This Belongs In A Museum

There's a Lego shop in The Gardens, somewhere in KL. The shop is called Brickboy Toys and they had these awesome displays.

It belongs in a museum!

Indiana Jones' brick-pixellated head.

Look, a dragon!

No idea what this is.

The medieval marketplace, the set I wish I had enough parts to build. It'd be great for photo storytelling.

A distressed damsel being forced to walk the plank on a pirate ship.

Part of a Lego town diorama.

More bits of diorama.

I wish I had the space and parts to build something like this.

Droid Adventures Part II

Our intrepid little droid returns again for a photo adventure.

Here's R2 on the sterile white floor of the Death Star.

Here he is again on the Death Star, in the detention level. To the observant reader, this set may look just like the background I used for Cybertron. I'm uncreative when it comes to backgrounds, so I recycle them. Observant readers who are also die-hard fans of Star Wars might also (correctly) point out that R2 never went to the detention block. Feel free to protest this oversight in the comments section.

This might be a tank of Bacta fluid. It's too small to be an actual Bacta tank, so I'll pretend it's backup Bacta storage.

This tunnel is supposed to represent the one in Cloud City where Luke enters. Again, R2 never got near it, and it's too small. But I thought it looked cool, so there it is.

Droid Adventures Part I

R2-D2 is one of my favourite characters in Star Wars. I couldn't resist buying a little figure of him to use in Star Wars inspired photo shoots. The first two alludes to R2 rolling off on his own on Tatooine (before being captured by Jawas) and the last two is supposed to be R2 on the forest moon of Endor. These photos would work better if they were done in carefully built dioramas, but I don't have the patience to do that. So here he is, shot at different locations on campus.

Well, I'm not going that way. It's much too rocky.

What makes you think there are settlements over there?

And you said it was pretty here.

Wa-wait! Wait, come back! Artoo, stay with me.

Robosaurs

Everyone knows robots are cool. So are dinosaurs. So what's cooler than both robots and dinosaurs? Robot dinosaurs.

Robosaurs come in many shapes and sizes. Here is a robobrachiosaur, roaming around in a lush Jurassic jungle.

Technically, they run on artificial power sources, so I don't know why it's munching leaves. Perhaps it does so to fit in with organic dinosaurs. As they say, when in the late Jurassic, do as the organic brachiosaurs do (it's a popular aphorism, trust me on this one).

Contrary to outdated beliefs about robobrachiosaurs, they did not spend their time underwater but instead preferred dry land.

The roboraptor is a much smaller robosaur, but it packs a nasty set of teeth and claws. No, actually, those look pretty blunt and child-safe. However, it does makes a fearsome roar. That counts for something, right?

The fearsome roboraptor is ready to pounce from the top of a rock. There is no escape from its mighty jaws, except when you disable it via the on/off switch conveniently located on the back.

The robosaurs co-existed with other dinosaurs from those prehistoric times, such as this DEC AlphaStation.

Silicon Graphics workstations were featured in the movie "Jurassic Park". It fit right in with the other dinosaurs.

The mass-extinction that occurred 65 million years ago may have killed the organic dinosaurs, but the robot ones lingered on until the ice age when temperatures dropped to the "max" setting and they froze up. However, they may return someday.

The robobrachiosaur is a Zoid model I got for cheap during a clearance sale, and the roboraptor is a trinket that's supposed to be a smaller version of the raptor toy from Wowwee Robotics.

Bumblebee Transforms

Bumblebee the Autobot transforms from a Chevrolet Camaro 2008 concept car to a big alien robot in this sequence of pictures. Click here to see it in animated gif form (this is a terrible example of stop motion).

Bumblebee On Earth

I've tried to shoot this little guy in places where the scale of the model is not entirely obvious. I want him to look life-sized, and it's quite tricky to make the illusion look real.

I don't think Camaros can be driven into the jungle like this.

Bumblebee the Camaro parked near a scenic view of the Penang bridge.

Bumblebee transforms into his towering robot mode and poses in front of the bridge to have his photo taken.

It's hard to shoot a tiny model on the grass, because usually the blades of grass are really tall compared to the model and that breaks the illusion that this toy is actually a giant robot. However, this grass is nice and short. It's not entirely convincing so you need to pretend it's really tall (and fat) grass he's stepping on.

Bumblebee standing around amongst rocks and plants.

Bumblebee On Cybertron

Cybertron is a metal world inhabited by giant robots and torn apart by civil war. It was never fully explained why the Cybertronian conflict occurred in the animated series or the movies, other than the fact that Decepticons were power-hungry and wanted to rule over all and the Autobots wanted to stop them.

Bumblebee is a little Autobot fighting for his life, as he's cornered in the above picture. I don't know why he has bits of Camaro sticking out of his robot form even when on Cybertron. While we're on the subject of Cybertronian mysteries, just where does Optimus Prime's trailer go when he becomes a robot? How does Megatron shrink into a tiny gun? Which one is Rumble and which one is Frenzy?

Sadly, these questions may never be answered.

Bumblebee On The Racetrack

I'm took my Bumblebee figure for a photo shooting session on a racetrack, where I basically fiddled with manual focus and F-number values to set depth of field. The H2 can be cranked up to f/8.0, which produced the racetrack photos.

Here's Bumblebee the long-distance runner, warming up for a race.

The road turns out to be a little too long though, and running is tiring. See how droopy his head is?

But why run when you can drive? Bumblebee makes the transforming noise as he folds himself up into a Camaro. Choo-choo-chee-chee-chee!

Marathons are easy to win when you have wheels and a motor (and also when there's no one else around actually racing you). Here is Bumblebee enjoying the view from a lofty spot after winning the race.

Turtle Power!

This series of photos depict each of the ninja turtles in different locations. It took a long time to get this set done, but here it is now.

Here's Leonardo on the top of a rock, triumphantly waving his ninjaken in the air.

Raphael is out in the jungle alone, descending stealthily from a vine.

Michaelangelo is in his element on the beach, planning to have fun riding the waves on a jetski.

Donatello walks on a ledge high above the streets of the city.

Bumblebee

Here is a Bumblebee action figure from the new Transformers movie. He turns into a Chevrolet Camaro. This edition of the toy is the "2008 concept Camaro" which he turns into later in the film.

These shots were taken with the H2:

Ninja Macro Photography

I recently got myself some Ninja Turtle action figures to use in macro photography. I was inspired to do so by this article I stumbled upon on the web. I've been taking these photos for the past few weeks, and I'm putting up my favourites here. Some have been digitally edited slightly so that they look better.

The ninja turtles on a rocky outcropping.

Donatello doing ninja things, jumping on balconies near rooftops.

Raphael is doing his emo thing by not joining the rest of his brothers. He's over there on another rocky peak, sulking. Or he could be waving, it's hard to tell.

Mikey on a rock. Behind him is a waterfront condo that ripped off the Petronas towers' design and is blocking the view of the Penang bridge.

Leonardo posing in front of geodesic dome thingy that the architecture students built.

Leonardo gesturing Donatello to follow him.

Now Donatello is doing the leading with Leonardo behind.

Donatello and Raphael hanging out on a shiny shiny surface near some trees. Shiny!

The Ninja Turtles invade the city!