodiziorobs Posted July 6, 2015 Posted July 6, 2015 (edited) Mastermind! I'm flattered Love the giant foot, very entertaining! I think the cliffs turned out well. Also, my olive green is limited to two minifig parts, so it looks to me like you have plenty! Edited July 6, 2015 by rodiziorobs Quote
mrcp6d Posted July 6, 2015 Posted July 6, 2015 Quite the fun story! The microscopic scale prelude is great fun and the layered rock face looks nice too. Quote
Mike S Posted July 6, 2015 Posted July 6, 2015 Love pic #3 with the minifig leg about to step on some scorpions! Funny stuff! Also neat that you included bits from other people's builds! Quote
Kai NRG Posted July 6, 2015 Posted July 6, 2015 Very nice series of builds, especially the first two! For a first try that rockwork turned out really well! I hear you about your brother! Only, my brother usually takes my pieces and then complains when I reclaim them! Quote
Kodan Black Posted July 6, 2015 Posted July 6, 2015 Love the intro that progresses into the usual Dr. Long mode. Fantastic how you incorporated so many other builds, I think including pombe's was my favorite bit. Quote
pombe Posted July 6, 2015 Posted July 6, 2015 Poor Dr. Long! She has to deal with all the incompetence at Octan! Such is the corporate life, I'm afraid. Laundry issues, prisoner issues, live specimen recovery issues.... At least she's busy! HAHA...great story telling, as always! Quote
Commander Turtle Posted July 6, 2015 Posted July 6, 2015 (edited) Nice playing with scale, and a smart use of yellowed white parts. I think we're both coming to this game doing solid builds without that many bricks at our disposal - we're not so different, you and I Edited July 6, 2015 by Commander Turtle Quote
LittleJohn Posted July 6, 2015 Posted July 6, 2015 Great builds, I really like the rockwork in the second one Quote
NuckElBerg Posted July 7, 2015 Posted July 7, 2015 Haha, love Octan's obsession with laundering! Nice little builds with great humor, good job! Quote
Boxerlego Posted July 7, 2015 Posted July 7, 2015 Wow, Excellent build Dr long! Your story is very well done! Good work on everything! Quote
Dannylonglegs Posted July 7, 2015 Author Posted July 7, 2015 (edited) Love that giant foot. What a great way to start this off. Fun story and great figs as always. Thanks! There's a bit of symbolism there! Mastermind! I'm flattered Love the giant foot, very entertaining! I think the cliffs turned out well. Also, my olive green is limited to two minifig parts, so it looks to me like you have plenty! To be fair, Dr. Nai is kissing Dr. Long's you-know-what, but as far as he does know, you were in charge! I love how well our collaboration turned out, although you should have told me you'd be using those police helmets. I was this close to doing the same as a sheer coincidence! Thanks! I was pleased with how it turned out too, but it's obviously derivative of Soccerkid's vastly superior style! Ha, I just picked up the 10 buck chima set with the crocodile people for this. I really wanted to make it look thematically cohesive with Soccerkid's MoC. Quite the fun story! The microscopic scale prelude is great fun and the layered rock face looks nice too. Thanks! I hope to try it again in future MoCs. Up until now, my go-to style for rocks has been snot, but the idea of mixing textured bricks is genius. Love pic #3 with the minifig leg about to step on some scorpions! Funny stuff! Also neat that you included bits from other people's builds! Thanks! I think I'd like 4 best if I had thought to include some of the bug's slime eeking out from beneath her boots, but alas, hind-sight is 20-20. Very nice series of builds, especially the first two! For a first try that rockwork turned out really well! I hear you about your brother! Only, my brother usually takes my pieces and then complains when I reclaim them! Thanks! Yeah, the last few were really just backdrops for story-stuff, and that joke at the end. We'll he's the collector and I'm the builder. I collect a very small amount of things, and he occasionally makes freebuilds, but it's funny how we usually stick to the one or the other. He always yells at me when I get into his StarWars stuff. Love the intro that progresses into the usual Dr. Long mode. Fantastic how you incorporated so many other builds, I think including pombe's was my favorite bit. Ha, thanks! I couldn't post a Dr. Long build without her //"Log date"// appearing! Yeah, this week was a big one for collaboration for me, and hopefully future builds will have even more collaboration. Even considering, I still had to reference some builds that were not collaborations, because they fit into the grander AG story, and making connections between builds to advance the larger picture is something I love doing. There are interpersonal stories, Corporation wide stories, and then there's the mystery of the Gates themselves and the Aliens inhabiting these worlds, and I'm sure that will come into greater focus later in the game, so consider some of some of my builds foreshadowing to what I anticipate will come... or a self-fulfilling prophesy... Also, I had wanted to throw a poke at Pombe for a while now (and planned to two weeks ago, but ran out of time), so when he featured that super simple Alien this week, I knew I could finally reference him properly. Hahaha @ the giant foot! Priceless. It's the long shadow of Octan, and the boot crushing our enemies, as symbolized by Corporate Tool, Dr. Danielle Long. Poor Dr. Long! She has to deal with all the incompetence at Octan! Such is the corporate life, I'm afraid. Laundry issues, prisoner issues, live specimen recovery issues.... At least she's busy! HAHA...great story telling, as always! I love that you have so much sympathy for her, when she really deserves half of the nasty stuff that happens to her, Karmically speaking... Although maybe Octan's incompetence made her into the jerkass she is?... I mean.... Someone has to make sure the trains run on time, and everyone else at Octan seems to be a dysfunctional alcoholic. No one's ever accused her of being lazy. She enjoys long hours of mindless paperwork, and watching the grass grow... for science! Thanks! Nice playing with scale, and a smart use of yellowed white parts. I think we're both coming to this game doing solid builds without that many bricks at our disposal - we're not so different, you and I Thanks! Glad you noticed! That was intentional... although it'd have been hard to avoid, considering that's how half of my white pieces look like. Thanks! I'm glad you think so! Great builds, I really like the rockwork in the second one Thanks! Haha, love Octan's obsession with laundering! Nice little builds with great humor, good job! You can thank KaiNRG for that! I mean, we Octans have to keep our whites white, somehow! And we never mix our reds and greens with those whites! You can really tell a Noobie Octan when he/she/they shows up for work in pink! Wow, Excellent build Dr long! Your story is very well done! Good work on everything! Ha! Thanks! ~Insectoid Aristocrat Edited July 7, 2015 by Dannylonglegs Quote
soccerkid6 Posted July 7, 2015 Posted July 7, 2015 Very glad that my build inspired you, and I totally understand your frustration at not having many parts in the colors needed for the rockwork. Still, I think it turned out very well, and the pillar is a great touch Really clever use of perspective with the large scale minifig foot too Quote
kabel Posted July 7, 2015 Posted July 7, 2015 always great to look at your builds and read you stories! I really enjoy your sense of humor, gosh Dr. Long is just such a terrible person ... Anyway, I think you should take the next step and start working on your photography. Sometimes its clear and sometimes it is really grainy and your background doens't look that great either. So why don't you use a large sheet of white paper as a background and then work a little with the light settings? Quote
Balbo Posted July 7, 2015 Posted July 7, 2015 Wow, that's awesome! I enjoyed reading the story. The builds are nice, too. My favourite is the giants feet Quote
Dannylonglegs Posted July 7, 2015 Author Posted July 7, 2015 (edited) The judges awarded you 5 points. Thank you. That's generous! I was expecting less. Very glad that my build inspired you, and I totally understand your frustration at not having many parts in the colors needed for the rockwork. Still, I think it turned out very well, and the pillar is a great touch Really clever use of perspective with the large scale minifig foot too Thanks! That means a lot coming from you! Thanks! It seems that was a huge (or, more accurately, very small) hit! always great to look at your builds and read you stories! I really enjoy your sense of humor, gosh Dr. Long is just such a terrible person ... Anyway, I think you should take the next step and start working on your photography. Sometimes its clear and sometimes it is really grainy and your background doens't look that great either. So why don't you use a large sheet of white paper as a background and then work a little with the light settings? Thank you! Yeah, she's not what you'd call a people's person... Who let her get into a position of power in the first place? I hear you. I've been relying entirely on the weather being amenable to photography outside, but in some cases (this week, and last week), I've had to take crappy photos inside, or in dark outside conditions. The background is 2 grey folders. I'll try a white paper. For bigger MoCs, I use a white shirt. Does anyone know of any tutorials for super-duper cheap lighting advice? Wow, that's awesome! I enjoyed reading the story. The builds are nice, too. My favourite is the giants feet Thanks! The stories are my favorite part, too! I didn't think I'd be making so many of them, but now they almost overshadow the builds. ~Insectoid Aristocrat Edited July 7, 2015 by Dannylonglegs Quote
kabel Posted July 7, 2015 Posted July 7, 2015 Does anyone know of any tutorials for super-duper cheap lighting advice? I usually take pictures outside, in the shade on sunny days, in the open on cloudy days. I then use the MS office picture manager and increase the light. After that I use Artweaver (most use gimp) and cut out the background so that it becomes completely white. Quote
Dannylonglegs Posted July 7, 2015 Author Posted July 7, 2015 I usually take pictures outside, in the shade on sunny days, in the open on cloudy days. I then use the MS office picture manager and increase the light. After that I use Artweaver (most use gimp) and cut out the background so that it becomes completely white. Ok, so maybe it's my photo-editing skills I need to hone... Or maybe I just need to get my pictures while the sun it still out! Thanks, though. I usually edit my photos in Instagram. ~Insectoid Aristocrat Quote
kabel Posted July 7, 2015 Posted July 7, 2015 best light is usually in the afternoon, it's softer and easier to work with. On sunny days that is. The thing is, if you do it in the shade or in days of cloud cover your shutter opens a lot wider and has the colors less blurry. So yeah, either that, or you build yourself a photo box with three light bulbs and shoot inside. okay, your pics are kinda small to begin with, but this is what it kinda might look like once you work on the pic a little: Quote
Dannylonglegs Posted July 7, 2015 Author Posted July 7, 2015 (edited) best light is usually in the afternoon, it's softer and easier to work with. On sunny days that is. The thing is, if you do it in the shadow in days of cloud cover your shutter opens a lot wider and has the colors less blurry. So yeah, either that, or you build yourself a photo box with three light bulbs and shoot inside. okay, your pics are kinda small to begin with, but this is what it kinda might look like once you work on the pic a little: Yeah, I think the lighting inconsistencies are my biggest issue at the moment, especially when the entire title of the MoC is based on a soda ow I failed to create in the second picture. Some of the graininess is because I zoomed in on a dark picture. I'll try to put more work into editing the pictures once I take them. I think what I did for "The Derelict" would be replicatable on a regular basis. I just need to work on getting my pictures before night time. That title. so true! ~Insectoid Aristocrat Edited July 7, 2015 by Dannylonglegs Quote
mrcp6d Posted July 8, 2015 Posted July 8, 2015 I take all my pictures indoors. My setup is both "mediocre" to "adequate" and dirt cheap. I use white posterboard for my backdrops, though I really need to get some other colors! A sheet should run you less than $0.50, and, if you hit the stores during the back-to-school sales that will be coming in a few weeks, you can probably get cheaper--plus, no taxes! While you're at Wal-Mart (ain't looking for quality here...) get some cheap desk lamps, clamp lamps, floor lamps or whatever works for your LEGO space and some CFL lightbulbs with the highest kelvin number you can find on them (They'll probably also say "daylight" or something, but trust the numbers, not the words.). Why they decided to measure the "whiteness" of light with a temperature unit is beyond me. I like 2 clamp lights for the front so I can just clamp them to the edge of the LEGO table and 2 taller lamps on either side from above. Use blue painters' tape to stick some facial tissue over the lamps for some dang near free diffusers or you'll have glare like crazy (which messes up photo editing for me, but I've got limited skills there). Also use the blue tape to keep the posterboard stationary on the table and stuck to the wall in the back while leaving no residue on your LEGO table. The tripod for your camera might cost more than this MacGyver photo booth. Using my LEGO table as my photo area also forces me to clean up the mess more regularly since all the extra pieces have to get off the table before set up. And definitely get some actual editing software. GIMP is free and you only really need to figure out a couple functions (crop to rectangle selection, magic wand select, lasso select, color levels<--awesome!, spray paint/smudge/paint bucket/etc. on rare occasions--usually because you screwed up the pic setup...) to seriously improve your pics. Quote
Big Sal Posted July 8, 2015 Posted July 8, 2015 Hahaha, one of the funniest yet! The rockwork is great! I love everything about the opening, but especially how you used yellowed parts for Dr Long's foot - you'd have thought her clothes would be cleaner given Octan's obsession with laundry Quote
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