The Hawkflight Archives, Vol 02: The Master Builder Academy Years (2011-2012)

[Hawkflight]

Welcome back to the Hawkflight Archives, where we obtain the powers both of flight and more options for color schemes!

I got into the theme of aircraft before I got the set with this one, with a few Ninjago inspired builds. This one was based on the Fangpyre vehicles that were popular at the time. The lack of white in that color scheme does appear to hurt the shaping of this one.

I’m surprised I didn’t use the wing pieces from space designer as, well, wings. I don’t think the MBA piece set I used lends itself to skeleton vehicles as well as it might the snake ones.

This one was built ten years ago almost to the day - I remember working on this around July 4th. It’s a bit odd that I found a set that had a similar color scheme to the level two kit and made a plane out of it.

This was another mod of an existing model. Biplane? Now it’s a triplane.

Expanding on the Ninjago themed aircraft earlier, I made a glider for NRG Kai - though now I’m wondering why he would need it.

As per usual, I liked to build two models just with the kit, and then combine it with my existing MBA parts. For my first combo model; I believe I had been playing a lot of retro sonic games, and came up with this jet-powered shark robot. Though despite it being in my aircraft folder, it looks like it would be better suited for underwater use.

A second take one a Ninjago snake plane; pulling in extra pieces from my Ninjago sets for good measure. Apparently, it can fire snakes.

I wasn’t super into planes after I combined the parts together, but I did make this one. The weird thing to me about this model is how it seems cohesive, but the fuselage is on top of a wide plate.

Also created a variant that used more of the Kit 1 colors (though not completely.)

Join me next time, maybe, to see what kinds of mechs I built with these new pieces.

[Hawkflight]

Welcome back to the Hawkflight Archives, where my love of mechs:tm: combines with the power of better color scheme options!

With the different color schemes; I wanted to try my hand again at a faction-based build - I lost interest shortly after; but did just enough for most of the factions I had to be represented.
I think this MOC would have been made when I had the idea but hadn’t yet combined the Kit 4 parts with the rest, as one of the “heroes”. It had a shuriken attached to its back, but no way to throw it, since its arms were gunes. Guns with elbows, mind you.

A part of the “villains” faction (it had a name I’m sure but I forgot about it) with a white, yellow and purple color scheme, and a white sword. Making mechs with classical melee weapons was probably not an intended use case of these sets.

It also had a “dropship” component - though looking at its structure I don’t know how much this would have helped.

Another hero-team mech, this one has a claw to throw its shuriken (not a great claw, and a claw nonetheless) as well as an electrical shock. It was also lime and dark red, but that’s hard to see against my red wall.

Less hard to see here. Most of these MOCs have multiple images, but they usually aren’t necessary to include.

Another hero-team mech, mimicking the build of the first one. I want to try to rebuild it someday with less clunky legs, because the torso shaping is pretty good.

Part of another, more dastardly villain faction - I remember this was called the “ruinous mech”. I don’t think I ever reused this color scheme in a MOC, but it’s been reused for villainous entities in other stories I’ve made.

Fun fact - this MOC, the “Storm Combat Walker”, was my most liked MOC in the Master Builder Academy galleries. It was so popular, that I actually saw someone try to reupload it and pass it off as their MOC. Someone called it out before I did, but I don’t know whether it was taken down or not. Anyway, it’s a concept that I revisited later (spoiler).

I also revisited the space theme with these new color options - and these were the last MOCs in the space folder. Combining yellow with other colors was the order of the day. This picture - taken with the horrible quality of my then-brand-new Nintendo 3DS, combines purple and dark green - again, a color I have reused in other contexts - with yellow. I’d venture to say it does not work. I also am not sure whether the color blocking was intentional or not.

This example, which replaces the purple with dark red, is more cohesive, but not necessarily the colors I’d choose for a futuristic space vehicle. It also uses a lot of the same pieces as the previous - bubble cockpit, black cannon pieces, and yellow wing pieces on their side.

It wasn’t all that, though - this one seems to be a throwback to mostly Kit 1 parts. It also doesn’t reuse the cockpit design of that set like a lot of my old space builds did. I think it would have looked better than what it has.

aaaaaaaaaand a third and final build with the design elements I mentioned before - but with the dark red swapped out for lime, and I don’t know if it works or not. I’m going to say the white bit earlier was intentional, because it’s repeated on the tail end here.

Join me next time, maybe, where there will probably be even more mechs. Bigger, more ambitious mechs. Possibly better, possibly not.

[Rukah]

Very nice. These don’t look too bad

[Wekua]

This is really fun to follow

[Hawkflight]

Welcome back to the Hawkflight archives, where we continue to explore the various ways one can build a mech.

We begin with the category of clone mechs. I’d already experimented with creating a pair of mecha despite having enough joints for one before, but this time I had enough colors to create the same build in two color schemes (not the first time I’d done this, if you’ve already seen my BIO-MOC Hawkflight Archive.) They also have some decent looking brick build melee weapons, courtesy of using a color that makes it look like a melee weapon.

Another Ninjago themed mecha. It’s a bit odd that despite being piloted by a Fangpyre I didn’t use the Fangpyre color scheme, which would have been easy to do with the pieces I had at my disposal. This was done in conjunction with the previous snake plane, so not an impressive build.

Also in this folder for whatever reason, is what I will affectionately call the Rattlacopter.

Up next we have a subtle continuation of the “Dark Line” theme I discussed a while back. Two characters continued the story. This is Kruscave, who took over the Dark Line’s facilities after the battle that destroyed their leadership and all the mecha you saw earlier.He has quite big hands.

And he was fought by Dark Flame, who utilizes the red from Kit 2 for a properly edgy (if slightly muted due to the grey) color scheme.

Speaking of muted by the grey, this was one of my first attempts at a “gritty realistic” color scheme. The wing pieces as legs kind of take the sails out of the sense of realism, though.

Here’s another build for the same concept, taken on the Nintendo 3DS camera.

We return now to bright and happy color schemes. This was the “para-bot”, who by virtue of having two helicopter rotors was able to fly. And he had an energy spear with two rotors, which also meant it could fly. Physics is great.

We have ourselves more clones. Three of them, which makes coming up with coherent color schemes a lot more difficult.

Speaking of incoherent color schemes, this was an exercise in complete spontaneity.

Nothing I could say about this build is more important than the fact that this was the first MOC I consciously added a bust to. I don’t know why, other than the fact I had recently started puberty. (True Hawkflight Archives fans may notice I discounted a lot of my previous BIO-MOCs as consciously adding busts based around Kiina’s torso, but I don’t know if I ever put that together, aside from it being a design I knew “worked” for female characters.)

Oh look, some constraction. And an oddly flat neck.

Branching outside the MBA sets for a bit, we have here my fourth and final mecha created just using Alpha Team parts. Generally a more interesting build than my previous ones, though not interesting enough for me. So I combined it with other pieces and created…

The FireRipper, my largest mecha at the time (and possibly to date), armed with a decently working color scheme, Ice pieces for feet, and a mis-styled left arm.

And this was its opponent, a rather normal mech at this point, save for a lack of white in its legs, and a shield.

Thank you for tuning into this Hawkflight Archives installment. Join me next time, maybe, where will encounter another MBA installment, that features a lot of new joint pieces. Will these bring my now well-documented love of mechs to the next level? Or will the allure of cool biological creations overpower the mystique of cool mechanical ones?

[Rukah]

neat. The mechs aren’t that bad

[Hawkflight]

Welcome back to the Hawkflight Archives, where I make up for my lack of MOCs in the present by displaying MOCs of my past. I’d say it was a better time, but this topic says 2011-2012, so not strictly true…

We begin with this Creator monstrosity, based around I forget what set, but clearly it didn’t have the right pieces for what I (and my friend whose set this actually was) wanted to make.

Beginning with the actual creature kit, we have ourselves this snake…

And this bootleg version of the T-rex from the set. My patience had already run dry. I was ready to build more mechs.

Now that I had a lot more parts that would make for good mech designs, I started revisiting some of my previous MOCs. The “Axe Bot” I had created but months prior got a reworked color scheme, forward facing armor, and a still sketchy but overall more convincing weapon. (Probably should have added a bit more white overall, though.)

A bit more humble in design, and using the effective opposite color scheme, this redux of the previous sword wielding mech with yellow and purple most prominently replaced much of the white with grey. I’m not sure how much improvement was made beside the slight bestial look - the original had better looking legs than most of the others. It also didn’t have knees. Maybe The LEGO Group is on to something.

Also, apparently, this mech had a lot of weapons.

My previous stint of black and grey villains made a slight resurgence. This creation - the ElectroLord - adds both translucent blue and an early use of MS paint to the mix.

My last contribution for today also provides a short story about the censorship of LEGO.com - after building it, I didn’t know whether I was going to classify it as a sniper (though it doesn’t share the look of one), a ninja, or an assassin. I originally submitted it under the assassin name, and it wasn’t approved by the website’s moderators - then I tried again as a ninja, and it made it in. Also, I think this one was photographed in a different room than all the other ones (incidentally, the spare room I was in while taking pictures was converted into my bedroom later on when I had outgrown the one I was in.

Join me next time, maybe, where we’ll wrap up this chapter of the Hawkflight Archives with a few more mechs and a handful of wheeled vehicles.

[Rukah]

neato. I like the axe bot

[Hawkflight]

In the final installment of The Hawkflight Archives, Vol. 02 - some mechs, some mechs, some MOC revamps, and something brand new - wheels!

We start with this build that, while I uploaded it to the robot gallery, fits the bill for a creature build just as well - inspired by the Dark Wasp mecha, but now with a lot more options to make it more realistic.

This was another build using the pieces from a friend of mine, so it’s on par with the other Kit 3 smaller bot builds, minus the much more vibrant black, purple, and grey rather than black and grey. Also, I guess the space and mecha sets both had a controls piece that represents its brain.

We’ve got ourselves some more photoshop, and another robo brain. I believe this was a subservient unit to the ElectroLord included previously. It also had a few variant weapons it could use.

Following up on my most well-received build with a lot sleeker design, I think this MOC became my 2nd most well received MOC, almost but not quite reaching the success of the original.

This little guy is part of the inception of my big persistent idea of fiction - with its origins in some of the lore for the Dark Line MOCs that never got posted online, this idea has persisted through original story ideas, bleeding into my BIONICLE storyline, my D&D characters’ background, and the music that is my primary creative project now. “Erkebala” as I called him was the heroic robot protagonist of this iteration of the story. Hm, sentient robot protagonists, with a sci fi flair but dense fantasy lore. I wonder if I’ll encounter a similar idea within the next year of making this.

And here we have what I believe is my final entry in the “black and grey villain robot” concept, and maybe my last system-build melee weapon. I think this also marks the first time I’ve seen the magnifying glass that came with Kit 2 used in one of my MOCs.

From here, we’ll make a detour into the realm of wheeled vehicles - which, like the last two kits, I made only a partial effort to build - before introducing the last mecha of this era.

And the oldest one in the auto folder is, in fact, a combo model of two of the very first Ninjago sets. I definitely didn’t get much of an opportunity to utilize the Skeleton’s aesthetics with the pieces given to me.

And this MOC was build along with some of the other Ninjago-inspired MOCs earlier, and was one of the few examples of integrating the MBA piece set I primarily used with other pieces - including some tank treads from Mars Mission and a Power Miners drill.

Here’s the first proper MOC from the auto set. The most interesting thing about that set to me was the inclusion of rubber bands to create suspension (as well as the first significant inclusion of technic.)

That concept went even further this this build, that used the two rubber bands across two wheels each, creating suspension on each wheel that deserves to be applied to a much more off-roady vehicle than this one.

Continuing another consistent and dark color scheme, from sets not necessarily designed to accomodate them - we have a tank with a weirdly attached turret. This was also the first MOC that I created “instructions” for. With those instructions - I can see how much yellow and lime green bits were used as supporting colors, just like with real sets.

The final MOC(s) I’ll leave you today, and on this volume of the Hawkflight Archives, continues the story of the little white MOC I showed earlier - trying out different approaches using different collections of pieces. I was pretty strict about trying to keep my pieces separated by theme - a scruple that actually ended after these MOCs, as I realized that restricting myself to a particular piece set for MOCs, while sometimes a useful creative exercise, might not give me the best results. Of these three, I think the Mars Mission one was my favorite, though I’m willing to attribute that primarily to the nicer shade of translucent blue. It’s also, by default, the best looking of my Mars Mission MOCs - as, rather than combining both factions’ color schemes, it combines one primarily color from each.

Part of me wishes that I had a proper “grand finale” MOC - a creation combining the bits of all six sets, culminating all the experience I had so far. But alas, that is not here. I have considered going back to these sets, whether that be revamps of the official models or attempting to try some new things with the restricted piece count I had so much experience with. But that’s a MOC for another topic. Join me next time, maybe, as I continue to explore the world of creating mechanical characters in this growing world of mine - and when I discover the depths to which LEGO beat me to the concept!

[Rukah]

Ah, very nice. I like the yellow wasp looking thing and the three robots at the end.

[TotalMaddness]

@Hawkflight

I think this might be my favourite build out of the entire topic. It’s really well done and in surprisingly accurate colours for something built with limited parts.

[Eilrach]

gotta say the same thing