I've seen many kinds of LEGO centaurs on Brickshelf. The main difference between them is the legs. Here's a list of the types of LEGO centaur legs I've seen and why I didn't use that method:
2 Pirate peg legs on 1 waist - legs look to thin
2 pairs of minifig legs - looks unhorse like, too much like a Shpleem
1X1 round bricks - 2 round bricks are too tall, and 1 isn't enough
At first I tried making the centaurs' legs out of 1X1 round bricks with 1X1 round plates towards the bottom of the legs with a black 1X1 round plate on the very bottom for the hoof. I could achieve the exact height I wanted by this method, but the 1X1 plates made the legs have weird looking ridges. Also I wanted the horse part of the centaurs to be brown, and while brown 1X1 round bricks are fairly cheap and easy to come by, 1X1 round plates in brown are not.
I knew that I wanted the legs to be 2 bricks (6 plates) tall. Using 2 round 1X1 bricks meant that I either had to leave the centaur hoofless or add hooves and make it look a little too tall. Then I remembered that those Technic pin joiners that are completely smooth inside and out are exactly 2 & 2/3rds bricks (5 plates) tall when placed upright. If I used those as legs, I could use the black 1X1 round plates as hooves and achieve the exact height I wanted while creating a very smooth and thus asthetically pleasing horse leg.
I had known that I wanted to use the 2X3 curved slope (2X2 studs, curved at one end) as the centaur's body for quite a while. Just as I've seen many centaur leg types, I've also seen many centaur body lengths. There are some who use only the 2X3 curved slope as the body, making it 3 studs long. I think that this makes it too short, and then the centaur looks sort of top heavy. I've also seen centaur bodies that are 5 or 6 studs long. I think these look like weiner dogs (which I have coined "centaurpedes"). I think that a centaur body of 4 stud's length gives just the right visual ratio so that it looks like a...um, well... like a real centaur.
To make the centaur body, I put a 1X2 brick in front of the 2X3 curved slope and attached them by a 2X2 plate from above. (All of this is in brown.) Then I placed whatever torso I wanted on the 2X2 plate, above where the 1X2 brick is. This left an unused 1X2 plate portion just behind the base of the torso, but I figured that it could just be where the human back slopes into the horse back. (I always wondered if centaurs would have severe back trouble in that spot, since the human and horse spines would meet at 90°.) As it turns out, that 1X2 section of studs turned out to be really useful with the female centaurs who I made into archers. If you put long hair on your female LEGO people, then they're going to have to learn to live without a quiver on their back. For a humanoid minifig who's an archer this could be a problem...but not with a centaur! The quiver fits perfectly behind the human back and puts the arrows in easy reach (assuming that your archer centaur is right-handed).
Feel like making your own centaur? Here's what you'll need:
· One 2X3 curved slope (back of horse body)
· One 1X2 brick (front of horse body)
· One 2X2 plate (holds 2 horse body pieces together)
· Four Smooth Technic pin joiners (legs)
· Four 1X1 round plates (hooves)
· Four ½ Technic pins (connects legs to underside of body)
· One minifig torso & head
Brown isn't the easiest color to get these parts in, but black, white or shades of gray would be fine for horse bodies.
The whole gallery is here.
The picture of all of the centaurs together is with Aslan and the lamppost.
Enjoy!
David "Fuzzy" Gregory
