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PurpleHills - the castle of the wizards

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 9:42 am
by jens
Hi!
I want to show you my first castle after my "dark ages": PurpleHills!
It's not the newest, but I found this forum only a few days bevor.

In the big tower at the left corner of the castle I have build two trap-doors:

Image Image Image

With the one an enemy falls thru the wall outside of the castle, with the other you can reach the bottomarea of the tower with the hidden door behind the rock.

Each floor of this big tower you can lift of, to watch inside.

I hope you like my work, and if you want to see more please visit "PurpleHills" on brickshelf:

Image


Please excuse the bad quality of some pictures, they are a littlebit to big and some are blurred. Next time it would be better.

regards,
jens

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 11:05 am
by flying dutchman
WOW this is amazing that must have cost you a lot of time i think?

greets
bjorn

Re: PurpleHills - the castle of the wizards

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 11:48 am
by JoshWedin
Wow! This was your first after your dark ages? Incredible. The purple roof is quite interesting, I like it. Where on earth did you get all the purple tiles? This whole MOC is designed very well. There are too many cool details to go into since I am about to leave for work, but I think this tower is my favorite: http://www.brickshelf.com/gallery/schli ... wer_01.jpg

Keep up the good work,
Josh

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 11:49 am
by Troy T. Moore
Well, obviously that "dark age" took ALL the creativity out of you :shock: :wink:

The purple tile roofs are very, very cool. I like the pig pen with pigs, including suckling piglets :) The castle doors and the spacey pieces on each side look neat. All said this castle has a very "fantastical" feel to it. The tan/brown wattle and daubbish buildings on the one tower are quite striking.

Sadly I am only on dial-up and could not veiw all the pics in full size (they are too big, too long to load), so I am probably missing a lot of other details. Very nice, very inspiring.

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 12:10 pm
by The Tennis Ball Kid
Hello, Jens!


I like this castle a lot, especially the roof.


We discussed when this when it first came on Brickshelf too:
viewtopic.php?t=2787




ttbk

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 1:31 pm
by jens
I think I can clear up some questions:

The Idea for this castle I got at Legoland Günzburg. They had there a big box where you could pic some bicks in a ZipLok and pay for each ZipLok.

At my visit in this huge Box there were only purple tiles 1x2 and some basics with faces-pattern in color nongrey (yellow, white, red, ...).

I thought about the possibilities and had the roof idea. I bought a second bag (together something about 20 EUR). The Army of ca 80 Dumbledores was much more expensive.
  • At home I build 10 weeks on the whole castle.
  • I used ca. 2.500 Tiles 1x2 in purple. The corners were tricky, because I only had 5 1x1 Tiles in purple.
  • The big tower was the last thing I build.
  • I started with the church/chapel. And then I wanted to build a Castle around it.
  • The Pigs aren't my idea. I found them on brickshelf from user Gingivere, but I was fascinated. The Piglets are an "advancement".
  • The doors I had to do so, because I wanted huge doors.
regards,
jens

Re: PurpleHills - the castle of the wizards

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 1:33 pm
by footsteps
Well done, Jens. The attention to detail that I've seen is amazing. Makes me drool. I'd love to build something like that (but my wife hates purple so I'd pick a different colour).

Seeing all the wizard-warriors standing and marching around, I couldn't help but feel like I was looking at a "Where's Waldo" take-off. Great fun.

Alan

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 3:48 pm
by erikut
Thats awesome Jens. i really like it man youre good.

Erik

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 4:14 pm
by Jacob C.
Amazing!!!
I never thought purple roofs & colors would be appropriate for castle but I was wrong. You pulled it off very well!
It's one of the best "Fantasy" type castles I have ever seen!
Very clever how you made the pigs! The details are quite beautiful & lush.
Really Unique!
Looks like it popped out of a fairy tale book.
Great Job.....Hope to see more of your creations in the future.

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 4:36 pm
by Skudmunky
seeing this made me de-lurk to tell you how amazing it is. looks so realistic, the purple highlights are beautifull, and the castle does not suffer at all from big-grey-wall-syndrome. great job!

amazed, skudmunky.

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 5:15 pm
by ottoatm
Wow.... I think I would happily go into a lil dark age if it meant I could build something like this upon my return!

I was going to ask where you got all those dumbledores/unique pieces... I really need to make (several) trips to legoland.

Very well done - there is way to much to even talk about everything - I love it all... like a druid's keep or something - I love that everything seems somewhat mystical -

- and I love the detail! :shock:

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 5:27 pm
by Athos
Very nice. I love the purple roofs. Nice use of those prefab castle walls, I have a very hard time using those effectively.

Steve

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 6:51 pm
by Bruce N H
Hey Jens,

Welcome to this forum! I remember we "ooh"ed and "ah"ed over this creation when it first appeared on Brickshelf. The whole thing is amazing, and it is definitely the best use of purple in any castle-themed MOC. My favorite detail is probably the curved roof on the chapel.

Bruce

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 7:27 pm
by Snap Dracone
*low whistle*

I must say that that is incredible. I love the various towers, but the protruding plates on the round one are distratcing. The layout is also excellent, as are the various features like the stables and well. The chapel is quite something, but it seems too small to me... The attention to detail on the inside is fabulous, and I love the trapdoor system.

The huge army of wizards just seems too huge... I hate to say this, since it's obvious you spent a lot of time on them, but I would imagine that there would be fewer, perhaps two-thirds as many, and in more varied colors of robes, like blue, brown, shades of gray, sand red, perhaps, and maybe a green or two... Then it would look excellent. I love the rooftops and uneven look of them.

Fantastic!
–Snap

Posted: Mon Apr 04, 2005 8:44 pm
by bannear
This is a really wonderful Castle. I really like the Purple Mage forces - you really worked that theme well. The Secret entrance is very nice and the trap is marvelous.
The pigs and piglets are great - now I have a use for those pink pieces!
I also really like how you did the Scarecrow and the birds in the fields - nice idea.
I also like the use of the horns on the horse barding used to cover the drawbridge "chain" holes. Are these bardings also being used to guide the string? or just as a cover ? I couldn't really tell.
Also is the whole castle sitting on tiles or just the curved and angled sections? I see them at the front gate so that is why I ask.
I also like the use of the curved slope space pieces at the front gate - I have been trying to think of a way to use the ones I have. The roofed portions of your towers jutting out from the side break up the walls wonderfully. I will have to try that.
The modular nature of the towers is also excellent. I have learned so much from looking at your work! Wow!
Thanks for sharing.
Cheers
SirBert