[OL - FB1] Palais Royal de Granoleon

[Gideon]

@all not mentioned below: Thanks for the nice words! I'm glad you liked my first attempt at this period's architecture

But I'm always happy to hear your opinions/constructive criticism regardless of what you think of the build as a whole, so please don't hesitate to help me improve!

I think your project turned out great! It has been a lovely ride to see your building evolve and I'm already looking forward to your next build in the same genre! Thanks for the shoutout btw :)

Thanks for the help getting started with this "new ground" for me!

Now I can finally drool over this in public

It's been some amazing weeks, and the result is nothing less than spectacular!

That's how a King resides

Thousand royal thank-yous again for building this masterpiece, Gideon, and almost as many to everyone else involved in our Transition Process.

It's an honor serving with such a fine bunch of Oleanders

Vive le Roi!

Thank you very much for the feedback along the way, it was very helpful to have someone to discuss concepts and WIP pictures with

Fantastic!

There's much life in facades. The combination of large scale, beautiful architecture and colors, and lovely details make this a magnificent creation. I really like the second photo; it provides a great ground-level perspective and the crowd looks nice. Excellent work.

Thank you! I always have a camera angle in mind when I do my builds, and the fact that I wanted to take "100 % LEGO" photos of this was one of the major reasons I wasn't happy with only a 5 windows wide build. It was very close that I widened the whole build a few more windows, but with the need of getting this published for the story reasons I was content with only adding four flimsy windows with surrounding wall temporarily when I took that picture to make it "100 % LEGO". (Btw, I'm curious if no one has noticed that there are too many windows in that picture compared to the shot of the whole facade...? )

Well I suppose we all should just pack up our bricks then and stop building.... while it is indeed a masterpiece, it annoys me to no end when builds are always being ranked instead of being enjoyed in their individuality.

Thanks for your comment! I think it's important to remember that these projects like BoBS and GoH are way more than the odd build someone put too much time and bricks into and not create an atmosphere where developing builders feel that they don't dare to post their creations. Ranking is for challenges (and maybe other game mechanics in the future?), this is a freebuild which I only happened to build big because it was fun and because it was going to be part of the first impressions people get of Oleon. For me, the great ship builds some people contribute with here are way more thrilling than a "cut and paste" design like this one

This is stupendous, Gideon, absolutely awe-inspiring, and indeed a fitting residence for royalty. (And luckily you found a king to put in there! )

I have followed it a bit on flickr, and was really looking forward to the result, but this absolutely blew me away!

Especially the center with the large door, the balcony and the pillars (and very clever use of that crown, btw) is brilliant, but the overall composition and those windows works wonderfully too. The big "bricks" in the foundation are inspired and the statues too, large and small.

Great job! It really goes to show how much you can extort your people, if you can get them to believe in divine rights!

Thank you! I wasn't sure about sharing the WIP pictures with potential spies from other countries but at least I didn't include the king in any of those

Of course a King with only the Gods as his superiors have the right to make his subjects pay whatever taxes needed to make him able to show his proper station!

What a beautiful facade... so many lovely architectural details and soooo huge!

The window frames especially are fantastic and so is the arch over the door, and great use of micro figures and that fleur-de-lis is brilliant!

Congrats on becoming a fellow as well!

Thanks! That fleur-de-lis took a while and many failed attempts to get it in a way I liked, and now I can't wait to put it at the back of a ship as well

The tiled arch was also a bit of a pain to make, mostly since those half-arches extend quite far so it's hard to put small tiles close to the inner edge...

It's been fun to watch this evolve into its current state. Amazing job all around with plenty of details that truly make it stand out as a masterpiece.

When are you going to start on the interior ?

There will of course never be a full interior in a build like this, but I'm not dismissing the idea of interior scenes in minifig scale sometime in the future. I'm constantly trying new things now with BoBS and I'm actually a lot more excited to build in the "old world" than in the colonies so this might not be the last build from Granoleon, Bothnia or somewhere else I build instead of a bunch of small EGS builds. But in line with challenging myself to try out new things I really should give shipbuilding a try soon...

Ready to be frontpaged or not yet?

Not my call to make

[Mpyromaxos]

Amazing structure!! Lovely details and Archtecture.. especially the windows design and the balcony!

Great Moc!

[Ayrlego]

Simply breath-taking. While I don't really have anything new to add that hasn't already been said, I just needed to comment to show my appreciation of this work! It is a truly royal looking palace and should achieve your goal of giving impressive first impressions for Olean!

Edited April 22, 2016 by Ayrlego

[Captain Becker]

Now theres a palace worthy for the King and the Queen of Oleon!

An excellent example of the fine skills of our master craftsmen! The building is very intimidating and Grandeur! Very well done.

Captain Becker

[BrickOn]

It's beautiful and I want it. You've done an amazing job here.

[Bregir]

It's beautiful and I want it. You've done an amazing job here.

And I thought we had seen the last claim to the Olean throne... ;) :P

[Garmadon]

Lovely palace, Gideon, the facade really turned out spectacularly, and that all LEGO scene in particular is absolutely superb! The architectural details are fantastic, with the arch above the doors, the windows, and of course the fleur-de-lis design being some of my favorites!

And yes, I at least noticed that you had built those extra windows for the scene shot, and the extra work certainly paid off!

[Capn Frank]

Ready to be frontpaged or not yet?

Sounds good to me.

[Gideon]

Amazing structure!! Lovely details and Archtecture.. especially the windows design and the balcony!

Great Moc!

Simply breath-taking. While I don't really have anything new to add that hasn't already seen, I just needed to comment to show my appreciation of this work! It is a truly royal looking palace and should achieve your goal of giving impressive first impressions for Olean!

Now theres a palace worthy for the King and the Queen of Oleon!

An excellent example of the fine skills of our master craftsmen! The building is very intimidating and Grandeur! Very well done.

It's beautiful and I want it. You've done an amazing job here.

Lovely palace, Gideon, the facade really turned out spectacularly, and that all LEGO scene in particular is absolutely superb! The architectural details are fantastic, with the arch above the doors, the windows, and of course the fleur-de-lis design being some of my favorites!

And yes, I at least noticed that you had built those extra windows for the scene shot, and the extra work certainly paid off!

Thanks! Glad that my attempt to enforce the fact that Oleon is the empire with the highest culture has been well received

Sounds good to me.

Thank you very much!

Vive le Roi!

[BrickCurve]

Its amazing! Great job on the photography as well, particularly the crowd shot. I would be interested to see a photo of the back of the model.

Edited April 19, 2016 by BrickCurve

[Maxim I]

I think I haven't responded yet on this magnificent bulding!

So many things to love! The colour combinations is excellent as well :) It was fun to follow the process on your flickr :D

[Kolonialbeamter]

Frontpaging isn't the only honor received for this spectacular contribution to Oleon and BoBS

Congratulations, Gideon!

[BrickFit26]

Impressive. Love the details and the minifig statues.

[Sir Stig]

Impeccable! So full of details and yet so clean and thorough design. Realistic as well. There is so much to like. I can only list a few. The riled line that goes underneath the balcony and along the whole build. How the crown is incorporated. How the lion head is emphasized by the handles and tiles. The ministatues under the roofline fits seamlessly into the brickwork. The big statues. I must stop now, or it will only be a list of every little detail. Well Done!

Which brick have you used on bottom part of the coloumns? (in the height of the soldiers epaulettes)

[Staslegomaster]

The palace looks like a real one. Would you build Buckingham palace and Elizabeth II during her jubilee?

[Gideon]

Its amazing! Great job on the photography as well, particularly the crowd shot. I would be interested to see a photo of the back of the model.

Thanks!

I don't have a picture of the backside now, but it is only a mess of various protruding backsides of the technical solutions and general sloppy parts usage where I often didn't care to match it at all on the back side. It is reinforced by four 2x4 pillars and I've also added a bunch of bricks with studs on the side aligned with the edge of the base to be able to cover the whole back side with large plates when this goes on some exhibition.

I think I haven't responded yet on this magnificent bulding!

So many things to love! The colour combinations is excellent as well :) It was fun to follow the process on your flickr :D

Thanks!

Since this is by far my most well-documented building process, I think maybe I should make a post here with some of my WIP shots to show how this build evolved?

Frontpaging isn't the only honor received for this spectacular contribution to Oleon and BoBS

Congratulations, Gideon!

Thank you very much! Great that it is possible to make progress in this game not only by building shacks on newly discovered islands

Impressive. Love the details and the minifig statues.

Thanks!

Impeccable! So full of details and yet so clean and thorough design. Realistic as well. There is so much to like. I can only list a few. The riled line that goes underneath the balcony and along the whole build. How the crown is incorporated. How the lion head is emphasized by the handles and tiles. The ministatues under the roofline fits seamlessly into the brickwork. The big statues. I must stop now, or it will only be a list of every little detail. Well Done!

Which brick have you used on bottom part of the coloumns? (in the height of the soldiers epaulettes)

Thank you very much! Glad you liked the framing of the lion head, had some trouble making that fit into the rest and finally decided to make something different there instead.

The column bases are using "Cone 2 x 2 Truncated" (98100).

The palace looks like a real one. Would you build Buckingham palace and Elizabeth II during her jubilee?

Havn't thought of that, but I suppose that would have been a nice build to do too!

I've never been very into recreating real life or popular culture scenes in LEGO...not that I can't help however trying to figure out how to build every other thing I see when I'm travelling

Probably I'm simply putting too high demands on myself to make very good representations so I never get around to actually make a representation of something recognizeable, but instead only steal some ideas from here and there in the real world (or well-known imaginary worlds).

[kabel]

Some of the wip pics we saw Flickr would be cool!

[Gideon]

Here are a few pictures I took during the process. As you can see it was a bit of an iterative process where different details have been fluctuating before settling on the final solutions.

I wouldn't be surprised if some of you like some of the discarded designs better, give me a shoutout in that case so I can learn for coming Oleander builds

Sketch build trying some different window concepts.

Final (well, almost at least...) window concept.

Gateway sketch build.

Fleur-de-lis sketch builds, and final concept seen from behind.

Base and initial layout work.

Ground floor conceptually takning shape.

Balcony and canopy sketch build.

Layout work of 1st floor, and trying dbg as the main ground color.

Updated door and archway design.

Layout attempt for distance to 2nd floor.

New canopy sketch build.

New canopy in place, progress on 2nd floor. Tried crowbars as handles on the door.

Roof completed, but the proportions are not quite right yet...

Mezzanine added, trying out some different concepts for the stonework there.

Crowd in front of the palace. The perspective causes problems on the sides, where the frame is not filled if I want to include all four statues.

Wall extended with a few more windows to fill the frame also when shot from below.

Bonus shot with the builder/photographer adjusting the camera angle for the closeup of the king & queen.

[Bregir]

Really cool to see how you progressed through the different iterations. I too do similar tests like you, with experimenting with different heights for floors, details, etc. And some day, I might reach something that looks like your skill!

[Capt Wolf]

Thanks for this peek behind the curtain and a closer look at some of the details. I really appreciate seeing the process!

[Kolonialbeamter]

Wow, that was some time ago. A pretty long way you've come with the palace - and worth every meter

Who took the photo of the photographer?!

[Staslegomaster]

So, you're fond of LEGO architecture and travelling, just as I'm. You take good quality pictures.Are there any of your criations in LEGO ideas?

[Gideon]

You take good quality pictures. Are there any of your criations in LEGO ideas?

Thanks! I've worked quite a lot on my photography since I started MOCing again (when the pictures looked like this: https://flic.kr/s/aHsjzkguiw)

I don't think my building style fits the Ideas program, since I'm relying heavily on many small pieces the part count would be out of what is feasible for Ideas models...

[Ayrlego]

Thank you Gideon for the detailed WIP shots! I really appreciate these kind of pictures as it allows us less experienced builders a chance to see how these epic type builds all come together and shows how you got some of the details to work.