BrickFest 2009

[Bruce N H]

Post links to galleries from BrickFest 2009 in this thread. Attendees, it would also be great if you could share your impressions of the event here as well.

Bill Ward:

Here we see setting up the castle display (and John's back I think) and some of Justin Major's micro stuff.

Snowleopard


I'll add more as they appear and I see them, but please add links to any you find.

Bruce

[plums_deify]

Lemme tell ya: Having a 4:45am shift start the morning after Fest is over is a difficult thing...aiyaiyai.

So! Yes! Castle rocked, of course. The display came together quite smoothly, and was a highlight, I think, of the entire Fest.

Steve Witt's boss was the Keynote for the second night. I'm told the LEGO Store event went well.

I'll be posting photos later tonight of the display and some of the folks that were there and stopped by and said hi.

[Lewa Rocks]

I'll get my pics up as soon as I can..... and I'll try to get my cousins too....

The event was great! I loved the Castle section. Too bad it's over

[plums_deify]

Attendee Photoshoot:


Lord Doom smiles upon us!


My Flickr Gallery has more photos. More will be going up throughout the day, since these are pretty big files and I can't wait for ages. Resizing's a bit difficult right now, and since that's the only editing I'd be doing, I figured it wasn't worth it. Yay for auto-resizing.

So! Enjoy!

[wunztwice]

Pic links to my small gallery from the event. I didn't end up taking alot of photos, and some of them were on Thomas (Remyth's) camera. I was pretty tired from doing the early morning news shows (plugging BrickFest and TR-57) and the camera wasn't all that good anyways, so I apologize for the horrible pics.

[Remyth]

BrickFest was a blast this year. The castle section was one of the biggest sections and came together fairly easily. All of the pictures I took are up on Chris (wunztwice)'s flickr stream. More might come later...

Thanks for the great time to those who attended!

[Lewa Rocks]

Ok here is my pics on brickshelf.
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=376144

For flickr I reached the monthly limit of uploads but tomorrow I can add the rest.
Here is flickr anyway: http://www.flickr.com/photos/34318478@N06/ with half the pics.

I will hopefully soon get the pics my cousin took on here.

[LORD DOOM]

Hey Castlers and BrickFesters!

Three days later I finally get around to telling you what I thought of Brickfest PDX 09, I guess I just needed some time to recover from the mad blast that was the fest.
It blows my mind to bits at what a great community this is, what an astonishing assortment of individuals make what I only dreamed of as a kid come to life and take on a life all it's own. One that's filled with creativity, ingenuity and downright genius.
It was my first fest as a participant and not just a spectator and it was an experience I hope to relive over and over again in new exciting ways. I was stunned by the amount of respect everybody has for everybody else. By the overall excitement and fun that took president over the clique's and politics that plague most of humanities social circles.
Three days went by so fast as I met in the flesh and bonded with so many people who until recently were just pseudonyms and avatars. I tip my hat firstly to our orchestrator and captain, Richard (The Blue Knight) who did so much work just so we could all have fun all weekend heck he even bought me lunch. Also to Caylin (Plums Deify) who was such a welcoming spirit that I felt instantly at home from day 1. I have to give mad credit to both the Wunz bro's, Chris and Thomas who were engaging and at all times open minded and helpful. I have to say thanks to Frank Filz for providing a wealth of baseplates and MOC's to expand to our display. (BTW Frank if your reading 1. I think I may have upset the balance of your original layout intentions and for that I'm sorry I didn't realize untill I got back here and reviewed the thread that maybe you hadn't intended to share that table with me but I did appreciate it a lot and 2, I have your address and your baseplate it's on it's way home. ) I have to give a gigantic "holy smoking Moses" to Stephen who's dared to, in a mere 3 days assemble his enormous castle and transform it into a living work of art. His castle has and no doubt will continue to dwarf 99% of everything I've ever seen in my life. I have to shout out to Mike Crowley, (Count Blockula) who provided me with my favorite metal tunes when I needed them most, and mention of course how much I enjoyed the company of Tom Rafert and his lovely wife Kristen who I spent much of my time building side by side with. Great to meet such a mind as John Langrish (J1A3L5) and spend some time with him and also thanks for your contributions to the display. Lewa Rocks cool to have met ya and have another Castler in mix, think big buddy. I know there's so much more to say but then again there's always BrickCon.

Now I'm not blaming anybody(but myself,) but somebodies got my Goblin King's shoes. *pokeCaylinpoke* And yeah those were expensive kicks and he's gonna need them back.*Sigh* Eventually. No worries.

I want to thank all the vendors who scored us with great deals and trades and TLG without a doubt who contributed so much in prizes and attractions that it got all of us a little bit of attention of our own.

Aw man I don't want to leave anybody out but there were so many people so many new faces and friends it's hard to name them all. What a great time I will hope to see you all again soon.

Edit - HOW COULD I FORGET; Steve DeCraemer, is officially "A Right-On Dude" as if It were my place to give him such a title. Meeting him was an honor. Can't wait to see what insanity he's up too next. Lastly thanks to Steve and Christina our Brickfest PDX host and hostess, you are some unreasonably generous and down to earth folks and everybody appreciates your work without a doubt, all our love and support. Thanks for the great weekend.

[BreadMan]

Looks like you guys were able to pull everything together fabulously. Frank even showed up!

Seeing all the pics and reading Doom's diatribe definitely make me regret having to miss this one. Hopefully I'll be able to make it up in October, and whether I do or not you all better make it down here for BBtB!

[Lewa Rocks]

Ok update!
My Flickr now updated with all my photos.......
http://www.flickr.com/photos/34318478@N06/

And my Brickshelf
http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=376144
with mine and some of my cousins photos. He still needs to give me more (he is being lazy).

To Lord Doom:
Hey, it was great to meet you and all the Castle builders! I already do (and will continue) to think big!
It was lots of fun and everyone had great displays! The Castle layout was great!

To The Blue Knight:
Thanks for introducing me (I stink at that). I wish I could have attended the event!
To anyone who doesn't know: I was a guest visiting Brickfest.

I hope I can visit Brickcon! I just need to convince my parents.

[The Blue Knight]

Dear fellow castlers (we need to work on a cool name for ourselves),

I apologize for the delay in making a write up, I feel it incumbent on me to do so as I was the castle coordinator. Work kept me very busy right afterwards, but a sprained ankle has helped to slow me down, so here goes.

First, here is the link to my pictures on BrickShelf. Lots more to come there. http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/galle ... BlueKnight. Someone will have to PM me on the picture as a link cool thing .

Though I was the coordinator, I was also busy with other duties that kept me away from the display. Despite my lack of a strong central plan, I did have a good general idea. Evidently it was enough for the experienced attendees to run with, and the newbies to follow. Special thanks must therefore go out to Caylin Feiring and Tom and Kristin Rafert. They stepped up big time and coordinated the display during my frequent absences, and they brought some outstanding MOCs of their own. The Wunz boys were present, Chris and Thomas, it was great to see you guys again!Justin Major made some village buildings and micro scale. Frank Filz dropped his black castle and waterfront by. Steven Penuel came by with his gargantuan "Black Castle." It has grown over the last several years and included a lava flow this year!New to display, but not new to us here was Micah "Lord Doom." It was great to meet you, another Oregon castle builder. During the public hours Lewa Rocks visited with us. We certainly did miss some of the "core" group, but it turned out to be another in a growing line of great castle displays. I sure hope I didn't miss anyone, and if I did there is no slight intended. Just PM me and smack me around if I did.

Justin Major won an award for Best Vig. This was for the best building in the Pillage the Village sub-theme this year. He made a small mill packed with loads of incredible detail like a turning water wheel, a working lathe, and a table saw! The award brick was engraved Best Castle Fig, instead of Vig. Oh well, you got a rare error brick!

Tom Raftert won for his innovative tree. What other theme gives awards for foliage? His tree is simply amazing, check out the detailed pictures in my gallery. He used a brown slope plan for the trunk, giving it a very organic feel. Then came the branches, where he used technic pieces that I can't name to make a truly natural looking and very large tree.

I had a blast this time around thanks to all my old friends, and my new ones. You made this a truly memorable weekend for me. Thanks again, and we'll see you next time (if there is to be a next time )

Final sign off from BrickFest 2009, Richard

[Bruce N H]

Hey BK,

See this all about images and links in the forums.

Bruce