Bricks in Motion
We are a friendly filmmaking community devoted to the art of stop-motion animation using LEGO® and similar construction toys. Here, you can share your work, join our community of other brickfilmers, and participate in periodic animation contests!
A place to discuss, share, and create stop motion films.
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I'd be up for having like sub-level stories take place in this universe. I don't own any of the sets that you mentioned except for one monster Hunter set. so I couldn't really animate any main-level story.
Another idea:
Once people have decided one some characters to include in multiple animators' films, the creator of the character would send out some general guidelines for that character. And once the other animator has written the script, he could send it to the creator for some minor adjustments if needed.
And BTW Nathan Wells, thanks for commenting. You're the reason I make brickfilms. Big fan.
*waves*
Always happy to see someone inspired to brickfilm.
To everyone: I'd caution about getting too hyped up and biting more off than you can chew. These community projects are always great in theory but rarely come to fruition. There's a reason only three community projects have succeeded to date, and two of them were basically montages.
I'd start with posting pictures of characters you'd like to see crossed-over, and featuring those characters in each other's films. Maybe make a few references to other people's films, maybe even get people's characters to even interact and play a plot in each other's plots.
But don't try to build up a massive complex universe that tries to incorporate all LEGO themes. It will be a lot of effort that will result in failure. I've organized one successful community project (The Day Brickfilms.com Crashed) and was heavily involved in another failed community project (Super).
Start simple, stay simple.
What about light flesh figures even though we aren't going to use licensed themes?
Do skin tones matter?
We should probably stick to yellow for consistency, although dark skin tones (e.g. like used for War Machine and Mace Windu and so on) should still be allowed. I guess.
Another thing we could do is stretch the buildablility of figures with simple clothing changes.
Great idea.
We also do not necessarily have to have films existing in actual themes, but also have custom themes.
I kind of meant that in my original post, although I guess I didn't make it clear. It was late. Me waz tireeed.
I suggest that we don't set out any finite rules for what themes don't exist in the weird realm, but just make it a world jammed with almost everything and then just throw something else in if we ever find that we need it.
Seconded.
Another idea:
Once people have decided one some characters to include in multiple animators' films, the creator of the character would send out some general guidelines for that character. And once the other animator has written the script, he could send it to the creator for some minor adjustments if needed.
Also seconded. I like your idea about people uploading pics of their favourite figures, too.
And Nathan, don't worry, I totally know where you're coming from. Of the two big community projects I started on BZPower, only one has come anywhere close to completion (BIONICLE: Next Generation), and that took years to get off the ground. I think if we're smart about this though, it will work, because once we've got the basics sorted out a lot of it revolves around people just sorta' doing their own thing.
Hmm...Seems this is quite a hot topic.
It may be difficult to coordinate, and would require a lot of communication between members, plus the differences in tone, writing and quality may be a bit off-putting, but overall it sounds fantastic. I'm not able to participate right now, but would love it if a figure of mine made it into some other films. (Or even my signature element, the dark red fez.)
I'd love for this to materialize, and it's a great idea for a unofficial, and more casual and loose, community project like thing. Still, I suggest taking it slowly at first, and not jumping right into something too big to handle. And as a final thought, remember to be fairly loose with the crossover elements, I think super-picky attitudes and strictly regulated elements could kill the whole thing. So whatever you do, don't get mad if others 'mess-up' your character.
Yeah, I think this might work because its not a community project. Its really just suggesting some ideas for Brickfilmers, which is great because people are more likely to create a Brickfilm based off-of a licenced LEGO product (or just a project which a lot of people have already been discussing) thats basically just their Brickfilm.
I'm keeping all this stuff in mind. I don't have enough time to make anything huge before I go back to University (this is the time of year where I 'stockpile' short Brickfilms and stagger out the release dates to keep my channel alive), but I'll start planning. Its been a while since I've made a film longer than 5 mins, and I think my skills have grown to a point where I can make something larger than two guys talking.
Hmm...Seems this is quite a hot topic.
It may be difficult to coordinate, and would require a lot of communication between members, plus the differences in tone, writing and quality may be a bit off-putting, but overall it sounds fantastic. I'm not able to participate right now, but would love it if a figure of mine made it into some other films. (Or even my signature element, the dark red fez.)I'd love for this to materialize, and it's a great idea for a unofficial, and more casual and loose, community project like thing. Still, I suggest taking it slowly at first, and not jumping right into something too big to handle. And as a final thought, remember to be fairly loose with the crossover elements, I think super-picky attitudes and strictly regulated elements could kill the whole thing. So whatever you do, don't get mad if others 'mess-up' your character.
Yeah, for now it should be smaller. If everyone taking part just does a small video to establish a different part of our world. I'm going to wait until a few more people have signed up and then start seeing about how's starting with what. No big crossovers until the world has been thoroughly established (e.g. Tony Stark and General Ross met in The Incredible Hulk, but it was another 4 years before The Avengers was made).
And if you have any number of characters that you'd like to appear, post them here with their details/description, and we'll see if someone taking part can build them. The more little cameos and Easter eggs, the better!
Yeah, I think this might work because its not a community project. Its really just suggesting some ideas for Brickfilmers, which is great because people are more likely to create a Brickfilm based off-of a licenced LEGO product (or just a project which a lot of people have already been discussing) thats basically just their Brickfilm.
Exactly. It's sort of business-as-usual, but with the added bonus of name-dropping and cameos, at least at this stage. We'll see where that takes us.
However, we do need to start setting out some basic plan for who's doing what first (e.g. who will do the first Castle or Space video, or the first City or Adventurers video), but I'll start coordinating that when more people have signed up.
Last edited by jampot (August 29, 2013 (11:21am))
Just going to toss my chip in on the old community project SUPER: Perhaps y'all create your own superhero/villain character and have different team up videos (hero team ups, hero vs villain, villain team ups, etc.). Of course, someone should set the rules first about the universe you're working in and then go from there. And just like with Marvel's CU, create the videos one at a time or coordinate with each other to avoid having events occurring at the same time or place in this universe.
All this is possible. You just need to establish the universe first.
Is anyone capable of building anyone from the Pirates Rule! crew?
They're relatively simple if you have any of the more recent Pirate sets.
Pirates Rule! also already exists in a universe where aliens and ninjas exist, so it's the sort of thing that would work well with an everything adventure.
Wow. Just...wow.
This sounds like an absolutely beautiful, fantastic idea. Unfortunately I don't really make many Brickfilms anymore, due to my Brickfilming laptop having broken a while back, but I'd love to act as a story consultant/character designer/occasion screenwriter, even! Possibly volunteer some voice talent, if I ever get over my dignity. Just let me know how I can help. Of course, it occurs to me that we may want to change the name if this ever develops in any official capacity, seeing as we don't actually own the term 'Brickfilm' as far as I know (though someone more legally savvy than I may need to explain this to me). The best part about this is we can make our own gods, and it can be the craziest, zaniest world we can think of. My head is buzzing with ideas for interconnected, coordinated storylines, and I'll see if I can get some Original Character images and quick bios to throw out ideas and see who can build what. It'd be a great opportunity for me to return from being a hermit, and I'd absolutely love to see how this turns out.
(Of course none of this is in the secret hopes that Small World Guy will appear again. Nope. No ulterior motive whatsoever.)
Last edited by Golden (August 29, 2013 (03:55pm))
The first animations should really be something like this. For Phase 1, we should have:
At least one space video. Since there are so many very different space themes, we could have a couple to start with. One might by really zany, like Space Police or Ice Planet, while the other might be more Earth-based, like a Moon mission or Alien Conquest.
A castle video. Either just warring kingdoms, or including the crazy skeleton or troll warriors from recent years.
An adventurers video. Johnny Thunder, Pharoah's Quest, or something new.
A spy video. Most likely Alpha Team or Agents - something that is definitely ground-level and modern day.
Possibly a high-fantasy video (e.g. Chima, Ninjago, or something new but similar).
One additional theme, which could be anything from Racers to Pirates to Dino.
That way it encompasses the majority of the basic, over-arching types of theme. Later down the line, we can go into them in more detail, and add more themes.
Do people agree with me? Tell me if you think this should play differently.
I kind of like the idea of Castle. I have a good amount of Troll Warriors and Crown knights/soldiers from that theme.
However Kingdoms I barely have any sets from.
I have a good amount of Troll Warriors and Crown knights/soldiers from that theme.
I have loads of trolls and Crownies. We could totally make a crossover.
Walter Benson wrote:I have a good amount of Troll Warriors and Crown knights/soldiers from that theme.
I have loads of trolls and Crownies. We could totally make a crossover.
Can I leave you two to coordinate that? If you focus on doing some that just has each others' characters appear for now, then we can work on adding other castle/kingdoms characters and references down the line. Simplicity is key at this stage.
However Kingdoms I barely have any sets from.
Don't worry. As far as Castle and Kingdoms go, it's fine to generisise them/mix them. Aside from the trolls, dwarves and skeletons, they're all the same thing. So Castle alone is fine, as is Kingdoms if someone further along the line wanted to add them as well
I really love this idea. We could develop this a bit further; what if every brickfilmer has their own fictional universe, which we then link together into a multi-verse of sorts? (For instance, Squid would have Riigo-Faloo and Fallentomato/Nightly News at Nine would have the NNN-verse, to give a few random examples.) Brickfilmers could either choose to collaborate if they felt like it, or simply reference other characters in their own films if they please. One problem though is that this might somewhat restrict creativity if brickfilmers wanted to make something completely unrelated to their previous work, though they could always specify if their work was related or not.
I think this could work really well, though; we could have a LEGO Universe-esque world in which multiple themes exist simultaneously. (Time travel could get a bit messy, but I think it could work if we made it very limited and restricted to a few characters.) Regarding LEGO's official themes, I think it would be better to stick to our own themes and work on fleshing those out--and definitely no licensed themes. I suppose this is my own personal taste, but it seems to me that LEGO's themes have gone pretty downhill lately. There are far too many themes that are either licensed or too short-lived (or both)... and many seem to be really childish (the new castle theme is meh, Ninjago is horrifically cheesy, and don't even get me started on Chima....) Of course, we could have themes inspired by official ones, and perhaps reference some in our work, but I think it would be better to focus on our own creativity.
In fact, this idea actually fits quite well with a few ideas of my own that I've had. I was on a road trip recently. During that time, I realized my brickfilming mascot of sorts, Mr. Vertigo (who is an eccentric wizard from another dimension) needed a backstory. So I started fleshing out the dimension/world in which he lives. It's a bit patchy--right now I've got only a handful of characters and places. So far I have no specific brickfilming ideas, but I want to make some minifigs of characters, and hopefully post some drawings I've made of some of the stuff in this universe.
Oh yes, and here's a picture of Mr. Vertigo:
He also talks in a very weird high pitched squeaky voice (a bit like Jahk from Pirates Rule!) He should be fairly easy to make, as most of the parts are pretty common, but if anyone wants to make him and doesn't have the exact parts, just use whatever is closest--I love seeing what combinations other people come up with. 
A minifigure doesn't have common parts if it includes two from two separate collectable minifigures.
I could build him in exact detail with the exception of the unique judge robe.
Well, I sadly don't have too many characters that could be integrated into something like this. Ax-man would be utterly fantastic, so I guess if they were set before 'Ax' he could be used.
It would be great to get this up and well established before THAC, allowing entries into that to have a bit of back story to work with. But anyway, I think it would be better to have one somewhat wacky and random universe than to try a big multi-verse thing. That would make integration better IMHO, and folks wouldn't have to come up with a lot of ways to go between universes. But then again, it really doesn't matter how they all link together, just that they do.
Also, cool figure, and interesting character concept there FlyingMinifigure.
I think I can build him, but others may have to do a bit of part swapping.
It would be great to get this up and well established before THAC, allowing entries into that to have a bit of back story to work with. But anyway, I think it would be better to have one somewhat wacky and random universe than to try a big multi-verse thing. That would make integration better IMHO, and folks wouldn't have to come up with a lot of ways to go between universes.
What he said. Alternate universes get choppy. Trust me - I've spent years trying to work out the way a multiverse could work for a novel I wanted to write, but the moment you even think about trying to make rules apply to it, you're on a long and treacherous mountain road down to Badsville. That's the town that the Howard the Duck movie comes from. And I'm afraid I disagree on the themes - I think they're a great springboard to work with. What nobody seems to have got from my first post is that they aren't the be-all and end-all; they're just a way of getting started. Take Agents for a second: if someone wanted to do an Agents film, they could use completely different characters (secret agents and villains both), so that the dark blue vehicles and the logo were the only link back to the original theme. I'm not saying that they're all we do. For instance, the first three films that I would like to do for this are Galaxy Patrol (so based around one of the collectable minifigures rather than a theme as such), Vampire Council (which, strangely, links back to the old LEGO Racers games) and Caden Hawke (an extension of the old Adventurers theme).
So it's just about using bits here and there. There are no rules here saying that you have to use one of LEGO's themes, but equally there isn't a rule saying that you can't use them at all. If you'd rather that you did a film based on your own theme, that's perfectly fine. That's more than fine, it's awesome - it expands the BFCU by bringing a new theme into play, something which might not otherwise have been thought of or explored.
And I can build Mr. Vertigo too, but without the robe. Again, collectable minifigure parts aren't common. I think Squid said something earlier about costume changes...
Making a list of alternate combos is a good idea. What other torsos and such can be swapped out and all that.
I've also been tempted to do small things like have The Nightly News at Nine playing in the background of some of my Brickfilms - but I can't be bothered to ask for written consent, and there is a huge chance that either I won't recieve a response, or won't be allowed to use it.
I know I don't post much, but I hope I don't give off the impression that I'm inaccessible or overly-protective of my characters. 
Nothing pleases me more than when someone uses NNN characters in their brickfilm! I have even provided voices for some of these cameos, most notably for Minilife TV. In my last animation contest I asked people to make animations set in part of the NNNverse, provided some audio and video assets to help out, and promoted the winning videos on my channel.
Let me be clear: I hereby grant everyone my permission to use any character or idea from NNN in their brickfilms. I have neither the desire nor the resources to pursue legal action against anyone. 
The only thing that would bother me is if someone took my videos and tried to pass them off as their own and profit form them. If you want my blessing/feedback/voice acting for a brickfilm you are working on that has an NNN component, the fastest way to get my attention is to email me at [email protected].
I love the idea of a Brick Film Cinematic Universe. I think we should all be always looking for ways to reference each other and cross-pollinate characters and ideas. However it will be difficult to ever have anything as tightly integrated as the Marvel Cinematic Universe since we have no central authoritative editorial vision.
Some of the things that you're talking about here are what I've tried to do with NNN. Namely, establishing a world/universe in which all LEGO themes co-exist simultaneously. This is why the first 6 seconds of Chapter 1 show Phil and Sherry in Town, Castle, Pirates, Adventurers and Space settings in rapid succession. I've even mapped out where on the planet Figuria the different themes are generally located. But I don't expect most people to be interested in writing stories set on my fictional planet (though if you are, more power to you!).
The way Minilife TV has explained it to his audience in YouTube comments, his characters live on the planet Legondo, which is in the same galaxy as Figuria. This has been a pretty good way to handle the fact that we're each doing our own separate thing, while still giving a plausible explanation for my characters occasionally appearing in his show. Others who have used NNN characters for cameos haven't necessarily taken the time to think out the implications of that for their fictional universes. That's cool too! Not everyone is obsessive about world-building (though I obviously am 
).
In the NNNverse, it doesn't hurt if you take off your limbs (though you die if you take off your head [unless you're a wizard]), guns shoot gravity beams instead of bullets, and the colors are intangible beings of immense power who get into petty fights with one another. These are some of the rules of the NNNverse I've established in my own mind and through the episodes I've released, but I wouldn't expect other brickfilms others to stick to them, even when they use my characters.
I'm already thinking about how to incorporate a Sharks and Clowns reference and a Minilife TV cameo into Chapter 3 of NNN. Orange Beats Binary was a shameless homage to Robota and the Toymaster General section of The End of Sports owes much to the conceit of Little Guys! (which is why I asked David Pagano to voice him). This is all to say, I already act as thought there is a BFCU and animate my stories accordingly. I encourage others to do likewise.
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