Who wants a double 10K Club Interview?! Meet Baron von Barron, the creator behind both Working Canal Lock and Working Log Flume II – Redesigned + Motorised.
Please show your support, and find out more down below.
ABOUT YOURSELF
- Who are you?
Baron von Barron
- Where are you from?
Munich, Germany
- How old are you?
Born 1989
- What do you study or do for a living?
I’m a technical writer.
- What hobbies do you have?
Apart from the obvious ones, I like riding my quad, programming, and cooking.
- How and when did your interest in LEGO products come about?
It was the pretty classic way: I was given DUPLO and then later on LEGO sets as a child, and I simply continued building and playing with LEGO bricks basically ever since then.
- What is the LEGO hobby to you? What does it mean to you? How does it fit in your life? E.g. build, display, meetups, play the games or 'just' watch the cartoons.
For me, it’s just a fascinating hobby that allows me to create something completely new every single day, and it is both exiting and stress-relieving at the same time to come home from work and build something, even if it’s just a teeny-tiny build or a small detail of a bigger one.
- What is your favourite LEGO theme (current or past)? Why? And has any theme inspired your building style or preference in any particular way?
Regarding my avatar, I guess it’s pretty clear that it’s the first Adventures series from 1998, the design and storytelling of these sets was just outstanding, my younger self even wanted to become an Egyptologist for quite some time only because of this awesome theme!
- What is your favourite official LEGO set ever? Why?
This is without any doubt the Freight and Crane Railway (4565) from 1996, this set is just perfect speaking in terms of design, functionality, and playability, especially if you consider the limited parts and color palette of those days!
- What is your favourite LEGO element? Why?
It’s definitely the minifigure in general, LEGO just wouldn’t be the same to me without it, and I’m pretty sure that you won’t ever see a build of mine without minifigures – for me, they just add all the heart and soul to the little worlds we all love to build so much.
- Is there a LEGO designer (official LEGO designer or fan designer) who you are inspired by and look up to? Who and why?
There are of course many official and fan designers whose work I admire, but it would be rather unfair to emphasize now one or two in this context.
- Is there one or more particular LEGO-related websites (not official LEGO websites) that you visit often and/or are inspired by?
I regularly visit https://www.stonewars.de/, https://www.promobricks.de/, and https://zusammengebaut.com/, mostly because of their awesome set reviews, so I’d like to take the opportunity and thank them very much, these guys really do a great job!
ABOUT YOUR PROJECT - Working Canal Lock
- Where did your interest in this particular model come from?
That’s a rather funny story, because I simply don’t know where the idea initially came from; I just remember that on a Monday in February, when I headed off to work, this idea came to my mind, even though I don’t have any relations to canal locks in my environment, and I actually have never visited one in reality to this day.
- How long was the process of making the project, and what did you have to research as well? What kind of prep, research and design phases did you go through to produce your creation?
Due to the fact described above, I had to do quite some research on canal locks in general, but I started directly building parallelly, so it was always kind of a mixed progress that did not determine any clear secluded project phases, and it went like this for about two months.
- What special challenges did you face creating the model? What was the most difficult part to recreate?
Hah, I’ve initially made a big mistake by starting the base layout in a way too big scale, but this I discovered just once half of the build was already done, so I had to start everything over again in the current scale; however, for both scales, the by far most difficult part was surely the design of the drivetrain with the transmission and all its connections which had to be embedded practically invisibly into the scenery.
- If you could talk to yourself before you started on this project, what would you tell them? What do you know now that you wish you knew then?
As per the question above, I definitely would have told myself to think about for at least three seconds longer if the originally intended scale could not be indeed a little bit too big for the parts maximum, and that it would be really a shame if I have to purge everything halfway to start over again at a smaller scale – but of course, you're always wiser afterwards.
- How long did it take to complete the model? Did you finish it fairly quickly, or did it take a long time? And how did the build time compare to the time you spent promoting your Product Idea to reach 10,000 supporters?
As said, completing the idea took about two months, but since I’m not active on most social media platforms, there was not that much of promotion time, I’ve just told friends and family about it, uploaded it to reddit, and that was it.
- How did it feel when you reached the magic 10,000 votes and how long did it take?
If I’m not mistaken, it took 205 days and was for sure an awesome feeling and a very big relieve after I saw that it had finally achieved enough support – that’s why I like to express once again heartfelt thanks to everyone who supported and commented it!
- Approximately how many LEGO bricks did you use to create your model?
2999
- What is your favourite building technique or part/section that you’ve incorporated into your Product Idea?
Well, I don’t want to practice any self-praise at all, but I like the rear end of the build with the optionally motorizable central steering unit the most as it provides kind of a playability increasement that is not visible at first sight – so that was at least my intention.
- If you built your model digitally, what software did you use to build and render your model?
Studio 2.0
- If you used custom stickers or prints for your design, how did you create them or where did you get them?
I’ve created the labels with GIMP and applied them with PartDesigner.
ABOUT YOUR PROJECT - Working Log Flume II – Redesigned + Motorised
- Where did your interest in this particular model come from?
I’ve already submitted a working log flume idea in 2022, which was unfortunately not approved by the review board, and ever since then, it kept preying on my mind a little bit, so I finally analyzed all its flaws, and came to the conclusion that it was worth another shot, but with a completely different concept – heartfelt thanks to everybody who helped me improve things by commenting on the issues the first version had, I hope I did not disappoint you with the redesigned one!
- How long was the process of making the project, and what did you have to research as well? What kind of prep, research and design phases did you go through to produce your creation?
I simply started by re-reading every single feedback I’ve received on the first version, then contemplated on how to improve the valid critic points, and once I’ve finally decided to go for the native roller coaster elements as base drive concept, I just started building; overall, it took roundabout a month.
- What special challenges did you face creating the model? What was the most difficult part to recreate?
The most difficult part was definitely getting all the angles and connections right for the wanted at least rather smooth surfaces of the track, and the drivetrain in the boarding platform was also quite challenging, because I wanted to have it as small as possible to be able to embed it somehow naturally into the station.
- If you could talk to yourself before you started on this project, what would you tell them? What do you know now that you wish you knew then?
Well, since it’s already kind of a revision project, there weren’t that much struggles compared to creating a completely new idea; however, looking back, I guess I should have simply used a calculator for getting all the right angles of the casing instead of just messing around by trial and error, that would have been most likely way faster.
- How long did it take to complete the model? Did you finish it fairly quickly, or did it take a long time? And how did the build time compare to the time you spent promoting your Product Idea to reach 10,000 supporters?
As said, completing the idea took about a month, but since I’m not active on most social media platforms, there was not that much of promotion time, I’ve just told friends and family about it, uploaded it to reddit, and that was it.
- How did it feel when you reached the magic 10,000 votes and how long did it take?
It took 137 days and was of course just wonderful and such a big relief, I really had my doubts mid-way that people will support a log flume again, because despite being a technically totally different execution, it’s basically the same idea in general as last time – luckily that was quite unsubstantiated, heartfelt thanks again to everybody who helped getting it to 10K!
- Approximately how many LEGO bricks did you use to create your model?
3000
- What is your favourite building technique or part/section that you’ve incorporated into your Product Idea?
I kind of like the spring-loaded drive rolls, as I at least hope this to be a more sustainable solution than just using rubber bands, which may wear out over time, and I also like the swordfish on the top of the ticket booth, but enough of the self-praise now!
- If you built your model digitally, what software did you use to build and render your model?
Studio 2.0
- If you used custom stickers or prints for your design, how did you create them or where did you get them?
I’ve created the labels with GIMP and applied them with PartDesigner.
ABOUT LEGO IDEAS
- Do you have any useful advice about creating a successful LEGO Ideas project?
Well, I’m really not that good at anticipating which ideas have success and which not, and this goes both for my own ideas as well as for others, but I guess a fine main image is obviously one of the keys, and if you do have social media, I suspect that it’s wise to use them for promotion too, but that’s just my impression from the outside; apart from that, the subject of the idea itself is definitely a crucial, yet also a critical factor, because I guess it must not be too simple or commonly known, but also not too complex or niche, and the technical execution matters too of course.
- What (if any) methods did you use to advertise and attract support to your Product Idea?
As per above, I’ve just told friends and family about it and uploaded it to reddit, I don’t use the other social media platforms, and I also did no advertisement on LEGO blogs, forums, fairs or something like that.
- What is your favourite LEGO Ideas Product Idea (besides your own of course)? Are there any Product Ideas you think have been overlooked?
Like for the question on the favorite designers, I normally would prefer not to emphasize anybody due to fairness reasons, but this time, I’m sorry, I just have to as I think that both of the current builds of @_MrB_ are indeed shamefully overlooked – his little stories of the clumsy assistant, embedded in completely alternating contexts are just incomparable funny and outstanding for this platform, so here they are:
https://ideas.lego.com/projects/b3ae6d12-4b9c-4e0b-839a-d8fb3306f485
https://ideas.lego.com/projects/a03fdc3e-91ff-47d4-82c6-49ca74d08d58
- What is it about the platform that attracts you? What tips would you give to anyone who is thinking about uploading an idea?
Besides its unparalleled variety of LEGO creations and the really lovely community, it’s foremost its basic principle that anybody has the equitable chance to propose LEGO their ideas, no matter their background, and that’s just wonderful – and only one tip about uploading an idea: just do it!
- Do you have plans to submit any other Product Ideas in the future? If yes, can you give us a hint what that might be?
Yes of course, I don’t know when this interview will be published, but the time I’m writing these lines, I’m actually working on two new ideas, and as always, they will be builds in minifigure scale that deal with rather technical topics.
By
JacobM366