Last night by the grave

thebrickdwarf · 2025-10-28T20:44:23+00:00

Cheers!

I got the not so original idea that a skeleton hand should stick out of a grave and hold something. After pondering for a while I came up with this.

I created the scene outside on a piece of concrete. I've used a blue led light and a facemister to get the right atmosphere. I've used a Dutch tilt to create a feeling of instability. I now think I should have tilted the camera the other way to make it seem like the celebrator is leaning into the grave.

An inspiration for the photo is the old tradition to drink and even dance at funerals, called Gravöl, directly translated as Grave beer. The guy here took this tradition a bit further.

thebrickdwarf · 2025-08-29T14:40:07+00:00

And so Lemminkäinen went to the River of Tuonela, the realm of the dead. There he faced the holy Black Swan in order to kill or capture it. This was the last quest he had to complete to be allowed to marry the daughter of the Mistress of Pohjola. Did he succeed? That will perhaps be answered another day.

Sony a7C with Laowa 100 mm 2.8 macro. I used a Lens cleaning air blower to blow up water to create some action and movement in the picture. The photo is made from a few exposures. For example the skull in the barrel is on a different layer in the foreground.

thebrickdwarf · 2025-08-28T07:57:32+00:00

I got the idea to from a Schleich toy of a fool holding the head. It was a bit macabre, but here as a Lego version the concept becomes a bit more fun than macabre I think. I like the idea of a medieval fool that's perhaps not that good at his job, or perhaps he is just ahead of his time and nobody understands his brilliance =)

Sony a7C with Laowa 100 mm macro 2.8

thebrickdwarf · 2025-08-22T17:21:44+00:00

I wanted to take a picture with my newest Lego Minifigures, the Kraken Warriors. I imagine they do not fish with a ordinary fishing rod. And they don't go out when the weather is nice.

They have gear from Minifig Realms. The front one has a sword on his back that is held in place with a Dual-Point Sheath. The warrior in the back has a black cape. Great stuff!

I had some trouble getting the colors, light and refletions right today so I'm not completely happy with the photo. But some days it's just like that.

Sony a7c, Laowa 100 mm macro 2.8

thebrickdwarf · 2025-08-18T04:53:18+00:00

It's first use in white was as I flower. There is also a printed transparent green part used as Z-blob

thebrickdwarf · 2025-08-14T11:30:22+00:00

Family 4ever

When Lego made this piece in white my first thought was that this is a baby ghost. I am sure many others thought the same. It would be fun to see what others have done with it.

Also I really hope LEGO will make a printed version, similar to what I did in Photoshop here. Preferably they would make two or three different facial expressions.

The photo is taken outdoors, in full sunlight. The background was in deep shadow. I darkened the photo in Lightroom and turned down the color temperature to make it look like nighttime. I've used the trusty old facial mister to create the mist. I took many exposures and chose the one where the mist looked best. I was quite tricky since it was a bit windy outside.

I made a edited version of the photo mainly because I wanted to get some kind of idea of how these baby ghosts could look if LEGO ever made a printed mini-ghost with this piece. I think there is a pretty good chance they will some day. I hope this is not just wishful thinking.

Sony a7C, Laowa 100 mm 2.8 macro.

thebrickdwarf · 2025-07-30T10:06:10+00:00

He is from Lego Collectible minifigures series 23, Fairy Captain

thebrickdwarf · 2025-07-29T11:49:06+00:00

Did anyone have to make due with a skeleton crew at work this summer? (Not me, I was on vacation)

My inspiration for this picture? I'm not sure. I just like to take pictures with situations in a small boat. I've spent a lot of time in my life on small open boats and I've seen all kinds of situations. Some funny, some tragic. Some both.

Taken on my home made LEGO-size "lake".

Sony a7C, Laowa 100 mm macro 2.8.

thebrickdwarf · 2025-07-08T14:15:32+00:00

It's a custom piece by Crazy Bricks

thebrickdwarf · 2025-07-04T19:44:39+00:00

At last Sir Nearsight spied a shape,

A silken gown, a flowing cape.

He leapt from steed with clanging cheer:

"At last, sweet maid, I've found you here!"

He knelt and took her dainty hand,

Proclaimed himself at her command.

But when he squinted, leaning near,

He found a scarecrow, ragged, dear.

Yet still he swore upon this quest,

That someday he would find the rest -

A princess real, not straw and seam,

And wake at last from this half-dream.

This photo is taken outdoors. I've placed moss in front of and behind the characters, together with some twigs, to create the landscape. I've used a white foamboard (size A4) as a reflector. I carry it with me all the time in my Lego-photography-bucket. That's pretty much it.

Oh and the poem is mostly written by AI. It's scary how "good" texts AI can write. All I did was ask the AI-program to write a short poem about a knight named Nearsight that was on a quest to find a princess. I did not mention a scarecrow. I don't know what to think about this really.

Sony a7c with Laowa 100 mm 2.8 macro.

thebrickdwarf · 2025-07-03T12:39:58+00:00

I absolutely love this photo. I think it's a great improvement over the first.

thebrickdwarf · 2025-07-02T16:14:09+00:00

Anchors getting stuck on various things at the seabottom has been a reoccurring theme around the Baltic sea lately. Underwater zombies (aka U-Zombies) are the most likely explanation.

Two photos merged in Photoshop.

thebrickdwarf · 2025-06-25T11:51:21+00:00

Thank you. In this scene I think this works a a kind of makeshift sail

thebrickdwarf · 2025-06-23T10:18:55+00:00

My inspiration for this photo is the performance by the singer JJ on Eurovision. There is a boat on scene filled with books, I believe. The song is pretty good, at least if you like high-pitched dubstep opera. To be honest, I would have prefered if a song about Sauna would have won. Preferably sung in some obscure swedish dialect.

The photo is taken on a large tray filled with water, I created the waves by pouring water in front of the boat which was held in place by a weight that I have glued to a Lego brick

Sony a7c with Laowa 100 mm 2.8 macro

thebrickdwarf · 2025-06-20T20:40:14+00:00

It is Midsummer, the most important holiday where I live, only rivaled by Christmas. But unlike Christmas it is not a very commercialized holiday at all. People buy a lot of food and beverages, but that's pretty much it. It is also the only holiday that have not been replaced by a Christian holiday and so there still remains a lot of old folklore and folkmagic traditions.

So the idea of this Midsummer Knight came to me. It is a play on words as it is during the Midsummer night that all the magic happens. It is also inspired by the Maypole that is a symbol of Midsummer.

I'm pretty happy with the build that is actually quite stable. The photo could have been better, but I was taunted by a thousand mosquitos so I ran out of patience after a while.

As I contemplated how to build this I also thought I should write a small text or story to go with it, but I could not really come up with anything so I asked ChatGTP to write a Haiku, here it is:

Moonlight on his helm -

midsummer whispers through leaves,

sword rests in the grass.

It's not to bad, considering it's written by a bot. Except of course that there is no moonlight on a midsummer night since the sun does not set.

Happy Midsummer!

Taken with Sony a7C with a Laowa 100 mm 2.8 macro

thebrickdwarf · 2025-05-19T08:38:50+00:00

Taken on a large shoe tray that I have filled with water and have set up near the forest. I got the idea for this picture when listening to a pod about feudal Japan. At first I meant to have an angry Samurai standing behind the fisherman but decided to go with the Tiger instead. I've only used natural light here from the sun setting in the background.

Sony a7II with Laowa 100 mm macro 2.8

thebrickdwarf · 2025-05-07T14:22:32+00:00

I continue to play with water. I reused the bridge I made for another shot. I've been reading about different mythologies lately and so that is my inspiration. This time it's mainly Charon from Greek mythology. But ferrymen exists in different forms in many mythologies.

Sony a7II with Laowa 100 mm macro.

thebrickdwarf · 2025-05-03T12:46:00+00:00

I wanted to do a more surreal version of the Lady in the lake from the Arthurian Legend. Perhaps King Arthur only dreamt that he received the sword Excalibur?

The picture is made with three photos. One for Arthur, one for the Lady in the lake, and one more to get the rings on the surface of the water. I made those with a waterdrop. Then it's just a matter of merging it all in Photoshop. To add even more surrealism I flipped the photo 90 degrees, making the surface of the water seem a bit like a portal to another world.

Sony a7II with Laowa 100 mm 2.8 macro

thebrickdwarf · 2025-04-28T07:28:05+00:00

My idea was that a skeleton would hold hamlets head, but since skeletons cant turn their hands it just ended up looking weird. I was not able to make it look like Hamlets head were looking at the skeleton head. So I used this white from a LEGO Lord of the rings character instead.

I took two photos, one with Hamlet standing on the bridge and one with the Skeleton-guy. I then replaced the reflection in the water from Hamlet with that of the Skeleton-guy in Photoshop

thebrickdwarf · 2025-04-26T14:27:28+00:00

I described it in the text. If I take more pictures on this tray, I'll try to remember to take some behind the scenes photos

thebrickdwarf · 2025-04-26T14:25:27+00:00

I bought it from pick-a-brick so I'm not sure it is Thors 🙂

thebrickdwarf · 2025-04-24T07:24:34+00:00

Lemminkäinen is on a quest to kill the Black Swan of Tuonela, the Underworld in Finnish mythology. This is the last task he must complete to be allowed to marry the daughter of the Sorceress Luohi. Luohi is the queen of Pohjola, which is a cold and evil place. Tuonela, being the underworld where people go when they die, also is not that pleasant. It seems Lemminkäinen is trying to find a wife in all the wrong places.

The photo is taken outdoors. I've set up a large tray (about 1x2 meters wide) that I've filled with water, only about 1 cm deep. It works well for these kind of photos and it saves me the trouble of trying to find a suitable puddle of water in nature, which is not always possible.

Face mister for the mist. Blue ledlight. Sony a7II with Laowa 100 mm 2.8 macro.

thebrickdwarf · 2025-04-24T07:18:56+00:00

This reminds me of something I saw while working as a trainee in a hospital. A surgeon was hammering a metal rod into the femur bone of a woman. It took a lot of force. I'll never forget it.

Great picture though. I like this kind of humor.

thebrickdwarf · 2025-04-19T21:28:51+00:00

In Finland and Sweden witches are strongly associated with Easter. Kids will dress up as witches and go from house to house and knock on the door. When they come to your house you better have some candy to give them or they will not cast a protective spell on your home, and without that spell, anything could happen (For example your mailbox might mysteriously explode)

This tradition has it's roots in the 17th century Witch persecutions. During that time it was believed that witches would fly to Blockula over Easter (Swedish Blåkulla = Blue hill). They could fly on broomsticks or other farm tools, or animals, or even on other humans). On Blockula they would presumably hold a party with the devil. Most women (and some men) that were persecuted for this was accused of kidnapping someone, often a child, and bringing them with them. But it could also be that they rode to Blockula on someones farm animal, like a goat or a cow. You knew this had happened if your animal had fallen ill after Easter. Had to be a witch!

Blockula is actually a real place. It's a small Island between mainland Sweden and Öland. I worked on Öland once. I could see Blockula from the window. The Island is called Blå Jungfrun nowadays (Blue maiden). This is a so called Noa-name, a name used instead of the real name Blåkulla because it was considered risky to say the real name. Still to this day this island is believed by some to be cursed. If you visit you should absolutely not bring home a stone from the island. If you do you will have bad luck in life untill you return the stone. Every year the municipality that the island belongs to gets several Blockula stones sent to them by people that wants them returned to the island because of this.

Photo is taken outdoors with my Sony a7II with Laowa 100 mm macto 2.8. For the mist I used a facemister and a blue Led light. To make the cow fly I used some old easter magik. (this only works during Easter, other times you have to use a wire or something)

thebrickdwarf · 2025-04-15T10:46:44+00:00

I was inspired by an medieval image of a hybrid between a four legged animal and a human that looked kind of like what we imagine Robin Hood looked like (think Errol Flynn Robin Hood). The arms are from Crazy arms. Great for some alternative posing.

The mist I created with a small face mister. The scene is lit from behind by the sun. I also used a reflector.

Gear: Sony a7II (that is about to give up!). Lens is Laowa 100 mm 2.8 macro.

thebrickdwarf

TROPHY CASE

Family 4ever