PROCEDURAL / LEGO® Construction Animal Logic Logo

The Animal Logic logo, recreated in LEGO bricks structure using Blender.

I have a bit of time so I feel like doing another little fun project in Blender.

I decided to touch on LEGO® and I will be using the "Animal Logic" logo because of 2 personal reasons:

1. Animal Logic is currently working on LEGO feature film for next year release. I actually nearly got chance to work on it (was interviewed), unfortunately I did not get it. Perhaps I did not have enough experience and they also need artist with skill in Softimage. An "awesome reel" and "many years of experience in commercial industry" help you get in. I guess opportunity will arise again in the future. Always have positive thinking. Keep refining the skill, make your own projects.
2. Animal Logic logo is apparently simple and nice to recreate (to model) using just Blender Skin Modifier technique. The logo seems to be based on elephant or mammoth animal creature. Animal Logic logo: http://goo.gl/SDi2W

NOTE: In case you might not know, Animal Logic is one of big and top CG VFX studios in Australia.

Anyways, I thought I might create something in Blender to blend those two inspirations (LEGO and Animal Logic experience). Also I kind of always wanted to do this kind of LEGO structure after I saw Nathan Sawaya's LEGO Bricks works.
http://brickartist.com/

That Nathan Sawaya creates the LEGO Art manually and painstackingly, spending his hundred of hours to build a structure using real LEGO bricks. We are 3D artists, so we can build the LEGO structure using mouse and personal computer and Blender, and then print it out, maybe.

PROCEDURAL LEGO BRICKS

Here is a Python code that gives you a simple LEGO brick from Blender Artist named CCLDESTY:
http://www.blender.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=18934&sid=b8993d9226716d562bd39c7a2ec99730

There is also this video by David Miller that shows you a more clever way to generate LEGO bricks more procedurally. It utilizes Shape Keys and Drivers and a bit of Python. This video tutorial is actually really clever and unusual, I highly recommend you to study this:
https://vimeo.com/40389198

So, either use that "create LEGO brick" script or do a little bit of modeling of LEGO brick yourself and do that procedural setup to get different shapes of LEGO brick pieces.

For our purpose, just a single square generic LEGO bricks is enough. I use the Python script above actually.

This is the basic LEGO brick created using Python code.

PROCEDURAL LEGO ARRANGEMENT

You probably already know how to do this if you have been following Blender Sushi postings. You can search topic such as "Voxel" and "Particle Instancing". I repeated same techniques multiple time.

Basically, we will be using Remesh Modifier to instantly get the voxelated or blocky structures. That part is very easy as we have learned that in the past.

Before we get to Remesh step, we of course needs our 3D mesh first, kind of shapes that resembles something. It can be letter, can be anything, any 3D object.

For this particular example, I am using Animal Logic logo. And for that I am using Skin Modifier. I simply draw the line to match the logo and let Skin Modifier do the job of meshing.

I love Skin Modifier, as you can tell.

Got the mesh and then we can "brickify" it using Remesh Modifier.

Once we got our blocky mesh structure, we simply "instance" some LEGO bricks into every vertices.

Ok, I was kind of explaining the whole process in reverse, so to summarize everything again in order, the process is like this:
1. Create the 3D mesh shapes that you want to be LEGO-fied. The shape can be from anything, maybe you can even just use the 3D shape created using 123DCatch.
2. Apply Remesh Modifier (as Blocks). Adjust settings to your liking. Whether you want the LEGO structure to have more details, or simpler.
3. Instance some random LEGO blocks into every vertices using Blender Particles and Instancing method.
4. Render it out nicely. Or 3D print if you like.

NOTE:

• Remesh modifier will create blocky structure that is 1:1 ratio or perfectly cube. LEGO bricks does not always come as perfect cube. If your LEGO bricks is indeed is in different ratio, the trick is then to first Scale your Mesh up or down in attempt to have a final result that fits the LEGO bricks.
• You realize that the resulting LEGO structure created this way will be slightly thicker or fatter from original block mesh, so take that into consideration. You may want to slightly shrink your mesh before you turn them into block structure.

That is it, very SIMPLE and SUPER EASY way to create a random (random LEGO brick color) or single coloured brick LEGO structure using Blender!

What is next? Maybe some procedural LEGO Characters, that should be fun.

ADVANCE: TO COLOR PARTICLE INSTANCE OBJECTS VIA UV TEXTURE?

Here is slightly more tricky. What if, instead of having randomly colored Instance LEGO bricks, we want a color that is more controlled, maybe via UV texture or via Color Vertex Paint. Is this possible?

Well, I think at the moment, since there is a slight gap between Blender Particles and especially in relation to how it got linked to the Material of Instances, there is no easy way to achieve this.

I though that maybe Particle Info Node for Blender Cycles will be the answer. But maybe not yet. I could be wrong.

Or maybe by using Dynamic Paint method? Dynamic Paint method is nice, we can paint it in realtime, but it is probably going to be heavy for Blender. Dynamic Paint does its paints based on Vertex.

In our case, we simply want to transfer color information from UV texture into instances. You may be only able to do this using Python script.

Another way is to fake it using Texture Baking. The result maybe a little bit dirty though (similar to what I previously did when I touch on "3D Voxel").

Erik from Happy Feet Two.

However, if you do know the answer, please let me know. I have been looking for ways to "color" or assign Materials based on certain "property".

The idea is to transfer UV TEXTURE COLOR information into every VERTICES of the mesh, which then Particle Instances will be born and created on that position and then coloured accordingly. I am sure there is a clever hack to do this in Blender.

The easiest way to do this by far is using Houdini (another 3D package). I think one day, it will be easy to do this using Blender Particles Node System.

ANYHOW, keep your LEGO structure simple. Sometimes a single colored LEGO is enough and nothing wrong by using all kind of random colored LEGO brick to get the design you like.

Probably add little mini figure from HUMEDIASTUDIOS:
http://www.blendswap.com/blends/scenes/lego-minifigure/

SIMPLE BUILD UP ANIMATION

ADDENDUM 2012.11.18

http://www.kellbot.com/2010/05/from-polygons-to-voxels-to-lego-a-utah-teapot/
http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Extensions:2.4/Py/Scripts/Add/Cells_v1.2

ILP (Important Looking Pirates) Voxel Advertisement
https://vimeo.com/61357044