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Hi everyone!
This time I bring a set on the very classic and iconic Avatar: The Last Airbender. It truly is an amazing show in my eyes and a lot of others. Kids as adults. With the new live action version just having been released I wanted to go back and visit the iconic world of Avatar. I re-watched the whole series recently and had a lot of ideas to make sets of. Kyoshi Island, Ba Sing Se etc. In the end I really wanted to capture the feeling and scenes from the pilot episodes. So what suits better than Zuko’s ship and the southern water tribe village?
This build clocks in at 2991 pieces. With the ship itself being 1672 pieces.
I started off with a sketch as usual. What was new though is that Lego released one set of Zuko’s ship nearly 18 years ago. So I started, after the sketch, with building the set in Stud.io 2 to see what features they had back then and what techniques. I did keep the principle of the wedge pieces on the front and back for the narrow part. I also like to have the bigger and blockier parts in some sets like the old sets. Many new sets have so many special parts. I like the style and feel to building with classic pieces, brings me right back to when I was young.
I originally thought about building the iceberg where they found Aang, but in the end it didn’t fit with the rest. So I kept the kanu and deleted the iceberg. I did also try to make Appa, but it was hard to make him relatively small. He is also not present (on screen) when Zuko’s ship arrives and they capture Aang. So I discarded those and expanded the village instead. This made it all come together a lot more. The biggest change I made was to include some igloo’s instead of tents as in the cartoon. I think the igloo’s make more sense than tents in such a cold climate. The live action series does expand the village and make it bigger, also includes igloo’s rather than tents. In the fandom, there are descriptions of both tents and igloos being present. So I guess this is correct in some ways.
The ice wall is meant mainly as a play feature, not so much for display. It mainly serves the purpose to have the ship break it like in the cartoon to get to the village. So you really can re-create the first episodes scenes.
I think this would make an amazing set since it captures such an iconic scene and ship from a very bellowed series that many, like I, grew up with. It has a lot of details for display and many play features. To the ship I added some myself since the cartoon didn’t have a lot. Especially the backside engine, I wanted it to look very detailed and pretty for a display. Aswell as have a lot of rooms and playfeatures for younger audiences (mainly). Suiting it for adult and young fans alike. I think this would look just as amazing on a shelf as in a playful kids' hands.
Features:
Zuko’s quarters. This room is supposed to be located in the tower on the ship in reality, but I could not fit it at this scale. So now it is located underneath. It is supposed to be a storage area in reality, but that would feel boring to include just a big storage room. So I made Zuko’s room instead. It is a little bit more narrow than the series, but it includes the key features such as the 2 swords on the wall. There is also a hint at the corridor outside with the door.
A break room / rest room for the soldiers where they can eat and take a break. Since this is in more of a play scale the room isn’t that big and located where it fits.
The captain’s bridge isn’t too big but it fits a figure and maybe 2 in there. I also placed the cylindrical “thing” seen a very short time in the series.
In the animated series, Aang never gets placed in the cell on the ship before escaping. However in the live-action he did. So I included a prison cell that can be removed to be accessed from the top. The staircase leading down is also accurate in placement & direction and leads down to the prison cell.
You can also flip down the front wing / point like in the movie. I managed to make it so that 2 figures can be placed in the walkway when it is closed. Making it somewhat accurate to the series when it lowers down and Zuko and his guards walk down it to capture the Avatar.
I also included some little interior for the igloo’s. The small ones have just a bed and a little stove inside, like an individual home. The bigger one I assume is like a meeting hall (not specified in the cartoon), so I made some benches from ice and snow inside. The thought is also that you can move the fireplace inside there if you want. So it's a gathering place rather than someone's individual home.
Minifigures:
General- This is my first time figuring out how to make custom prints outside PS. So for being a first time I am very happy! I think that I managed to capture the general style of minifigures too, I think they look believable. I have not done any back prints, but I would like them all to have that on their torso.
I included 2 guards so you are able to re-create some scenes from the series. You have for example 2 guards training with Zuko on his ship when Iroh is sitting with his tea playing Pai Sho.
Zuko & Sokka would need custom hair pieces for their pony tails, and the guards a custom helmet. Other than that I think the existing pieces look good. Possibly that Iroh & Katara needs one too, but theirs work compared to the others.
Fire Nation Soldier (FNS)- They have a very distinct helmet mask, and I am not allowed to create custom parts. I do however think the old Vladek’s mask from kingdom knights II does the trick. So apart from that, I am very pleased with them. I think I captured the aesthetic of them very well and also the color scheme. I think the existing shoulder pad piece works very well with the pointy edges on the shoulders. I also gave them a skull head to hint at the white that should be on the mask.
Iroh- I gave him a more serious face. Can use an alternate face with a more happy face since I made the more serious one. He has the same arms as Zuko. He also got the more dress-like legs since he has that in the series too. I could however not add a print to them, didn’t work out. But I would like them to have some front printing.
Zuko- Probably my favorite one. I think I really captured his facial expression well and the scar too. Especially the color. His uniform looks very royal too with the gold like details. He also has a warmer brown on his cloth pieces compared to the FNS with the colder grays. I would like some details printed on his shoulder pad too but I couldn’t get that to work myself.
Katara- Really liking her too. I think her angry face looks very accurate and she has the warmer set of clothes seen in episode 1 & 2. I really like the tribal clothes she and Sokka have. I really like her shoulders with the 3 feathers on. Could also include a hood piece for her, the one like darth maul had in the 2012 advent calendar (I couldn’t import it to studio myself sadly).
Sokka- If Zuko isn’t my favorite then Sokka is. I am so so happy with his war paint face. It turned out so good. The seriousness in his face and just the menacing war paint. He also has his tribal clothes (NOTE: I am aware he is supposed to have changed clothes when he put on the war paint, however, I really like the tribal outfit and this is the only place where it is logical to give him this outfit. So I decided to combine the clothes and war paint face). I gave him an axe since his real weapon is very unique and it is hard to re-create with existing pieces.
Aang- The easiest to do imo. He has very basic clothing with his short cloth tunic being the most interesting thing. I am very happy with him even though he is quite simple. Maybe he can have an even happier face, but not sure.
All the background images have been drawn and created by myself in Procreate on an Ipad with Apple pen, like with the rest of my submissions.
A big thank you for checking it out,
Best regards,
Tobnac
By
Tobnac
Help your fellow builder by leaving your feedback based on these three criteria:
- Originality: How original is this - never seen before?
- Building Techniques: How much skill do you think the creator of this MOC has, in terms of building technique?
- Details: Express how much you like the details of the build.
Your feedback is only shown to the creator as well as yourself. It is not available for other users to see. The creator won't see your user name.