Interview with Andrew Woodman, senior design manager, Technic
Posted by Huw,
As you may recall I was privileged to attend the inaugural Fan Media Days in Billund at the beginning of June. Part of the event was the opportunity to interview various people in LEGO, including Andrew Woodman, the senior design manager for Technic.
The interview was conducted the day after the official announcement by LEGO about the Porsche gearbox, just before the model was released.
I recorded the interview on my phone so it needed to be transcribed, edited and then sent to LEGO for approval before publication. Unfortunately due to attending the Fan Weekend in Portugal the weekend after, then some family commitments, I did not get the edited transcription to LEGO until just before many staff went on holiday, which has caused a bit of delay in getting it published.
Anyway, better late than never... I hope you think it was worth the wait.
Brickset: Andrew – what do you do and how long have you worked for LEGO?
Andrew: I am the senior design manager for LEGO Technic. I have been in charge of LEGO Technic for two and a half years now and before that I was Design Manager for LEGO Legends of Chima. I started in the company 12 years ago and at first worked on the LEGO Racers theme, designing Ferraris, Lamborghinis and others.
How did you come to be a LEGO designer?
Like many of us, I built with LEGO when I was a kid and I really wanted to be a LEGO designer when I was younger. Then I discovered that making vehicles with LEGO was really cool, so then I wanted to be a vehicle designer!
So, I did everything I needed to become a vehicle designer: industrial design followed by a master’s degree in vehicle design at Royal College. When I graduated I was approached by some people from LEGO which was really amusing to me because I had wanted to be a LEGO Designer before wanting to be an automotive designer. I had just got to the point where I had graduated as an automotive designer and then LEGO approached me asking me if I wanted to be a LEGO designer so it was a little bit confusing for me at that point!
But, I really wanted to be a vehicle designer and I already had a job offer so I went off and did that for a few years. Then LEGO approached me again and said that they were recruiting once more so did I want to come and have a look. LEGO has always been a fascinating company to me so I was really flattered, so of course I came to have a look! I really enjoyed the company of the other international designers that were working here at the time, so I took the job and have ended up staying here for 12 years!
So, are you in for life?
Yes, I think I am! I know it’s a well-used term that no two days are the same but it really is the case here: It’s a job where you never know what you’re going to be doing.
Just a few years ago I was having discussions about how lions would fight crocodiles and now I’m talking to Porsche about the angle of the wing on the back of the car. With my automotive background I’m really happy being in LEGO Technic: this is the one area of LEGO that I’m absolutely in love with.
There’s been a lot of discussion about the gearbox issue of the Porsche 911 GTS R3 and we know the official line on that, so I won’t ask you about it now. I’m interested to know, however, if there’s anything you had to compromise on, in terms of not having enough time, or the right elements, or whatever?
In general, with any design project, you never have enough time to get it exactly right. If you talk to any designer anywhere, they will agree that you need a deadline in the process to force you to actually stop designing. You want to keep going up until the very last moment. I think that any LEGO designer will tell you that if they take any model off the shelf they have a way to make it better, and it will be the same with everything, there’s always a way to make something better, and I think from our side that’s really cool because if you buy like a die-cast model from a shop then that’s it, it’s pretty much fixed and you are going to have to do some pretty serious surgery to make it slightly different. But the cool thing with LEGO, especially with LEGO Technic now, is that, even with just a few of your own LEGO elements at home, you can take any of our models and modify them to be just as you want them to be, and I think that’s one of the fundamentally cool things about LEGO.
It is just amazing to see of some things fans do with our models: by the end of this week there’s probably going to be a remote controlled version of the Porsche out there and I am looking forward to seeing what people come up with and hopefully meeting some of them, because they take such pride in their creations. It really amplifies the pride that we feel when we create the models here. We love to see other people making their version of them - it’s just really cool!
When you designed the model, I understand you worked closely with Porsche. Was it primarily the cosmetic aspects of it that they were interested in?
Absolutely not! Porsche take pride themselves on the engineering quality and the technical solutions that they come with. They are the inventors of so many technologies that we take for granted and they’re really amazing at coming up with technical solutions. So when we sat down with them at the beginning and talked about doing this project, it was very much about LEGO and Porsche working together. Then when we got past that stage we realised we were actually very cool partners because we have a lot of similarities in the way that we work and the things that we appreciate.
The first thing we discussed was what model it should be, although I think it was clear to us both that it should be a 911 because of its iconic status. Everybody knows what it is from looking at the shape, whether they like cars or not. So then it was a case of sitting down with Porsche and discussing their product plans and being told some really cool information about what was coming next: before the world knew about the 911 GTS R3 we were talking to them about making a model of it.
We sat down with their design team and engineers and discussed what functions the model should have, because of course this is LEGO Technic so we want to make sure we have a functional level to it: it’s not just about the way it looks. We wanted to make sure we capture the cool functions that are important to Porsche and which will make a really great experience for our fans to build. Not only should it look unmistakably like a Porsche but it should also incorporate all the relevant functionality you find in a Porsche.
Once the model is built much of the mechanics are hidden away and it’s been suggested by some that it should have had a removable body, or transparent panels or something so you can see them. Is this something you considered?
Yes, we did talk about that a lot because that was one of the first questions we asked Porsche when we saw the car was “Where’s the engine?” because when you open the back of the car you pretty much just see two big fans. What we thought, though, was that it’s the process of building it and that pride of knowing that it’s there that’s important.
We put a lot of thought into the build process, whereby you build the whole of the drive train and if you like you could leave it like that and it will work as you’d expect. The next step is to build the frame of the vehicle separately before joining the two parts together just like on the real production line: a ‘marriage’ they call it.
You can’t see everything that’s going on in the real car but you know that there’s some quality engineering inside that gives you its performance: that’s what we wanted to capture.
One more question about the Porsche before we move on: some people wondered if you considered making the model purple, which is another colour the real car comes in?
Yes, we did. I like that colour and I think it’s safe to say that orange is the colour that we’ve gone with, but that’s not to say you won’t see others.
Moving onto Technic in general. Every year you come up with new parts and lots of useful little pins and connectors and so on. How do they come about? Did you always have an identified need for them or do you think ‘wouldn’t it be nice if we had a pin with an axle on the end’ or something like that?
We have a limited number of elements that we can create each year and our designers have ‘back catalogue’ of elements that they wish they could have used last year, for example, which they bring forward for consideration this year. Every new element we make we have to make sure that it gives us possibilities for the next few years, such as a new way of building, a new way of connecting something so that you can make things smaller, or perhaps bigger. Every element that we make has a very considered need and a very considered set of parameters in terms of what we can do with it.
For example, sometimes we’ll create an element to be used over a long period of time, like the linear actuator which allows us to make many different types of motorized or mechanical movement while others are more specific for particular models.
A good example of this are the buckets on the Bucket Wheel Excavator. The model obviously needs to have a giant bucket wheel which could perhaps have used an existing element. However, we soon realised that our existing buckets are made in even numbers which suits the old style of Technic models and System models but not today’s Technic system which is built in odd numbers. So, we had an opportunity to create a bucket for incorporating into an ‘odd’ build, one which is easier to build into models, and which also perhaps gives us possibilities for future models, but at the same time gives you that cool build and that icon of the bucket wheel in this model.
So different elements come in different ways: sometimes it might just be a small connector, like you say, like this little snap with the single module beam that came about with the need to develop close building, so the closer we make our models the more need there is to connect elements right next to each other.
Right – that’s certainly been evident thing in recent years: everything gets smaller and smaller as a result of this type of element
Exactly: before we invented that element there was a certain scale you could go to, but now this part makes it easier to build really compact models and it’s become one of those elements that’s used everywhere which is a success criteria for us: we don’t want to make an element and then never use it again. But having said that, sometimes we will specifically do that, for example the big shovel that we have on the Volvo Wheel Loader, that’s the main icon of the vehicle, we absolutely need a big shovel for it. The same with the Porsche wheel rim, we will only ever use that wheel on the Porsche model.
Do you ever consider making models other than vehicles, you know clocks or orrerys or some other static model?
No, we don’t. LEGO technic is very much about authenticity, functionality and a challenging build, so we’re looking at models that meet these criteria, and of course we want to have models that look unbelievably cool on the front of the box that makes you actually want to take it off the shelf and buy it!
So, we usually end up with vehicles but I hope you’ve noticed that over the last few years we’re really pushing the boundaries. For example, we’ve produced many bulldozers over the years but we make sure that every one is different and better than the last: we don’t want to keep doing the same thing, we don’t want to keep giving you the same model and we want to push ourselves to come up with new things.
We also have a new packaging design which gives us more pictorial content which a helps us to set the scene help people understanding what the model is. So, 3 or 4 years ago we could never have produced a Bucket Wheel Excavator even if we could’ve built it, because you wouldn’t really understand what it was looking at the box. Now we can really show all the cool functions and set the scene of what the model does.
The Bucket Wheel Excavator has just under 4000 pieces, making it the largest Technic set ever. Do you think that there’s an upper limit before we start getting problems with beams bending or whatever, or will we see 10,000-piece Technic sets in the future?
I think my question in return is, do you actually want a 10,000-piece technic set?
I’m not sure! It would probably take ages to build…
Yes, that’s always the challenge because if it’s going to take somebody a long of time to sit down and to build it we need to do everything we can to make sure it’s a great building experience, provides real satisfaction and is packed with everything you want from a technic model: new interesting building, new elements, new possibilities as well as lot of the traditional aspects
I don’t believe that we’ve reached the limit of our building system yet: we have internal rules about the way we build our models and as long as we stay within those, who knows how big we can go! But, yes, this is definitely the biggest Technic box ever and the most elements ever in a Technic model so I think it will take us a while to recover!
One of the most asked questions by my community was ‘will we see the return of Technic figures?’ because they brought models to life.
Everyone seems to love those things and, yes, they did used to bring models to life didn’t they!
It’s an emotional attachment for many people, a lot of the younger kids want to imagine a figure or driver in their model. When they get older they imagine it’s them in the model, so the figure doesn’t play such an important role. But for us the figure became came quite restrictive in terms of model scale and model size. Nowadays we prefer to create models that are the right scale for our building system, so while the figure definitely has some kind of story telling aspect for the younger kids, I think the figure has had its time…
This year 3 of the 4 biggest sets are licensed, so do you think it’s becoming increasingly important to have a license attached to Technic models?
No, it’s not actually a deliberate thing at all. The bucket wheel excavator, our biggest model, is not licensed, it’s just a combination of designs that are already out there. It’s a generic type if you like, which gives us great freedom to be able to do something that’s really Technic and also come up with a cool colour scheme as well.
The Volvo EW 160 E came about a little bit by accident. We were looking to produce a new excavator because we know they’re really cool and we have new cylinders for the pneumatic system and we wanted to use those in an excavator model. But we only recently 2 years ago had an excavator on the market so, as I said earlier, we didn’t want to do the same thing again.
So we started looking at the latest innovations in excavators and at wheeled excavators, which we hadn’t done before. We looked at loads of images and the one that kept catching our eye was the Volvo because of its unique feature of the raising cab which it has because it’s a materials handling machine and it allows the driver see into containers, for example. The more we looked at it, the cooler it looked because it was so full of functionality.
Then we started laughing because we were just finishing our partnership with Volvo for the Wheel Loader and Volvo had just asked us if we could do something else together because they really enjoyed it… So, that’s how that particular licensed model came about! Originally it wasn’t going to be a licensed product but because we have a great relationship with Volvo and we know that our fans love such authenticity and our business is about authenticity, so this was another great opportunity to make a model of a real vehicle.
The Claas tractor: I really wanted the blue Technic tractor (8859) as a kid and I didn’t get one so this model is perhaps a selfish thing! I asked if we could do a tractor and one of the designers already had a sketch design from a long time ago of one with balloon tyres so we investigated the possibility of producing the large tractor tyre the model needed. We spoke to our engineers who were fantastic so we ended up with an authentic tractor tyre that we could actually mould so we made the decision that we would do the tractor. Claas is a family owned German company and their values are very much in line with ours.
And now you’re the largest tractor tyre manufacturer in the world, no doubt!
Probably! we’re already the largest wheel and tyre manufacturer in the world so I think it will be very difficult to surpass us. So now we’re going for the tractor tyre market.
Sadly, my interview time is up! Andy, it’s been great talking to you. Thanks for sharing such interesting insights.
54 likes
30 comments on this article
"LEGO technic is very much about authenticity, functionality and a challenging build"
For the record I do have 8859 and got it when it was new so I'm aging myself here.
Authenticity has never been a priority with Technic for me. It has always been about the engineering, about the moving parts and how they interact. The fact that in so many models hide this behind panels disappoints me. The Porsche is about the worse for this but it applies to most modern Technic sets too.
I would love to see them go back to the days of skeletal bodies so that you can see all the interesting moving parts in action, not just be satisfied that you used them during the build process.
Here is where I think licensed set are hurting them as they try very had to make the final model look like the licensed vehicle. But that is what the Creator line is for. Take the Claas with its excellent and complicated steering mechanism. How much of that is visible in action once the assembly is completed?
Agree. It's nice to have a mini or a beetle in the creator line, but a porsche in technic? No thanks.
^^ The question is whether it's possible at all to make sets like Claas skeletal, because they are so densely packed nowadays. Actually, Claas uses very few panels.
I agree with stet: LEGO are missing opportunities for fans to learn about mechanics, and are instead focussing on the models' appearance, creating ever more densely packed agglomerations of ABS.
The perception I get is hidden in Woodman's answer to Huw's reasonable question: "Do you ever consider making models other than vehicles, you know clocks or orrerys or some other static model?"
Allow me to edit: "No, we don’t. LEGO technic is very much about ... the box that makes you actually want to take it off the shelf and buy it!"
If Woodman & his team want to copy real vehicles, then that's their privelege, but they should also (not instead of) offer a hybrid range with Creator or City, ie static models with entertaining machinery.
Off the top of my head, I can imagine a Technic/Creator hybrid of a modular observatory, with mechanisms for rotating the dome, opening the shutters, and elevating the telescope.
Hmm.. That's this autumn's homework assignment, then...
But of course, it would be under the Creator line. There also might be an Ideas observatory somewhere down the road. Technic these days can only have so much studded stuff in it... I haven't seen more than the Volvo's arm in terms of system-only building grafted onto a Technic model. I think maybe parts of the back of 42042 were as well, I'm not sure...
The problem with other Technic items is that, given the choice between, say, a racecar and a clock, every kid would choose the racecar. Hence the proliferation of vehicles. I keep saying they should do boats and spaceships, but they're not listening...
@ PicnicBasketSam,
Oh, I don't care what label it has, whether Technic or Creator, I just think TLG are missing a trick in not producing some sort of ... transitional... range.
I concede your point about clocks and racecars, and I'll happily sign any petition that insists that LEGO produces a Technic spaceship with graceful unfolding legs and motorised radar and spring-loaded escape pods and... and...
What a depressing interview. If its not a vehicle Lego Technic aren't interested.
Boats and ships are fine as long as they are based on real boats and real spaceships. I appreciate the challenge of making something look like its real world counterpart. It makes the whole thing that much more technically challenging and rewarding from a building standpoint.
I have to agree with @Bricklunch here - when Lego, or a designer, openly admits that they only really have vehicles in mind, it does feel a bit crushing. Even the Mobile Aggregate Processing Plant alt build for the BWE was, despite being a processing plant, mobile. At the end of the day, Lego usually maintains their stance that any set has to be for the kids, so the whole idea of cars, planes, helicopters and more cars makes sense if that's what the kids want, I suppose.
Still, it was a good read, always interesting to see into the life of a Lego designer.
As a car mechanic, I most enjoy all the different vehicles Lego offers. But I echo others opinion in that focusing solely on vehicles is a real shame.
Great interview! I'm not a technic collector but I do enjoy seeing the models and experiencing them in reviews and videos and such, so this was intriguing, a great read, thanks Huw!
"Do you ever consider making models other than vehicles, you know clocks or orrerys or some other static model?"
I am planning on building a working Technic clock and am interested in seeing the 11 x 11 Circle Gear Rack first. I would like to use these parts as the basis of the clock face, and perhaps using one circle gear to drive the clock mechanism.
http://brickset.com/parts/6151167
I have never thought about an orrery, but who knows?
I will admit I was a little shocked at the 'No!' to static models. I for one would be fascinated by a working clock or other mechanical object. I also agree with the other comments; more 'Expert' models that provide a morph/transition between the Creator/Technic ranges would be good :) If Lego can sell Big Ben, then they could sell a working clock, I'm sure. Many people look at my technic models and are perhaps disappointed that they don't look as good as the brick built mini and F40 and wonder why I like technic, but then they don't get that technic is more about the mechanics and structure. I loved building the Porsche for these reasons, but I've heard a few comments that they were disappointed by the 'gaps' in the model. I suppose this is perhaps because they have been spoilt by the look of the lovely creator F40 from the year before.
As for problems between modern technic and old, have you tried to ridgedly extend part 18942 with 3743 ? Nightmare! Its possible but a right pain. As for the part on my wishlist ? 87082 but with axles on both ends rather than pins....
I agree with the comments above. To me Technic was about the engineering, not the appearance so much. To a large extent I think Technic has lost its way, and certainly the Porsche is a perfect example of that. 8868 (Airtech Claw Rig) was the peak of Technic for me. It has not been surpassed or even equalled by anything in the studless era.
8858 (Auto Engines) was a great set from the earliest days of Technics. I have fond memories of it from my childhood. I think that it would be fun to have a modern, larger version of this. And it should include various transmissions too. While it not a vehicle, it is at least vehicle related and could actually teach kids a bit about engines.
I agree with the comments about clocks and orrerys making great technic models. However, we must remember that TLG's primary audience and buyers are kids. Some kids might think a clock is really cool, but most just want to play with some new toy. I really wish TLG would make an adult serviced theme...
Would have been nice to see a question about motors, but otherwise, good stuff.
I used to build Technic models before my dark ages: I started with the 854 Go-Kart and the 8030 Universal set before moving on to the 8851 Excavator and the wonderful 8862 Backhoe Grader, among others. I always loved the way those models allowed the builder to see the inner working, even after having completed the model. Lego Technic sets taught me all about shifting gears, just from looking at photo's of sets like 853 Car Chassis and the 8865 Test Car.
The 8275 Motorized Bulldozer was the first Technic set I built after my Dark Ages (which actually ended in 1999 thanks to Star Wars Lego), but 'unfortunately' I built that set with my wife, who built the gearing and the chassis (and which sort of bored her), so I wasn't able to fully appreciate the inner working of that model. Also, the switch to mostly studless building was jarring for me, as was the incredible amount of new Technic parts.
I've since bought a few more Technic sets, and I'm currently building the Porsche GT3 (which will be a long build, considering my wife and I have a 2 1/2 month old boy). I'm still on the chassis, and I'm loving seeing it all come together, so I'm kind of dreading the part where I will be shutting out being able to see the inner workings due to the panelling. I appreciate it being a licensed set, with Porsche having a say in the way they want the set to look, but for me, Technic Lego has always been about seeing the mechanics behind the functions. I also hope the designers will pay more attention to being able to actually display the mechanics in future Technic sets.
Is this all we'll be getting from the Fan Weekend? Whatever happened to the 'full report' we were promised? :-(
I think it's obvious from what Huw said that transcription and approval for interviews takes an age, particularly with him having so much else to do, and it coming at a time when TLG didn't have a lot of staff free to approve it. I'm sure there's more to come and we just need to be patient.
Thanks Huw for posting this. I watched the videos from the other Technic "journalists" invited to Fan Media days, and this far surpasses those in terms of clarity of the question and response as well as the value of the information provided. Well done!
^ Thank you. I've seen TechnicBricks/Sariel.pl's one here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dC4euxmkvxU but at an hour long I couldn't be bothered to watch it!
For those who have expressed interest in an orrery, JK Bricksworth made a small orrery (only sun, earth, and moon) and posted a video to Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=chFF_t79qOM
Thanks for the report Huw, enjoyed the read.
It does seem that the Technic line has become as much about the look of a build instead of pure function / engineering.
One of my favourite parts of building a Tecnic set is being given some sort of basic understanding as to how it works as once it was together you could follow the function from start to finish-but with the builds becoming more complicated and then being covered up, I know what I have built but I don't always get how it works.
Also, being possibly the most engineered/ Creative line in TLG's arsenal, what surprises me the most about the Technic line is how difficult it is to buy parts from Lego themselves to modify or build your own designs. I know that they used to do parts packs and there was probably a good reason at the time for stopping but the parts catalogue has changed a lot since then.
I would like to see Lego do Direct-to-Consumer Technic sets. This could be used to open the door for things like a clock or other non-vehicular machines.
I like the idea of Direct-to-Consumer Technic sets. I wonder how big a market Technic is, compared to other themes (is Technic even a "theme"? it's more of a system, if it's not confusing to refer to it that way when we already have System itself!), and whether it could sustain D2C sets. It'd be amazing if they could use that to give us sets that wouldn't need to be constrained by the usual "Can you market it to kids and people who are buying for kids?" limits...
We get all these cool Technic sets with fancy stuff like differentials, gearboxes, pneumatics etc. But there's no explanation in written text of how it works, what it's called and its relation to the real counterparts. I really miss that.
I agree with other commenters that Technic is not about authenticity, rather it's about exposing the mechanics. Hiding everything under panels is wrong, the Porsche being the worst case.
^^ Well we did have the limited edition 41999 and that flew out the shop in no time at all. So, the demand is there...
My first, and only Technic set growing up was 8832: Roadster. I still have it and love it, but for me it's the same sort of love that I have for say...Airwolf. What an awesome show that was...when we were kids. Try to sit and watch it now? HA! It's a laugh. Don't get me wrong, I still appreciate the simplicity and transparency of 8832 just like I appreciate the stunts in Airwolf, because they were real and well beyond what would be "safety approved" today.
That said, there's no way I would pay $180 today for a 1977 piece generic looking Technic tractor. In fact, I wouldn't buy one at half the price, because I'm just not that into tractors, but I bought the CLAAS tractor yesterday. Not because of LEGO's amazing engineering feats (which let's face it, are everywhere in their lineup) no, because of how well LEGO did to mimic the real thing and how awesome the real thing is. LEGO nailed with with the look and the stance on those huge wheels/tires.
I'm hiding the build from my 3 year old son until it's complete because I want him to experience his little mind getting blown when he see's it for the first time. I just have a hard time believing he would be as pumped if it were generic looking. In his world, he's going to have a small version of a real tractor that actually functions at his fingertips. I predict many unworthy hotwheels being crushed under the massive CLAAS tires. >:)
So I'm a fan of the panels/enclosing techniques and the mimicking of the real thing in modern Technic. I like having a good solid realistic baseline already setup to work with and inspire like in the case of 8110. I can spend my time dreaming up extensions and mods rather than trying to get to the baseline. It seems to me, with many of the offerings (Porsche excluded), you could easily leave off the panels to achieve the nostalgic look and see into the inner workings of the set if you really wanted to.
A pity the question of a return to studded Technic beams wasn't addressed....that said, I expect he'd have fudged the question just as he side-stepped other questions i.e. the Technic Maxifigure, the fact the Porsche is completely covered with panels...to me, apart from the great Arocs set, Technic thesedays is a pale imitation of its former glory....the same could be said of Lego in general, its way over-priced, the boxes are rubbish and their stranglehold on the market is quite disgusting...its a pity Lego's gone down such routes, give me classic Town, Space, Castle and classic Technic any day....and while your at it, how about showing some love for Fabuland!