Classic-Castle.com CCCVIII Winners

It's hard to believe that this is the eighth year of CC's CCC contest (wow, that's a lot of Cs!)

 
I especially like this winning entry by Daniel Kucera in the Realistic Castle category.

Check out all the winners here!

Ninja Showdown at a Japanese Tea House

Here's a new MOC from brickshelf user DARKspawn [gallery here].

It shows a scene from medieval Japan, wherein two groups of ninjas face off outside a tea house.  I really love the clever curved roof design on the tea house.  Also noteworthy is the landscaping, especially the waterfall and the staircase set into the rock.

Green Dragon Inn

Check out this MOC from Matthew Hurt [gallery here]

It provides a nice home away from home for traveling Green Dragon Knights.  Since they're so new to the LEGO realm, I'm sure they're traveling a lot these days to explore things.  And what better place to relax after a hard day's slog?  It certainly looks cozy and festive inside!

I particularly like the deer (or possibly moose, elk or wapiti) head mounted over the fireplace, and of course the boys throwing rocks at the chicken (a classic!).

Resting Outlaws

Check out this MOC by ElephantKnight. [gallery here]

It shows a few outlaws enjoying their spoils.  Of particular note is the clver use of the pig piece.  Mmmm, I love BBQ!

P.S.  Sorry for the break in there with no posts, I was out of town.  Resume regular posting!

Village

Brickshelf user legoutrgnc has uploaded pictures of a great scene simply titled "Village."

The thing I love most about this MOC is its randomness.  In a medium made up mostly of square elements, it's often difficult to create landscapes that realistically mimic natural features.  Legoutrgnc has done a very good job, in my opinion, of making an organic looking landscape as a backdrop for his village scene.  The buildings, too, have a nice sense of non-uniformity, due to skilful use of mottling, and color variations from one building to the next.  On detail I particularly like is this slanted doorway and little tower/pergola thing.

Note the great use of dark bluish-gray cheese slopes on either side of the door.  I'm still trying to figure ouy how he made all of this work!  This is definitely one of those MOCs which inspires me to get better at my own building.  You can find more pictures here.

Battle of Grunwald

LEGO Conferences offer a great opportunity for AFOLs to pool their resources to create monster displays, like this one from LUGPol members in Warsaw.  LUGs often spend many hours months in advance planning large-scale displays, and many more hours setting them up once they arrive at the venue.

This is a recreation of the Battle of Grunwald, in honor of the 600th anniversary of the battle.  According to one of the participants, there are 96 baseplates and over 700 minifigs.  I love the fact that it's not just a massive array of minifigs, but there has been significant attention paid to landscaping as well.  It must have taken a lot of coordination to get the various segments of the stream lined up, for example.  There are also a ton of very detailed custom figs in both armies.  You can see some in the photos below:

This really gives the impression that various lords have been called out and brought hosts of soldiers in different liveries to the battle.  Which is, I suppose, what happened here; various AFOLs brought out their own armies and gathered them all on the same battlefield!

Here are 3 galleries of more photos from this display:
Number 1
Number 2
Number 3

Church of St. Lazarus

Brickshelf user Rhox has uploaded pictures of a MOC called Church of St. Lazarus.

There are lots of great details to enjoy here for the castle enthusiast.  Check out the nicely greebled cathedral facade, as well as the nicely shaped sacristy (the rounded area at the back) roof.  That's hard to do with LEGO!  I think Rhox has done a good job of blancing greebling against clean lines and elegance.  I also realy like the tree with roots cascading down the rock.  Also be sure to check out the Medieval Port House, by the same builder.