It looks like I'll have to be bold enough and be the first to open my own topic about an entry! I think communication is very important, and I just wanted to say a few things in response to Shannon's review.

MOC: "The Green Hell"
http://www.mocpages.com/moc.php/173579

First off Shannon, I need to say that I can't thank you enough for hosting such a wonderful contest, and as if that's not already a burden, providing a monstrous review for every single entry. I infinitely appreciate critique like this: not only is it nice to see that I've been noticed, it's also extremely helpful advice for building future creations. Now onto notes about the MOC...

Being mentioned first in your review, I'd like to make a couple of points about the yellow car. I agree, using slopes is definitely a better way to work around those strange fender pieces. I'm pretty sure that they were designed to be compatible... Anyways, with the rear end being SNOT, I had no space for such a perfect bond. And I did think of tacking a yellow 1x1 onto the rear assembly so that it builds in and covers the gap, but the rest standardly-orientated car shaved off about a third of a brick's worth in the space I needed to do so.

The "crash"... The "crash". I'm a little disappointed here with myself for being unable to display a reason for the car to crash. Originally, I had a plan in which a column of smoke would be seen seeping out of the front corner of the car's hood. Later into the car's construction, however, I found that there could be no studs on the first three segment of the hood, due to the construction of the front. Most of the space under those tiles on the hood is SNOT building out towards the nose of the car. In addition, when I just held the smoke pieces there with my hand, they looked pretty ugly and fake. You got me here, good point.

Touching on the emptiness grandstands, I like to think that all of the people jumped out of their seats to see the action. Or it could be that there's 28 more miles worth of track-front property for them :)

About the medic—let's just say that the blood-seeking paparazzi are faster than him.

As for the flags, I know, racing flags are pretty close to square. I would've loved to use the piece you suggested: I have them in black, white, checkered, even Ferrari print, yet no yellow. Like you mentioned in another review, it's about making do with what you have. I guess the advantage of the piece that I used is that their waviness adds a little motion to the scene, which was pretty hard to capture.

That's about all all have to say in response here. Again, thanks for the amazing review: it means a lot to a rookie like myself. Based on some of the other reviews that I read, I'm honored to receive so much positive feedback.

Thanks again for everything.

-Dax
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You earned it. My standards are pretty high, and lets be honest, not everyone was going to meet them. A lot of people slapped together a quick build for the heck of it -- you were playing to win. A great deal of thought went into your MOC, and it shows.


It would have been great if you could have pulled that off. I'm with you though, I've never seen or done a smoke technique I was entirely happy with. Maybe if you'd moved the car a slight bit so it had broken through a section of fence? We might still wonder why the driver lost control in the first place, but it would look more crashlike.


I thought I had even made that excuse for you myself after the line about preferring to see them fuller, but apparently a thought is all it was, and didn't make it into print. It's really personal preference -- the way you have it might be more realistic. I think minifig crowds are just fun. If there's a ready made space to squeeze a few more in, I say, why not?


Fair enough. I was thinking you could somehow make one out of a yellow 2x2 tile if you lacked the square flag piece. But I just now noodled with that for a bit myself, and decided that it didn't look right either.


Again, great scene. You should be proud.
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It seems I misinterpreted the scene then. I really thought the reason for the 'crash' was a flat tire or two. It was pretty evident in this pic http://www.mocpages.com/image_zoom.php?mocid=173579&id=/user_images/13314/12613579645
It looks like you placed the left wheels of the car on the green plate on purpose to make it look as if the right tires were flat. Obviously I was wrong. Too bad, I thought it was a great idea. :P

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Ah, so the tilt of the car made you think it was flat on the right side? That's actually a good interpretation. With these sixties cars though, anything can go wrong :)

Also, I wanted to let you know how cool your dio is! When it first came out I thought it was going to win for sure ;) Very nice concept.

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Thanks! ^^ I was really surprised how many people liked it. Of course I knew that those fighters were awesome (hehe, sorry), but the diorama was just basic to me. I didn't invent any new techniques there, nothing that hasn't been seen somewhere else before, so I didn't think that it would get that popular at all.



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